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Democracy is big news, damnit

25 comments on Democracy is big news, damnit

Democracy is big news, damnit

: We have troubled, questionable, even corrupted elections filled with conflict in Florida and Chicago and New Jersey and all over the United States of friggin’ America. So why should be we the least bit surprised that there are some troubles and conflicts in a nation that has never had democracy and has been ruled by warlords and communists and religious fascists, Afghanistan?

I tried last night to find a positive link to a new story about the Afghan election today. Couldn’t find it. Today, the news isn’t much different. Ohmygod, the ink on the thumbs isn’t indelible! Well, forget it, then, let’s bring back the Taliban. Jeesh.

This is a big deal: Democracy has come to a land and a people for the first time, a land where they were bombing Buddha and hiding women and plotting mass murders against us. This is good news.

Reuters’ headline: Afghan poll mired in turmoil. BBC headline: Afghan vote ends in controversy. Newsweek’s headline: We don’t recognize the results. Washington Post headline: Afghan candidates declare results ‘invalid’. Washington Times: Boycott mars Afghanistan’s first election.

This is more like it: News.com from Australia: Joyous Afghans cast their vote. And go read Instapundit on Afghanistan and see the pictures of democracy’s birth.

This is good news, damnit.

25 responses to “Democracy is big news, damnit”

  1. MWB Avatar
    MWB

    C’mon, Jeff, if it might reflect well on Bush, it can’t be good news. Get with the program!

  2. TribeHasSpoken Avatar
    TribeHasSpoken

    How the hell are you getting news from news.com.au, Jeff? When I tried to access it on Friday, the page was stuck on Wednesday’s news and hasn’t changed since. My ISP, perhaps?

  3. shell Avatar
    shell

    Afghans on voting:
    *

  4. RobertL Avatar
    RobertL

    Institutional bias in the news media is pervasive. When a person stops being surprised by each instance of it, it leaves a void. The void is more uncomfortable than the surprise.
    Integrity in the media is as big an issue for our freedom as integrity in government. Literally.

  5. Franky Avatar
    Franky

    Yeah go to a guy’s site in Tennesse to read about Afghanistan because a New Yorker doesn’t like the coverage he’s receiving thousands of miles away.
    Long live the internet!

  6. Franky Avatar
    Franky

    I really would have thought the media-bashers would have learnt. Remember when the blogosphere couldn’t get enough posts ready on how good Iraq was yet the press didn’t want to cover it because of their agenda to make all our children communists? And now? You think people on the ground of a country you’ve never visited might perhaps know just a little more about afghanistan than you, jeff?

  7. Joe Baby Avatar
    Joe Baby

    Afghanistan has been a cursed pile of rubble for a few decades now…finally get an election (have they ever had one, by the way? wouldn’t know from the articles), an election that is relatively free of terrorism, and all the media ya-hoos can do is mock it. Shame.
    Makes me wonder if they think Afghanis et al either don’t deserve the franchise or aren’t worthy of it.

  8. chuck Avatar
    chuck

    Honestly Jeff, I’m always surprised that a guy in the media is surprised by this sort of thing. No one should know better how completely out of touch and content free the media is. I would hope that was so, anyway.

  9. chervokas Avatar
    chervokas

    Doesn’t anyone think it’s at all possible that an election where the handpicked annointee of the US government was never in danger of losing might be something less than honest self determination?
    I don’t know what did or didn’t go on with the voting in Afghanistan. Neither does Jeff. We have to rely on reports from people who were there, not root for what we hope the truth is. I get the feeling that a lot of people on this blog expect reporters to be the equivalent of “homer” sports broadcasters, rooting not reporting.
    I for one remain skeptical of any elections held under conditions when a foreign power takes over a country, installs a leader, and the leader wins a landslide while all the opponents pull out. Now, I’m also skeptical of all the opponents. But either way there’s a lot more to be skeptical about than to be cheerful about.

  10. Franky Avatar
    Franky

    I think Cuba and North Korea are having elections soon. Liberty! Democracy! Good news, damnit!

  11. John Avatar
    John

    Democracy is big news, damnit
    I agree wholeheartedly!

  12. tony Avatar
    tony

    democracy is big news.
    but how can you call it democracy when the election is fixed?

  13. Brett Avatar
    Brett

    Jeff,
    Are the articles correct? Sure they are. There is turmoil. But bias is in the whiteout – it’s what they don’t report, which in this case is that fact that a country once run by the Taliban is now moving toward democracy.
    Bias. It’s why Big Media can’t be trusted to report the news. If Big Media doesn’t address this, we’ll find ways to go around them. (And this isn’t the only issue that suffers from media whiteout.)

  14. Kat Avatar
    Kat

    Isn’t it sad that some people would have these people be talibanized, women treated like cattle, beaten if their shoes make a noise or if the wind blows away the hooded garb,girls circumcized, married as kiddies to 60 year old bearded fuckers for breeding stock, kept illiterate and enslaved,etc. rather than admit that this is a good thing–not perfect but much better than it was, thanks to the USA.

  15. Tom (American Voter) Avatar
    Tom (American Voter)

    While the Afghan elections may have had problems, at least they were smart enough to avoid hanging chads by not using punch cards. And while the wrong ink was used in some pollng places, at least they didn’t have a ridiculous 101% of the adult population listed as registered voters.
    Anyone think there is still time to bring some Afghans to Florida so they can help with our election in a few weeks?
    And to Jeff, do you still actually still beleive the Big Media reports news? Unless they control the story it’s not going to get reported.

  16. Tink Avatar
    Tink

    Yeah go to a guy’s site in Tennesse to read about Afghanistan because a New Yorker doesn’t like the coverage he’s receiving thousands of miles away.
    Yeah, DO go to the guy from Tennessee’s site. He has reports and pictures from Major John Tammes who is based at Bagram and was in Parwan for the election. Allah and Tim Blair also have reports from Major Tammes.
    My husband is in Paktika province, the last Taliban and Al Qaeda stronghold. Extremely remote, sits at about 7000 ft altitude. If you caught the Nightline report last month where the Governor of Paktika took a trip to all of the villages..my husband was on that mission.. Not a nice place.
    I spoke with my husband last night (our time) just as the elections were beginning. People were standing in line in a sandstorm and temps in the low 40’s, they were waiting to vote.
    Due to the violence “promised” by Al Qeada and the Taliban I was awake all night reloading Yahoo news and Google news watching for ANY mention of the elections taking place, there was very very little posted, it was almost like it wasn’t taking place.
    The articles about flew online when ink that could be washed off was found in SOME polling places..not all. According to reports, some polling places marked people’s fingers with the voting pens instead of the bottle of indelible ink. That was a second line of “defense”, they also punched the voter registration cards.
    Almost nothing in the hours before that happened…hmmm..odd.
    When my husband called today after voting had ended he reported that things had been quiet, there had been NO violence and more than a thousand people had voted at his location, MORE than half of those who voted were women.
    No violence in a province that borders Pakistan, no violence where they deal with IED’s and RPG on a regular basis. No violence when people had been killed just for holding voter registration cards in the past weeks….You’re damn right I call that good news.
    Platoons from our company are scattered from one end of Afghanistan to the other..the reports of the attitude of the people resemble what’s reported at the site from “some guy in Tennessee” MUCH more than whats being reported in the major media..whether you want to believe it or not.
    To me, the credibility of a bunch of grunts on the ground for months kicks the credibility of the media on the ground for a few days right out the door.
    No one ever claimed this election would be perfect. But it went much smoother and with fewer problems than expected.
    Jeff’s right, this IS good news.
    Jeff..sorry to suck up so much of your bandwidth, but some things just need to be said.

  17. Angus Jung Avatar
    Angus Jung

    “but how can you call it democracy when the election is fixed?”
    Good question, here’s another one: When did you stop beating your camgirl?

  18. Josh Avatar
    Josh

    Good news in Afghanistan is bad news for John Kerry. In this crazy mixed up world, I am more likely to believe my government’s propaganda than our free press.

  19. John Avatar
    John

    Really, the problem isn’t so much that the news isn’t available out there — Jeff and Glenn’s links prove that — but that the editors of the major media outlets in the U.S. are choosing either not to use those stories at all, or at best not to highlight them, as the New York Times did with John Howard’s major win in the Australian election, which ended up buried back on Page A-16 of the Sunday paper, or about 16 pages further back than the story the Times ran in March on the results of Spain’s election.

  20. chervokas Avatar
    chervokas

    This ranting and raving against “big media” has become really sad. For what it’s worth I think the NYT story today on the Afghan elections was spot on in terms of tone. It didn’t at all root either way it was full of quotes from Afghans who were delighted to be voting for the first time, quotes that were, frankly very moving. It also reported with some skepiticism the allegations of voter fraud, the withdrawl of the opposition candidates, and in a sidebar story, a slice of life piece, the coverage further pointed out the issues of tribalism and cultural suppression of women that complicate the issue of self determination. I can’t see in anyway how “big media” went wrong with this coverage.
    As to the Australian elections. I can’t imagine any situation–other that Hitler returning from the dead and rising to power in Australia–whereby the results of an Australian electiion would be anything but deep in the A-section news for the NYT or any American newspaper (other than those controlled by Aussies). I think the question of the election in Spain, because of its relationship to the bombing, was clearly a story deserving of bigger play than the story of an Austrialian incumbent winning for the 4th consecutive time.
    It doesn’t seem to me that people here are complaining about too much bias in the “big media” but not enough bias towards their side!

  21. MD Avatar
    MD

    I’ve been looking at the pictures of the elections – the pictures of women voting brought tears to my eyes. This is a wonderful first step! Three million refugees have returned to Afghanistan, per capita incomes have increased since the fall of the Taliban and young girls may now attend school. Of course, poppy production is high and there are remnants of the Taliban around, and unfortunately the Afghans are in a rough neigborhood, so it’s all still shaky. But what a first step. Good luck to the Afghan people.

  22. carsonfire Avatar
    carsonfire

    This can’t be good news. It flies in the face of Kerry’s very existence. You can’t have positive developments like this without long, protracted diplomatic negotiations with the ruling thugs.
    President Kerry would have had us in a summit with the Taliban in order to discuss handing over Bin Laden and trying to at least roll back, even a little, some of the human rights violations that defined the Taliban. He would achieve neither, but masses of leftist Europeans would love him for the effort! With nothing to show for the effort but ongoing repression and violence, he would probably even win a Nobel peace prize.
    Like Reagan, Bush has achieved far more headway in global human rights and freedom than any Carter or Kerry could. Like Reagan, he will never be recognized for his successes by left-leaning media, global leftists and detached-from-reality intellectuals.

  23. Russell Avatar
    Russell

    This USA Today article puts the vote in a positive light, while still explaining all the ups and downs well enough.

  24. Kat Avatar
    Kat

    Excellent article: Bush wins, Al Queda and leftist media lose.
    http://nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/31578.htm
    {Above all, Howard demonstrates the virtue of political courage

  25. Jack Tanner Avatar
    Jack Tanner

    Since Howard won in aus Kerry’s sister won’t be coming back to the US will it?