Reformist Gains in Kuwaiti Vote

[Posteritatis]

BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5131558.stm

Kuwaiti reformists campaigning on an anti-corruption platform, some of them Islamists, have made strong gains in parliamentary elections.

But women, who were voting and standing for the first time, have failed to win any seats.

. . .

State media reported a turnout of up to 78% in some voting centres.

Not much, by our standards, but it's more than was there five or ten years ago - and probably less than will be there five or ten years hence. This sort of thing can actually happen without the glorious, glorious instruction of the United States military.

I try not to editorialize too much on news posts - but it took "us" (as in "western civ" in general) more than seven hundred years to get our own democracy to something we'd recognize today as appropriately universal. If another country starts on that road and is going to take fifty years to get there instead, do I really have room to complain about how long they're taking?