Reading this article on the outcome of Iraq's election one can not but help see how religion played and import role in the elections in the US and Iraq and their mirrored outcomes.
Allawi and Kerry both failed to stem the tide of radical fundamentalists.
What is amazing is that this administration with it's Fundamental Christians are up in arms about Iraq having a religous government while at the same time here is the US we are headed towards a militarized theocracy. While we fight to take children out of Madras schools in the ME we are fighting to put churches in our classrooms.
It seems to me the very reasons why this is a very bad thing to do in Iraq is the very same resaons why it is objectionable in the US.
What has happened though in the US and is mirrored in Iraq is that the extremist have taken over and pushed the moderates out.
It was a dynamic that Allawi did not see until it was too late, he added.
Allawi's campaign also made some tactical errors. He campaigned mainly using TV, for example, although erratic power supplies and poverty made it impossible for many Iraqis, especially in the Shiite south, to watch TV. The Shiite faithful often got their news and commentary about politics from their mosques - not places where Allawi, who lives in the American-patrolled Green Zone behind massive concrete walls and American tanks, had much visibility.
For that matter, when Allawi cast his vote, he wore a navy blazer and khaki pants that would not have looked out of place at a U.S. country club brunch. Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the man in the top slot of the Alliance's list, cast his vote wearing a cleric's robe and black turban denoting his lineage to the prophet Mohammed.
As interim prime minister, Allawi gave the green light for U.S. troops to roll into the holy Shiite Muslim cities of Najaf and Karbala. He did the same, without apology, to the Sunni towns of Samarra and Fallujah.
"He represented powerful authority over the people, but not WITH the people," said Amer Fayadh, a political science professor at Baghdad University and a political candidate on a secular list of technocrats.
"Allawi's government hit Najaf, Karbala, Fallujah and Sadr City. And through those offensives he lost his credibility among the people."
As rumors of his disappointing performance seeped out this week, Allawi and his staff became hard for reporters to find. They turned off their cell phones.
Hussein al-Sadr, a candidate on Allawi's list, sounded bitter when asked about the Alliance's progress.
"Those who voted for Allawi list are the intellectual and educated people," he said. "The majority of the naive and simple people voted for UIA because they were under the influence of (clerics)."
Boy, this sure is beginning to look like a Holy War
yeah, on the screen is a picture of Jesus on the cross
Going to church is not what it used to be