Okay, I'll admit it—I've been swept up in the election fervor! From a rational standpoint, yes it's true that elections won't change much, and it's true that all the big problems still lie ahead. It's also generally true, as Swopa rightly points out, that these "one-man one vote" elections owe as much to Ayatollah Ali Sistani's agitating as to George W. Bush's foreign policy vision. But screw all that for now! How can this not be pretty fucking amazing:



Anyway, I'll have more later. The analysis below—written while a bit, um, tipsy late last night—still holds up. See also Kevin Drum's rough breakdown of the expected representation in the new Iraqi legislature. I'm also very pleasantly surprised that we haven't seen more feuding between the religious Shi'ites and the neo-Baathists around Allawi and Shaalan. But then, there are still millions of ballots yet to be counted, so keep crossing the fingers...