two--no, three cheers--for democracy

So the Afghan elections are going well, so far, and the primary challenger to Hamid Karzai has rescinded his call for a boycott, as long as the results are monitored by an independent panel. What this bodes for the future of Afghanistan is anyone's guess; but nascent democracy is better than no democracy at all. History, as any Popperian would warn, is too contingent, too chaotic to predict. (Look at the differing outcomes in post-Communist Poland and Russia for a comparison case. Life is especially tough in the latter.) But that's not what interests me, really. What I noticed immediately upon hearing the news was that the results won't be in for two weeks.

Two weeks!

Donkeys, helicopters, planes, trucks, and trains are carrying the results in to be counted. The potential for fraud is enormous, but that's still not what interests me.

It's the two weeks.

We live in a relatively stable democracy, where we vote over two months before the new candidate is sworn in. But I remember certain political pressure to render a quick decision in Florida four years ago, and I remember calls for "the nation to move forward."

And yet Afghanistan won't even have certifiable results for a fortnight.

If our upcoming election is as close as the last, and it could be (again, I'll be a tentative Popperian), anyone who calls for a quick recount will be dismissed from my already-small list of politicos I admire, or at least begrudgingly respect.

Democracy takes time. Every vote counts. We can't let Afghanistan upstage us, when we're the ones evangelizing democracy in the first place.