Democracy in Iraq

What have we done? What will be the result of a representative government in Iraq?
Looks like the Shiites are taking the lead.
"Who might they be?"
Why, none other than the theocratic, religious types that run Iran.
These are the same folks that prefer to set up religious states instead of what we like to think of as modern, "secular," representative states. They prefer -- and the population (read voters) really likes that idea.
Can you say Taliban?
Can you say fatwa?
Can you say jihad?
Again, I'm not making this up. Go read for yourself. Just last night I heard yet another conservative talk show host (Savage) asking if we really want to be in bed with the people that are being put into power, the Shiites. They are a minority in the big landscape of the Muslim world, but Iran jumps off the map as the country where they are concentrated, spilling over into Afghanistan to their East and part of Iraq to their West.

Most commentators do not draw conclusions yet. I noted one writer who tried to be optimistic.

Indeed, the representation of the one slate as "religious" and the other as "secular" may itself be somewhat misleading. There are religious parties in the Sistani-backed coalition, to be sure. But that slate pulled almost all clerics off it's role of candidates and has made clear over and over and over -- no Iranian style theocracy.

The hope seems to be that somehow politics will overcome the religious inclinations of those who put their religious leaders in charge by voting.
Who knows, maybe Iraqis are more hypocritical than we are. We don't put religious people in charge to have them contradict their faith, but maybe they do. We'll see.