Informed Speculation

Basing her estimate on preliminary tallies, the Secretary of State said:

“There’s a belief that it has probably passed,” Rice told reporters traveling with her, based on people in Iraq who are seeing preliminary vote tallies. At least 63 percent of Iraqis voted Saturday, she said, an increase of about 1 million voters over the first democratic election in January for a transitional government. Much of that increase, she said, comes from the higher participation of Iraq’s minority Sunni Muslims.

The violence also was lower and produced fewer lethal attacks than in January’s vote, she noted.

The constitution requires a simple majority to be approved, unless two-thirds of voters in three of Iraq’s 18 provinces voted against it. Then the constitution would not pass and Iraqi leaders would be forced to draft a new document to be submitted to voters.

News services from Baghdad reported Sunday that early returns suggested large numbers of voters rejected the constitution in the Sunni strongholds of Anbar and Salahuddin provinces. But according to initial results, Sunni voters may not have been able to reach the two-thirds threshold in Diyala province east of Baghdad or in Nineveh province in the north, where Sunnis also have large representation.

Rice is also putting a positive spin on any possibility that the Constitution was rejected:

Rice denied that a rejection of the constitution would be a setback. “Iraqis had a process . . . that told them, ‘write a constitution and then have a referendum,’ ” and they have done so, Rice said. “It’s not a setback for the Iraqis if they exercise that right one way or another, it is a process that is alive and well.”

Rice compared the outcome, either way, to the U.S. system of referendums. “That would be like saying in the United States if you put something up for a referendum and people don’t vote for it, that’s a setback for democracy. No, that is democracy,” she said.

Well, true, but I’ll still feel much, much better if this thing passes…still, as Rice says, losing votes that the government supports is only possible in a democracy; Saddam never lost a vote, now, did he?

UPDATE 9:38 a.m.: More detail from the AP:

To defeat the constitution, Sunnis have to muster a two-thirds rejection in any three of Iraq’s 18 provinces. They were likely to reach that threshold in the vast Sunni heartland of Anbar province in the west. Salahuddin province also looked possible, but with Ninevah out of the running, they would need to get the province of Diyala, which will also be difficult.

An elections official in Baghdad told The Associated Press that indications point to the charter having been approved. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the counting was still going on.

My fingers remain tightly crossed…