Because Free Elections Aren't Free

YRHT posted about this, citing America Blog and The New Yorker. Short version: in yet another not-surprising-at-all revelation, Team Bush looked at the election problem in Iraq (the problem being the possibility that Iraqis would be, ahem, too democratic and elect candidates who appealed to THEM, instead of Bush approved slate) and responded...by throwing money at it--covertly, and, quite possibly, illegally.

In what's becoming a whole new way of "restoring dignity" to Washington, administration officials are busily engaged in the latest DC fad: parsing, noting that "no individuals received funds, but declining to confirm or deny that money was passed around to political parties."

The idea behind the plan was to avoid the very real possibility of an electoral embarrassment, i.e., supermajority of Shi'a delegates, and to that extent it succeeded. As for the money itself, well, some went to fund a media blitz for Iyad Allawi--while some apparently went for more direct influence, i.e., it funded direct fraud.

Allawi's organization ended up doing better than expected, although it ended up ranking a distant third in the voting outcome...but considering just how bad Iraq IS, a few crumbs are better than no slice whatsoever. Still, as Oyster notes, supporting "democracy" via fraud isn't exactly democratic. To use a different metaphor, it's like fucking for virginity.

Of course, it could be that the United States, contrary to Mr. Bush's oft repeated claims, doesn't give a shit about anything resembling democracy in Iraq. For instance, Today in Iraq links to this article written by Tom Fox, who recently returned from the country, and notes a bit of white man's burden--and its corollary, western disdain--for Iraqis themselves:

Having grown up the Southern U.S. and having a very racist father, it was a very bizarre experience hearing almost the same comments being made against Iraqis that I heard as a child being made against blacks. The same venom, for lack of a better word, was coming out of their mouths as they denigrated the people, culture and societal norms of Iraq.

Equally disturbing for me was the colonialist attitude of most of the business- connected internationals (most of the contractors I talked to were South African or English and most of the businessmen were American and all except one were white males). Remarks like, "We have to show them how it's really done", or "They don't have a clue how it's done in the West". There seemed, to me at least, to be no attempt at understanding, much less respecting, the culture of the people they ostensibly are here to work in partnership with.

I have to assume the racist attitudes of the security contractors stems from the necessity for a human being to dehumanize and marginalize another human being in order to kill them. Dehumanization is a mind game military-leaders the world over have used to indoctrinate recruits with and it also seems to be the case with these mercenary soldiers.

The colonialist attitudes are harder to grasp. Is colonialism something unique to white, male Westerners? (And I include myself in this category.) Do we see Iraq the same way as Kipling saw India, that of being "the white man's burden" to bring Western civilization to the uncivilized Arabs and Kurds?

The degree of disdain is evident to anyone who's been following the Iraqi debacle. Combined with an almost complete ignorance of the country, a naiive belief in every shred of this administration's propaganda (and, let's be fair, the previous administration's as well), and a total denial of anything other than a Disneyesque outcome to the entire sorry operation--the latter point STILL being front and center to the wingnut argument...as if we can still salvage a victory there because, after all, "they LOVE us! Of course they love us!"--we've managed to spill gallons of blood and waste billions of dollars for...rigged elections that make old-style Louisiana politics look like the Jeffersonian ideal AND the almost certain eventuality of civil war, followed by some degree of Islamic theocracy (oh, and we'll not even get a T-shirt out of it).

Wow--what a bargain.