Gambling On Iraq's Future

Tom Villars at Ali Fadhil's Free Iraqi blog has kindly provided a link showing that the Iraq Pro-Democracy Party did in fact receive 1566 votes.

Tom says the Iraqi Pro-Democracy Party is List# 315. Comparing the Arab text in the PDF against the text on the Iraq Pro-Democracy Party website, this appears to be true. So what was the # 7461 that Omar/Mohammed Fadhil was trumpeting?

The world will remember the number "7461"; these were the candidates who didn't submit for blackmailing and decided to take the responsibility despite the threats and the dangers.

UPDATE 1: Tex at antiwar.com suggests 7461 could be the original number of candidates on the Iraq ballots (before many withdrew).

By the way, Tom Villars runs the Iraqi Bloggers Tech Support site, which helps transfer the funds to the Fadhil brothers. According to Tom, the reason why the Iraq Pro-Democracy Party did not receive all it's pledged funds on time was that Omar Fadhil turned up on the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) terrorist list!

Apparently someone close to the name of XXXX XXXX XXXX has appeared on the OFAC list. They need some additional information to say for certain whether his is the person in question is not eligible or eligible for a transfer.

C'est ironique, n'est-ce pas?

Never mind! Another US$9,000 was deposited into the Fadhil brothers' account on Feb 2nd, 2005. I wonder what they'll do with it, or what they did with the other US$16,000 for that matter?

Tom Villars, by the way, was obliged to declare a personal financial interest in the Iraqi elections:

Full Disclosure:
I am long 187 contracts on the IRAQ.ELECTIONS.JAN05 contract.
I am the Market Maker for the IRAQ.TURNOUT.+8.0M contract.

Yep, Tom has been trading on the Iraqi elections at Intrade. Talk about your true believers: Tom cashed in on "Elections for the National Assembly in Iraq to commence by Jan31 2005" and he cashed in again as the Market Maker for "Turnout for Iraqi National Assembly Election to be ON or OVER 8.0M". The final turnout was 8,456,266 people! Way to go, Tommy boy!

Warbloggers gambling on the destinies of ordinary Iraqis. Lovely, that. Call me a cynic, but I just can't help wondering whose money Tom was using...

Update 2: Tom Villars responds via the comments at ITM:

As to the money transfers, the complete timeline is here but briefly I started the money transfer Nov 16 and it took until this week for the money to arrive. I think what happened is the Feds put a stop on all transfers into Iraq until after the elections, but that is only a guess. I spent well over 25 hours on the phone with my bank and Western Union trying to find a way to get the money into Iraq but without success.

Ali is going to update me with campaign expenses and they should be posted on the accounting records page shortly. Since a significant amount of money does remain in the IDPD accounts, the party will need to decide how to spend if for the next elections scheduled for Dec 15th.

As to my activity with InTrade.com I openly posted my involvement and I make no apologies for separating fools from their money. Over $385,000 USD was put at risk on Iraqi contracts, and I estimate over $50,000 USD actually changing hands. If you want to bet against Iraq then suggest a contract and I'll be happy to take your bet.

Reminds me of the wager National Review talking head Jonah Goldberg offered Juan Cole - "making their own fortunes with a wager on the fates of others, whom they are treating like ants". No thanks, Tom.