Maybe it's just me -- but I think those elections happened just a

[onecent]

bit tooo quiet....I mean, those people will blow THEMSELVES up for ALOT LESS than someone trying to change their laws....so is it too quiet on the iraq front?

[BrklynLiberal]

1. They have totally stopped ALL traffic in the entire country.

All the polling places are surrounded in barbed wire and soldiers.
I am sure that the destruction will start up again as soon as the soldiers move back to their camps.

[ynksnewyork2]

2. Unprecedented security

It was like being home in Israel. Police, soldiers and guns everywhere.
It's actually a false sense of security! At least in israel it was. Things would be very quiet and safe for a day or two. People would venture out more and become a little more complacent. Then, BAM! The terrorists, insurgents (whatever you call them) were back with a vengenance, more brutal and catastrophic than before. I'm betting their sitting back, watching TV and plotting a vicious attack. They've also stopped all auto traffic, so it cuts down on car bombs, ambushes etc. I hope I'm wrong, but I think this quiet is just a ruse.

[Djinn]

3. quiet??

US operation centers in Baquba, some 65 km northeast of Baghdad attacked

bomb exploded targeting a car ferrying Sunni Muslims to polling stations south of Baghdad, killing at least three and wounding several others, police said.

Schools taken for polling centers targeted by mortars in Baiji and A Katyusha rocket fell on a military base in Baladand an oil pipeline from Kirkuk to Baiji was blown up.

A mortar struck a voting center in Baghdad's Shiite slum of Sadr City Sunday, killing at least four voters.

A suicide car bomber hit a polling station in western Baghdad shortly after the beginning of the poll, killing a policeman and wounding two Iraqi soldiers and two civilians outside Zahraa School.

In Ramadi, fierce clashes erupted when insurgents attacked theUS and Iraqi forces who called on the people of the city to head topolling stations to vote.

Three voting stations in Qaim near the Syrian border were also attacked.In Baquba, about 50 km northeast of Baghdad, explosions were heard as voters went for the poll. To the south, a bomb exploded ata polling station in central Basra.

amonst other violence.

Hoping you were being sarcastic with the "those people will blow THEMSELVES up for ALOT LESS"

[wadestock]

4. Quiet before the storm

Come on.
Be real.
Holding elections doesn't mean squat.

It was a foregone conclusion the Shia would win...and now the election results, after the hype calms...will suddenly look as if it's a fix by the US.

The only way to intelligently care about these people would have been to find a way for the Shia and the Sunni to have some means of governance that was mutually beneficial.

Keep in mind this administration thinks of these people as barbarians and that the only reason we're in this is because of their business interests.

[LunaC]

5. How many of those that were "elected"

will live to the end of the year?

And I sure as hell wouldn't want to be walking around with a blue finger in Iraq these days......maybe not as effective as a bullseye on the forehead but a (ahem) dead giveaway nonetheless.

[ban-one]

6. elections are BS

You put up with 4 years of bush's "presidency" and you haven't figured out that the Iraq elections were completely bogus and that bush already selected a president of Iraq already.
you should know by now that what bush does is just an act and is completely meaningless to anyone who isn't giving him money.
those elections back in november. total bs. probably some scam to get names of people who didn't vote for him so he knows who to take away to camps. the iraq elections. total bs. made up so when an innocent Iraqi was killed, he can say it was an terrist that did it.