What is this scandal? It is a horrific and shameful scene, a new chapter in the assassination operation – by Iraqi hands this time. What is this turmoil? Convoys and slogans and announcements… The world is entertaining itself by covering these images, along with the smiles and the conjecture. Analysts speak about lists and turbans; about the race between religious people, seculars, and Communists; about local, tribal and party alliances and regional sympathies. What is this scandal? Where did they bring this suspicious lexicon from? Multiple parties; the integrity of elections; foreign observers; the end of the mandate; peaceful handling of power; resorting to the Constitution; the role of civil society… What strange customs and terms. This is not the Iraq I love, and I have nothing in common with it. The ballot boxes produce nothing but ordinary people. Exceptional leaders do not take their mandate from them. Rather, they seize it directly from history. What is this media upheaval? Newspapers should not be left to the imagination of journalists. The front pages of credible national newspapers look all the same. They are written in the central kitchen of the intelligence services or at their Ministry of Information branch. Newspapers are written with a single pen, to satisfy a single reader. The new leaders of Iraq… He said it mockingly, with sparks in his eyes. These are good for exile and cable TV. He saw on TV Iraqis voting and smiling. The inhabitants of the provinces that had previously boycotted now loved democracy. The game was over and the page was turned. He called Chemical Ali but did not get an answer. He closed his eyes and remembered. I forgot that they killed him. I forgot that they killed me. Saddam Hussein went back to his long slumber. *** In his faraway ranch, he watches the news and paces around. They are voting. No one called him. He did not receive any faxes or emails. It would've been a different scene had I not taken that decision – one that cost America thousands of injured and killed, and 800 billion dollars. Without him, Jalal Talabani would have retired as a member of the opposition rather than president. Massoud Barazani will remain worried and ready to go up the mountains. And Nuri al Maliki in Damascus; Al Hakim family in Tehran; Iyad Allawi in London. Ahmed Chalabi is drowning in mathematics and numbers. Chalabi's picture provoked him. He spent years on the road to Washington. He infiltrated himself into corridors and backstage, advising, inciting, complimenting. Then, when Saddam Hussein's regime was uprooted, he entertained himself with counting mistakes. He got bored of fast food and became attracted by the Persian kitchen. So he devoted himself to extermination. The journey of Iraq is chasing George Bush. He stares one last time at his TV and says: History will forget the details, but it won't forget that I carried democracy to Iraq. *** In his faraway cave, he receives the reports. There is the taste of anger, and of bitterness. Iraq's Sunnis have betrayed Al Qaeda, once through the Sahwa and another time through the ballot boxes. Yesterday they voted in Fallujah itself. They said they were voting against the takfiris and suicide bombers; against what they called unjust ideas and explosive belts. They adopted the lexicon of others: the peaceful handling of power and a Constitution written by legislators. They gave the final word to ballot boxes. They allowed Bush's forces to prevail over Al Qaeda. Their current behavior will allow Obama to pullout. This is terrible. We will lose the opportunity of clashing with the Americans on the Iraqi territory. We need a new flow of suicide bombers to keep Iraq an arena of clashes with Christians and Shias. How difficult Iraq is, said Osama bin Laden in his faraway cave. *** In his office, he follows the Iraqi elections and smiles. It is Iraq's fate to be dangerous, if its force overflows beyond its borders; if it collapses under its rubble; if it rejoices; if it wails; if it votes. This democracy that is embellished with ideologies and colors is more dangerous than [uranium] enrichment. If the Kurd in Iraq has the right to… then why wouldn't he have the right in Iran? And if the Sunni had the right to… then why wouldn't he have the right in Iran? Moreover, where is the attractiveness of the Iranian revolution when we hear the provinces in the south of Iraq express their discontent at the role of the clergy in politics? To where shall we export the revolution if we are unable to export it to Iraq? What will we say tomorrow to the domestic opposition if it demands a democracy that is not controlled by the Supreme Leader, and if the ballot boxes bring in a leader who opposes the hegemony of the clergy? These embellished elections are not a joyful event for Iran and the region, said Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – repeating that they are more dangerous than [uranium] enrichment.
