Afghans who aren't scared of being murdered or convinced of the utter illegitimacy of the whole electoral process have voted! And with the polls closed, democracy's a winner. Or at least it might've received a plurality.

Of course, the Taliban have reportedly executed a couple people for voting and rocket attacks have killed a couple more people, but on the whole it is a very proud day for Afghanistan. Though turnout seems, so far, to be incredibly low, in part because of those concerns about being executed but maybe more because of cynicism.

Corrupt and largely useless President Hamad Karzai will probably be forced into a runoff election, unless he actually does manage to steal more than 50% of the vote.

Hah, remember that time when all those people in Congress gave themselves purple fingers, because they loved democracy in Iraq so much? Poor forgotten Afghanistan!

Yesterday it was reported that Britney Spears was registered to vote in Afghanistan, but as of yet there's no word on which candidate she supported.