72% Voter Turnout in Iraq

by Elsewhere 91 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  xenawarrior

  But PLEASE people, you look stupid throwing around 72% as if that has a basis in reality. Please stop, lest ye start wearing the pompoms of the Geraldo Rivera class.

  You won't have any semi-reliable figures for a few days. BBC reported 60%. Then came back and clarified; 60% is the number that potentially could have voted. That.is.not.news.

  So you are saying that we won't have reliable figures for several days but the ones from one place are bogus and the ones you have aren't and we look stupid? If you are going to go around calling others based on intelligence- at least make sure you are qualified to do so Sixy. You are acting like a jerk. But I guess that's okay for you.
• 

  bisous

  Yeah, I'm following you.
• 

  xenawarrior

  back attcha- btw- I also made a post on another board in the meantime -damn- I must type like 400 wpm and read even faster!
• 

  bisous

  By the way, I just saw the Secretary Puppet Condapleeza tell Wolf Blitzer that "it will be some time before we can determine the voter turn out, after all it even takes some time here in the US" and that turnout "is much lower in Sunni areas, given the level of threats and intimidation".

  Now her lips moved and these words came out. Should I believe them? or not?
• 

  observador

  In Brazil, the turnout is 99% !!!!!

  Voting is mandatory.

  Would anyone know if in Iraq is like that too?
• 

  Preston

  Six is right, it is just above 60%, still good considering all the people who were risking their lives. I would still be curious to see what percentage were over-seas ballots.

  http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/MAR055907.htm

  The voting issue is a moot point for me, anything can possibly be better than what the Iraqi people had to endure a few short years ago when they were forced to celebrate not just a 100 percent national vote for Sadam Hussein, the sole candidate in a presidential referendum, but a 100% turnout as well. What's it like to endure such a sadomasochistic ritual? I'm sure some of you can relate to the continually reinforced and inhumane notion that 100% attendance was to be expected lest we were to be viewed as good as dead at Armageddon

  My guess is that there are two ways in surviving such a system to self-respect.

  One is the mafia syndrome where you play along with the local bosses and learn a shitty way to smile....

  or

  The stockholm syndrome where you take a tiny consolation out of the security the boss can provide.

  Either way is rediculous, there is not a single person on this board who can convince me that what the Iraqi people have right now politically is not better than what they had before. Besides, Iraq has their own Green Party now, who knows, maybe they'll pass Kyoto earlier than we will..... I certainly hope so.

  - Preston
• 

  SixofNine

  :So you are saying that we won't have reliable figures for several days but the ones from one place are bogus and the ones you have aren't and we look stupid?

  Yep, I'm saying you look stooopid chearleading an obviously "baghdad bob" statement with an outrageously high number. No, I didn't say I had any figures. What, did you see that I said something about BBC and your brain shut down because BBC isn't 'merkin? Read till understood. Jerkette.

  :Six is right, it is just above 60%, still good considering all the people who were risking their lives. I would still be curious to see what percentage were over-seas ballots.

  Actually, I did not say that. I'll be surprised if when all is said and done, the turnout is more than 20%, though I hope I'm wrong.

  Here in America, where there is actually a chance that the numbers are somewhat accurate this soon, it was reported that 92% of American Iraqi Expats did NOT vote. But we're going to have Iraqi's risking their lives to vote for a slate of people they know little to nothing about, brought to them by a occupying force they at best dislike, at worst hate, in numbers of 72%? Or even 60%? I don't think so.
• 

  Double Edge

  Here in America, where there is actually a chance that the numbers are somewhat accurate this soon, it was reported that 92% of American Iraqi Expats did NOT vote.

  That's because they've already become "Americanized" and freedom is taken for granted. For some, the attitude becomes - if the weather's bad, why bother.

  But we're going to have Iraqi's risking their lives to vote for a slate of people they know little to nothing about, brought to them by a occupying force they at best dislike, at worst hate, in numbers of 72%? Or even 60%? I don't think so.

  Compared to when, under Saddam, voting was mandatory and there was only one candidate to vote for...Saddam.
• 

  heathen

  Oh they probly only promised the people extra food rations or some clean water for a change if they go and vote . The candidates no doubt being hand picked by GWB . Yeppers that's quite a democracy they have going there. I don't forget either that HITLER was also elected by a popular vote .
• 

  Double Edge

  Oh they probly only promised the people extra food rations or some clean water for a change if they go and vote .

  Yeah, right... like that would entice anyone putting their life on the line.

  The candidates no doubt being hand picked by GWB .

  uhhh, is that even worthy of a response. If you've watched the news, you'd see that a lot of the candidates running, and their parties are anti-american and want the americans out.

  I don't forget either that HITLER was also elected by a popular vote .

  WRONG. Hitler NEVER had a majority vote....

  In the May 5 elections of 1932, Hindenburg defeated Hitler 53% to 37% for the presidency, but there was no majority in the Reichstag for any party; in the July31 elections the Nazis won 230 seats with 37% of the vote and became the largest German party, but dropped to 33% in the Nov. 6 elections; Dec. 1, Kurt von Schleicher replaced Franz von Papen as Chancellor but instability increased.
  
  Hitler made Chancellor Jan. 30, 1933, with the help of von Papen, and sought revision of Versailles system by immediately beginning a rearmament program with the support of industrialists such as Alfred Hugenberg and Gustav Krupp (who by April agreed to remove Jewish workers from his factories), and a public works program announced at the Feb. 11 International Automobile and Motor-Cycle Exhibition in Berlin, to build autobahns with 600,000 workers and make a Volksauto for less than 1000 marks.
  
  In the March 5, 1933 elections, the National Socialist German Workers' Party won 43.9% and 288 of 647 seats in the Reichstag.
  
  The Malicious Practices Act of March 21, 1933, began the mass arrests of communists and socialists, the Dauchau concentration camp was set up March 22 in a former powder milk plant, the Enabling Act March 23 made Hitler dictator and eliminated other parties such as the pro-Catholic Zentrum, radical books were burned May 10.