Despite that previous post’s promise not to write anything about the Iraqi provincial elections until the outcomes of it are clear, this New York Times piece about the diminished role of Moqtada Sadr’s movement contains an ugly parallel:

In many ways, it seems the [Sadrist] movement is trying to regain its relevance and transform itself into something like the American lobbying group MoveOn — a group that candidates and parties seek out for support, but that is not a party istelf.

(And out come the wingnuts.) This is probably a case of a tin ear more than it is active hostility to MoveOn from Alissa Rubin and Sam Dagher, but still. It’s really, really inappropriate to compare MoveOn to an organization with with American blood on its hands.