Saddam Hussein has a sham election today, and it’s just too pathetic. He won the last one with 99.96% of the vote (I wonder what happened to that 0.04%?); why not just give himself 110% of the vote and really impress us? How dumb does he think we are? We’re actually just dumb enough to maybe fall for him getting in the high sixties in the vote, so he should check his ego and rig it thusly. Also, we might believe it more if he had a straw man to run against.
“Hi, I’m Steve Ahmed, and, if I’m elected, I’m going to raise taxes, give away our oil for free, and not gas the Kurds. Why vote for a dedicated, workaholic like Saddam when you can vote for Steve Ahmed in ’02.”
Yeah, yeah, I know: everyone who has never run a sham election believes they’re an expert at it. I really do think all that stuff would make it much more believable, though – not enough to keep us from bombing him dead – but enough to give us slight pause at killing an elected leader.
BTW, what happens if the “no” votes win in the Iraqi election? Do they actually have something written in law for if that occurs? My guess is that Saddam would then kill his entire populace. At least, that’s what I’d do.