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Newshoggers.com: UN Election Body Head Admits Afghan Runoff Will Be Just As Fraud-Filled
Politics Daily: Fragile Afghan Democracy Raises Questions about U.S. Goals
Reactions
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RT @JonHutson: The great American arm-twist in #Afghanistan: Run-off follows epic fraud & vote-stealing - NYT http://bit.ly/1HR2wD 10/24/2009 |
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The Great American Arm-Twist in Afghanistan: Beyond the politics is the war itself. The Taliban, feeding off th.. http://bit.ly/X7UCa 10/24/2009 |
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The Great American Arm-Twist in Afghanistan: The political deadlock — precipitated first by the fraud and then .. http://bit.ly/X7UCa 10/24/2009 |
UN Election Body Head Admits Afghan Runoff Will Be Just As Fraud-Filled
Newshoggers.com —
... Not even the heads of the two electoral bodies concerned with the election believe the spin.Dexter Filkins, in a piece today describing how Karzai had to be all-but dragged onto the podium to accept the run-off decision, has this: ...
Fragile Afghan Democracy Raises Questions about U.S. Goals
Politics Daily —
... Afghan President Hamid Karzai agreed to a run-off election following a fraud-plagued first round but only after intense pressure from the U.S. the United Nations and the largest European countries. And that, the New York Times says, raises questions about "the wisdom and direction" of the U.S. effort eight years after the Taliban had been pushed out of Kabul. ...
The Sunday Word: Afghanistan and the Flu
The Caucus —
... same — the same deteriorating situation,” Mr. Abdullah said. With many predictions giving the win to Mr. Karzai, Mr. Abdullah added, “I’ll pursue this in an opposition, provided President Karzai is elected as a result of a transparent and credible process.” Mr. Abdullah is also critical of Afghanistan’s election commission, which The Times’s Dexter Filkins wrote will have many of the same officials in place for the runoff who perpetrated the fraud in the first round of voting. In a piece revisiting the chronology to Mr. Karzai’s concession to a runoff , Mr. Filkins ...
Afghanistan Quote of the Day
The New Republic blogs —
From Dexter Filkins' New York Times Week in Review piece on Hamid Karzai and voter fraud:
“Mr. Karzai got 48 percent of the vote and Abdullah got 27,” said Azizullah Ludin, the chairman of the Independent Election Commission. Despite its title, the commission is widely seen here as a tool of the president. “We will have another election, and we’ll have the same result.”
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Vote By Donkey (aka - What the Afghans Can Teach Us)
Greg's Opinion —
» NY Times: Afghan Election Rests on the Backs of Donkeys (Sabrina Tavernise)
In more ways than one, I suppose ...
Aside from one short paved strip in the center of Faizabad, the provincial capital, the roads are dirt, with ruts and slants that make any car ride feel like a voyage at sea during a storm. Six districts have no roads that connect to the rest of the province, and ballots for those areas will be taken by helicopter, Mr. Masood said.
But even in areas with roads, many villages can be reached only by footpaths. Those ...
Round Two
Mudville Gazette —
By the looks of it, this NY Times story was going to tell the whole truth: The Great American Arm-Twist in Afghanistan
KABUL, Afghanistan -- By the looks of it, the ceremony that unfolded last week inside the Presidential Palace here was marking a joyous, even triumphant, occasion.
President Hamid Karzai, flanked by Senator John Kerry and an array of Western ambassadors, had just announced that he would accept the revised vote totals showing that he had not won re-election after all. The president's ...
Did Karzai Play Us?
The New Republic blogs —
When John Kerry persuaded Hamid Karzai to agree to a run-off election, the New York Times correctly described this victory as "little more than a catastrophe averted." So how do you describe the situation as ...
