ON Sunday Iraqis will be going to the polls to cast votes for a government that could potentially bring the savage conflicts of the past few years to an end and lead Iraq into a peaceful future with an equitable role in its development for Iraqis of all sectarian and religious backgrounds. That is the hope, at least. The missile attack on a polling station that was followed by two suicide bombings Thursday makes clear that looking to the future through rose-colored glasses is, at the least, naive. Nevertheless, just as Iraqis proudly displayed their ink-stained thumbs in 2005, there is no doubt that Iraqis will participate en masse in the vote Sunday, fully aware of the importance of their actions for their own and their country's futures. Iraqis across the sectarian and political spectrum are exhausted by the decades of abuse that they have endured, first at the hands of Saddam Hussein, his family and his close associates and now at the hands of vicious terrorists bent on killing innocent people in their effort to wreak havoc. The culprits are variously identified as Sunni or Shiite but the vast majority of Iraqis do not harbor the kind of murderous sectarian resentment that prompts the kind of shameful acts that still pepper the landscape of Iraq, specifically that of Baghdad. Even in the days of Saddam Hussein when it was an accepted fact of Iraqi life that elite minority dominated the government and the majority were left to fend for themselves in private enterprise, Iraqi families were comprised of members of various sectarian and ethnic backgrounds. Through marriage, extended families found themselves embracing Sunnis, Shias, Christians and Kurds as spouses, aunts, uncles and cousins. Nevertheless, the inevitable tensions that resulted from the Saddam years segued into civil war once the dictator was gone, unwittingly egged on by the clueless Americans who occupied the country and by foreign extremists bent on turning Iraq into a sectarian battleground. Tomorrow, the Iraqi electorate, the vast majority of citizens who long only to go about their daily lives, provide for their families, send their children to school and sleep at night without fear, have a chance to make their voices heard over those of the minority who long only for blood. It is a first but profoundly important step towards forming a government that truly represents all of the Iraqi people. __
