Bud Talkinghorn: Iraqi Voters 1--Naysayers 0

The success of the Iraqi elections must be causing severe gnashing of teeth in far-flung left-wing circles. Allison Smith of CBC had to use tape to paste on a smile when she announced the news. Needless to say that good news was immediately followed by a 'poison sandwich' of "yes-buts". John Kerry even went so far as to suggest that the Iraqis would pay dearly for this. When it comes to direct American action to promote democracy, versus a series of worthless UN "resolutions", the latter always wins in liberal circles.

Are there future problems in Iraq? You bet there are. The deadender Baathists and the death cult jihadis have no future, so they will go on terrorizing, until they are relentlessly hunted down and destroyed -- but, with a legally-elected government, their claims to legitimacy grow more feeble. If the Shia and Kurds extend an invitation to the Sunnis to help rebuild Iraq, the terrorists will become marginalized. Of course, we can never underestimate the centuries-old grudges and claims to religious 'purity' that each group harbours. Perhaps it will become another anarchic country like much of Africa. Still, I believe that, once people get the taste of freedom, it will be hard to reintroduce totalitarianism. What sane people would want the uterly mad rule of a Saddam Baathist regime again? A regime that makes the number dead in the current violence seem picayune in comparison to the million and a half dead under Saddam's rule.

Perhaps the most galling aspect of the left's criticism is their demand for instant improvements Are the supposedly astute writers of The Toronto Star or The NY Times unable to remember the rocky road that democracy took in America? This was a democracy that was founded in bloodshed, continued slavery for the next 80 years, and only ended that abominable institution through a viscious civil war. That war killed more Americans per capita then all the wars they have fought since then. Yet the naysayers expect the peaceable kingdom to immediately arise in a long brutalized country. If this crowd were around during D-Day in Normandy, they would have probably opposed the operation.

© Bud Talkinghorn--Let us rejoice at Iraq's first baby steps. Sure, it may fall down, but it will get back up.