I have been watching the nascent Iraqi election process since the US disclosed that it wanted elections by 30 June 2004.

I've been referring to Iraqi democracy as 'conditional democracy.' That is, democracy on our terms..which isn't democracy at all.

It seems that we have no plan at this juncture that is being carefully considered by all parties.

Kirk Troy, reporting for the VOA writes this:

Most members of the Iraqi Governing Council have said they no longer support a U.S. plan for choosing an interim government before power is handed over later this year. The U.S. coalition says it is opposed to any plan to include Islamic law in an interim constitution.

Most members of Iraq's U.S.-appointed governing council have said they no longer support a U.S. plan they endorsed last November that calls for regional meetings to choose an interim government.

Several council members, representing Shi'ites, Sunnis, and Kurds, say the caucus system is too controversial. Some back a proposal for the U.S.-led coalition to hand power to the current Governing Council until elections can be held. Others have suggested a national conference of political and religious figures from which a new leadership would emerge.

The current plan has been in question for some time and was one aspect being scrutinized by a U.N. fact finding team that visited Iraq last week. The team all but ruled out the possibility of early elections.

Meanwhile, Iraqi Shi'ite groups have criticized comments by U.S. top administrator Paul Bremer who, they say, would oppose any use of Islamic law as the basis of Iraq's new constitution. The coalition says this was part of a long-standing agreement the United States has had with the Iraqi council.

"It is not Ambassador Bremer's position, it is the position of the Governing Council that they took when we reached agreement on how the political process would move forward, which is that Islam, the recognition of Islam, as the identity of the majority of Iraqis," said Dan Senor, the coalition spokesman in Baghdad. "But at the same time, ensuring there are protections for freedom of religious worship in this country for all Iraqis. The statements made by Ambassador Bremer yesterday are consistent with the agreement reached in the fall of last year."

Much more at link.

That the U.S. isn't allowing any Islamic law to be written into the Constitution is a bit odd. I say this because the IGC under the auspices of the U.S. has already allowed Sharia in Iraq. In this entry from 01 Jan 2004 I noted the following:

For the past four decades, Iraqi women have had some of the most modern legal protections in the Muslim world, under a civil code that prohibits marriage below age 18, arbitrary divorce and male favoritism in child custody and property inheritance disputes.

Saddam Hussein's dictatorship did not touch those rights. But the U.S.-backed Iraqi Governing Council has voted to wipe them out, ordering in late December that family laws shall be "canceled" and such issues placed under the jurisdiction of Islamic legal doctrine, called sharia.

This week outraged Iraqi women -- including judges and Cabinet ministers -- denounced the decision in street protests and at conferences, saying it would set back their legal status by centuries and could unleash clashes among various Islamic strains that have differing rules for marriage, divorce and other family issues.

"This will send us home and shut the door, just like what happened to women in Afghanistan," said Amira Hassan Abdullah, a Kurdish lawyer. Some Islamic laws, she noted, allow men to divorce their wives on the spot.

"The old law wasn't perfect, but this one would make Iraq a jungle," she said. "Iraqi women will accept it over their dead bodies."

The order, narrowly approved by the 25-member council in a closed-door session Dec. 29, was made while Abdul Aziz Hakim, a conservative Shiite Muslim who heads the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, was chairing the council under a rotating leadership system. The order is being opposed by several liberal members as well as by senior women in the Iraqi government.

I'm sure that the Iraqis must be really angry and confused by all of this. By all of this, I mean from the invasion to today. They have no real security, the infrastructure is a bloody mess, and now they aren't going to be allowed to govern in the way that they wish. They have thousands dead over nothing, and some wonder why they aren't appreciative. I'll tell you why. It's because they're human beings. I'd be pissed too.