I read with interest the reports about the Ba'ath restorationists within the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior--lower level officers apparently interested in some sort of revival of the Ba'ath Party. It raises an interesting question--and I don't know whether there is any sort of polling on this--the level of nostalgia for the past in Iraq, compared with the security and economic situation of the present.
It also raises the question as to whether at least some elements of Ba'ath ideology--particularly secularism and nationalism--might still have some appeal, especially against the sectarian divide of the current government.
I've read about the rise in Yugo-nostalgia even in Slovenia, which by all accounts has done much better for itself since it separated from Yugoslavia. Is there a similar phenomenon at work here?
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