The Iraqis our elites don't know.(What's Next in Iraq?)

Inundated as we are by non-stop negative coverage, it's hard to believe there is a positive story to tell in Iraq. Our papers and screens are filled with roadside bombs, slain soldiers, and occasional swarthy, gesticulating Iraqis. Those huddled masses of Iraqis yearning to breathe free (or did they like Saddam?) might as well not exist.

The TAE poll is, for most Americans, a first glimpse into the silent world of the average Iraqi. Oddly, he is nothing like the Iraqi painted by our elites. By 4 to 1, the ordinary Iraqi thinks his country is better off without Saddam. By almost 7 to 1, he is more hopeful for his own future absent Saddam. By almost 2 to 1, he doesn't want an Islamic government.

This glimpse can be rounded out with a scan of the stories we didn't read in this month's papers. For example, 300,000 mourners at the funeral of murdered Shia spiritual leader Baqir Al-Hakim did not massacre, or call for the massacre of, Sunnis. Nor did they whip up an anti American frenzy. The troubles in Basra have been followed by calm. Kurds and Arabs are not killing each other in Mosul and Kirkuk. The story that isn't written, more often than not, is the most telling about post-Saddam Iraq.

But how to exploit this good news? Sadly, the U.S. government has been, for the most part, uninterested in the average Iraqi revealed by this poll. Rather, the quasi-colonial Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) has institutionalized all that was wrong with Saddam's Iraq. Saddam honed the divisions within his country, pitting Shia against Sunni and Sunni against Kurd, tribal leaders against urban masses and ...