From Baghdad to Tikrit, this week Iraqis cast their votes for the 275-member National Assembly, which will legislate for four years and then form a constitutional government for Iraq. While the ballots have yet to be tallied, Americans know that the one sure indicator of an electoral outcome is the exit poll. Here are just a few of the responses that American soldiers collected from Iraqis as they left the voting booth.


Faisal Kishta, 40. Sunni truck driver. "Democracy is a truly glorious thing. I voted first thing in the morning so I could go and shoot rocket-propelled grenades at the major Shiite polling centers this afternoon."


Meswn Hmed, 27. Feigning Ignorance. "Hey look at the purple voting dye on my finger! Just like in Ameri"¦Wait, what do you mean you don't dye your finger when you vote in America? Oh, you have electronic records? You know we used to have electricity, too. Then you dropped five million tons of explosives on us and we're back to the fucking abacus. No really democracy is great. It is in no way humiliating to walk around all day looking like I just finger banged an octopus."


Abdel Ayari, 19. Student. "I didn't really feel like voting and getting blown up, but all my classmates were like,

Do it, man. We haven't been able to vote for so long"¦ And I was like, Yeah well we've only been over the voting age for a year anyway. It' just like when all those teenage Red Sox fans were talking about how good it feels to finally win a World Series. You've been a baseball fan for what, eight years? Big fucking deal. The Astros hadn't won a pennant since you were alive either"¦Man, fuck Boston."


Ayad Jafar, 32. Homeless Iraqi. "I wake up with muzzle of M-16 in my mouth. The soldiers say, Wake up, it' time to vote. I tell them I don't care. I probably stay homeless no matter who wins. Then they start kick me and pee on my hut I make from empty coca-cola boxes. So I say, Fine, fine. I vote. Who must I vote for? And they say, Vote for anyone you want. This is beauty of democracy. But then I vote for local leader of my mosque and they say, Anyone but him.


Porter J. Goss, 61. CIA Director. Protestant. "I think exercising one' right to vote is important, which is why I did it 15,000 times. Usually I voted for the puppets of Big Oil, but I like what that Ali al-Lami guy had to say, so I threw in a few votes for the Kurdistan Alliance."


Amar Kawal, 65. Journalist. "It' great living in a war-torn hell-bucket of a country, because your vote actually matters. A hundred years from now, when our country is governed by two nearly identical monolithic parties run exclusively by like-minded corrupt rich men, we will yearn from the days when our votes actually meant something, as opposed to determining legality of marriage between men and goats."

Zuhiar Mahdi, 30, roofer. "I like to thank Mr. George Bush and Mr. Halliburton for opportunity to vote. He very good man. Very wise. Praise Allah. And"¦Ah, yes, democracy is good. Yes, good. What? Oh, OK. Yes, I love iPod and the xbox. They are very just. Praise Allah.

"OK, that it? You need any more pro-American quotes from your little A-rab caricature over here? Maybe I could get a turban and talk about how great democracy is, and how my children were happy to be blown up by American smart-bombs so that I could go to polling stations and get shot in the ass by some bored Iranian teenager. Or how 'bout this: the only show my wife is allowed to watch is According to Jim. That good enough? Now please stop pointing your rifle at me."

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