NYT Iraqis Abroad Seem Reluctant to Vote......

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Jan. 25 - After a two-day extension, registration of Iraqi voters living abroad drew to a close Tuesday but fell well below expectations, with about a quarter of the number predicted by organizers signing up for Sunday's election.

By Tuesday morning, some 255,000 Iraqis living overseas had registered in 14 nations. Organizers had expected that roughly one million voters would sign up. The low turnout added to the troubles of a process that was burdened throughout by security concerns, confusion and some controversy.


<What is most telling about the lack of support for the Bush Administrations war of agression is that only about 10% of elligable Iraqi's living in the US have taken the bother to register to vote........>



His agency initially planned to close registration on Sunday, but extended the deadline by two days when the tally of registered voters had reached only 131,635 by last Friday. There was a significant gain on Friday and Saturday, the traditional weekend in much of the Arab world. But while levels remained high over the past several days, officials said the final registration deadline was the latest possible before polling, which opens on Friday. Overseas voting is to continue through Sunday.

"It seems as if there was no enthusiasm for the process," said Mustafa Hamarneh, director of the Center for Strategic Studies at Jordan University. "Many of these people were disgruntled and did not feel the need to mobilize. There was no real sense that they can shape events and impact them." Most surprising, Dr. Hamarneh said, is that in Jordan at least, the apathy seemed to cross ethnic, class and religious lines


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/26/international/middleeast/26expats.html?oref=login

:kick:

in the good old US of A. They see how a bare majority becomes a Man Date.....

Oh well, what's another 80 Billion and another couple hundred lifes wated.....

Amazing.

Doesn't look like anyone is noting that. Should these suckers vote, they could loose their citizenship and get sent back home. Now there's a choice.

Or Nashville or Detroit... imagine how fucking hard it will be to get Iraqis to vote in Baghdad or Tikrit or Basra with the constant threat of station wagons full of explosives plowing into lines of voters.

that there are Sunni's are the one's who left Iraq. Maybe they don't care for the rising Shiite majority that is looming on the horizon. Matbe they see no use in voting.....

Their privacy. They might not like the idea of the U.S. government having their personal information. And if they're "disgruntled" and have "no real sense that they can shape events and impact them," that might because they saw how well the U.S. election process worked in the U.S!

:headbang:
rocknation