A Small Victory

If that image doesn't scream
Contrast
concerning modernization, I don't know what does.

C'mon Michelle, I made a very clever comment and you didn't respond. Wake Up! It's A New Day!!

That's just too damn cool.
"Hey, Oliver! Get your face out of the feed and get a load of these!"

Amen! It is for these reasons that soldiers are volunteering to return to Afghanistan and Iraq.

The reason we hear almost nothing from the MSM about Afghan elections is that there just aren't enough explosions and dead Afghans involved. A relatively peaceful and successful election might actually benefit GWB, which is a complete contradiction to the express aims of the MSM. Maybe if Karzai wore a Che t-shirt and kissed Castro's ass, he could have gotten St. Jimmy to come and drink some green tea and given the process 'legitimacy'. Or he could have sent Kofi a few duffel bags full of money (which would be more expensive but worth it if he could avoid having to spend time with St. Jimmy.)

Yup.

Now let us picture a day maybe a decade in the future... On the referendum before the Afghani people is a vote to allow women to wear the immodest 'half-burka' thereby revealing their faces. It's a close vote, but the women get their rights and the beautification of a country, the progress of a country, takes an even stronger hold.

Two decades... The people vote to amend the constitution to make no reference to the Koran or the sharia. Sharia is abolished.

Three decades... The new Xbox XXI console game DOA: Beach Volleyball Uncensored is selling out in Afghanistan faster than the new nearly viral implementation of Starbucks/Gamestop can sell them.

Sure, it's a dream, but I'm not only one having it. And people said Russia would never embrace western culture. China, Japan and all the Middle East for that matter. Our culture is a reflection of liberty no matter how flawed it is.

The MSM can't cover anything that proves Bush was right.

What a fantastic picture.

I know it's corny, but all I can hear in my head right now is the desperate, demanding sing/cry of, "Let freedom RING," followed by a William Wallace led growl.

But I cry whenever I hear our National Anthem, Proud to Be an American, or When the Eagle Flies so...

There is plenty of time for more sabotage of the elections. But Afghans are accustomed to rockets and bombs.

I'm a lifelong democrat, but I salute Mr. Bush for what he has done in Afghanistan. I have to strain to think of any well known Democratic Party affiliated politician who could have achieved half as much, in that god forsaken country. My friend Joe Lieberman would have tried his best. And certainly Zell Miller would have brought destruction to the Taliban.

Marvin

Joe Lieberman "gets it" about Islamofascism. Zell is rightfully pissed about the hijacking of the once liberal, but not leftist, Democratic Party. This is why both men are now pariahs in their own party.

Not only do I fear that a Kerry administration will embolden the anti-Western ideology abroad, but it will embolden it right here. A Kerry loss right now may make the Democratic party wake up and reform. Reform is coming sooner or later, but it could be much more bloody (and I don't mean just figuratively) if it is later.

I agree that these elections are a huge victory for freedom, but I just can't get over the irony of that image. Well, you have to start somewhere. I would like to know though, how free do women in Afghanistan feel to NOT wear a burka? That is the thermometer of freedom in the mideast.

Michele,

In talking to my husband very early this morning (about 2am)...people were already lined up to vote during a sandstorm that had lasted all night. This in a province that was the last stronghold of the Taliban and AlQeada and the last area to have a constant US presence I find nothing less than amazing.

Darleen and Spit,

Re: the burqa..
It depends on where you are in the country.. Freedom is moving..it took 25 years for this country to get into this state, it's going to take time for it to get out of this state.

Considering that the Taliban has been threatening to kill anyone who voted, and has killed people for holding voter registration cards, I am damned proud of the citizens in that country, as well as our soldiers, and the members of the ANA.

I'm extremely disappointed that our media isn't paying more attention, though I'm not surprised.

It's not perfect, but it's a huge start.

Tink
(whose husband is currently in Paktika Province, Afghanistan)

Tink

Please pass on my thanks and my best wishes to your husband.

Tink, thanks for the eyewitness account. It really helps put the Afghan election into perspective. Also, I second Darleen; please pass on my thanks and my best wishes to your husband.

For those who's attitude about the war on terror has softened over the last 3 years, as well as those who need a reminder of why it is worth fighting, the Deterrence article at EjectEjectEject.com is a good read.

Make your conservative voice heard in the Media at PollingPoint.Com.

Make a real difference in the election by doing what you can to help the President and his Local/State/Congressional candidates at Gop.Com/GetActive.

It could have been MUCH worse:
http://www.davidwarrenonline.com/Comment/Oct04/index250.shtml

And, Afghan soldiers stopped a fuel truck, just south of Kandahar, driven by three Pakistan nationals who had loaded it with 40,000 litres of gasoline, and rigged it to explode in the middle of Kandahar on election day.

Note David's essay "Bombs VS Votes" is a Must Read.

Another quote:

But a friend, who watches TV, notes some expostulation by a CNN correspondent, who said that with the death of Mr. Bigley, the British prime minister, Tony Blair, "has blood on his hands". This, my friend adds, is the moral and intellectual equivalent of asserting that Winston Churchill started the Holocaust. It is a judgement on events so utterly upside down as to constitute, in itself, a real evil.

Earlier this week the President reminded me that the Afghan election was to be yesterday. I forgot about it and don't recall any of my news sources reporting it. Today, I remember it here.

God bless your husband Tink.

Mission accomplished.

Um... you know, us contrarians do celebrate good things when they happen.

My view is this - and I HAVE been consistant throughout this - that the bang oughtta be worth the buck.

Afganastan was both the right AND the inevitable and needed target. It's good this is happening.

But iraq? It's Bush's russian campaign. And IMHO, any other criticism is just dust on top of that comparison.

In the words of Karen Kowalski; "nobody wins a shitstorm."