From his attention-grabbing headline -- "Iraqi Voting Disrupts News Reports of Bombings" -- to his story's first sentence: "News reports of terrorist bombings in Iraq were marred Sunday by shocking graphic images of Iraqi "insurgents" voting by the millions in their first free democratic election," Scott Ott gets it.
Remember when Beirut was the hot place, and we had Marines there, trying to protect Beirut International Airport and keep it open? I was one of those Marines, and I felt reasonably safe most of the time, given that I was armed, and in the company of over a thousand of my fellow Marines, all of whom were similarly armed. But most Beirutis were not Marines, nor were they members of the PLO, the Amal, the Syrian or Israeli armies, or any of the numerous other armed factions fighting over the place -- yet it was a big city, and most of them were simply trying to go about their lives. Day after day after miserable, lousy, scarifying day, that's exactly what they did.
I for one did not predict the high voter turnout which has apparently prevailed throughout Iraq -- but a lot of us should have expected something like this. I never claimed that the threats of violence would shut the elections completely down, and cower the majority of people into submission; in fact, I didn't give it much thought at all, because I simply didn't know what would happen.
I should have known. True, there were no elections in Beirut while I was there -- hell, there weren't even any policemen to be seen. But people drove to work, vendors sold bread and oranges and chewing gum on the streets, and there was running water and electricity in most of the city. Life went on. Not for everybody, true, but people in the tens of thousands made the effort, day after day, in the face of violence and threats of violence from all quarters, and they persevered.
Why should the Iraqis have been any different? Why should we have expected them to be any different?
I should have known, and more of the punditocracy, whether they favored the Bush invasion or not, should have known.
So good on ya, Iraqis, and Scott scores another one. Enjoy the whole thing.
Posted by Craig Ceely at January 30, 2005 02:05 PM