The One Word Death of Democracy in Iraq:
It's strange that an enormous, almost ridiculously micromanaging document like the Iraqi draft constitution ought to come down to its use of a single word. And while one could easily say that the fact that the document begins with a shout-out to the "Sons of Mesopotamia" means women are shat on from the outset and that the line, "No law can be passed that contradicts the undisputed rules of Islam," means that Iraq will become mullahrific, it's a single word, used a couple of times in the entire constitution, that means Iraq is fucked.

It is the word that, if amended to the U.S. Constitution, would make the Christian right go into a weeklong orgy the likes of which Babylon only dreamt of. James Dobson would go down on the withered, dusty snatch of Phyllis Schlafly while Chuck Colson, having a prison flashblack, fucks Dobson in the ass as Ted Haggard, madly jacking off, shoves a butt plug into the heaving, weeping Watergate criminal. Such madness would ensue, with Beverly LaHaye unable to fit enough cocks into her mouth to satisfy her, with Tony Perkins and Cal Thomas sword fighting on top of her lapping tongue. Surrounding it all will be a circle jerk of Pat Robertson, Tom DeLay, and Antonin Scalia, who has his prostate massaged by Clarence Thomas to ensure Lil' Tony gets his full mojo going. Goddamn, Gomorrah was destroyed for less, with the piles of bald eagle guts that the fucking mass will devour raw, with Terri Schiavo's stolen ashes mixed with blood smeared all over them, with virgin female members of Campus Crusades for Christ deflowered by trains of megachurch goers right on top of huge marble Ten Commandments monuments. Such grace, such smells, such screeches. But it'd be a once in a lifetime celebration over one word. A word that is part of the Iraqi constitution to be voted on by the people of that pseudo-nation in the coming weeks.

Article 17, Part 1 reads: "Each person has the right to personal privacy as long as it does not violate the rights of others or general morality." Article 36 says that freedoms of "expressing opinion by all means," "of press, publishing, media, and distribution," and "assembly and peaceful protest" are guaranteed "as long as it does not violate public order and morality." And in that one word, "morality," the hopes of a free and open and democratic Iraq are as dead as the soldiers falling there as this is written.

Let's re-state this: If you engage in personal, private activity that violates "general morality," you do not have the right to engage in it. Sweet Foucaultian nightmare scenarios. Homosexuality, judicious use of pleasure devices, adultery, pre-marital sex, even sexual positions in a married relationship can be banned because it violates what might be considered "general morality." And, since the Constitution says that Islam rules, forget about anal sex, with oral sex and masturbation up for debate. So if you like your husband to fuck you in the ass and you happen to mention it to some of the women at the market and they tell the local authorities, you can pretty much expect a home visit from club-wielding governmental holy thugs.

'Course, if this was just about the fucking, we could get all culturally-relativistic and shit (although, you see, as every fundamentalist of every stripe knows: if you control the fucking, you control the person). The Iraqi Constitution, if approved, would not give you the freedom to express an opinion, in press, in public, in private, if it violates "morality." Thought police, motherfuckers, thought police. This ain't about yelling "Fatwa" in a crowded theatre. It ain't even about supporting terrorism (that's specifically banned in other articles). It's about writing an editorial in the local paper that offends morality, like a call for more women to enter the electoral process. Then get ready for the pungent odor of burning paper, ink, and presses.

This doesn't even address whose morality will be followed: a national moral code? A regional one? A town by village code? Will there be shariah cops, like in Saudi Arabia?

In the end, banning offenses to "morality" means, simply, "we own you." Quite a democratic document there, even if it only succeeds in starting a civil war, plunging the region into chaos. Yep, it's worth a few thousand more lives to make sure morality is enforced, right?

And, loaded as it is, the Rude Pundit keeps thinking about another single word: immoral.