I can not say that I was following Leb politics closely enough to have really had an opinion on whether Amin Gemayel would win or not, so I make no claim to prior analysis, nor of deepest insight into the elections itself.

However, I think this line is 100% spot on (that is not only the obs is correct, but that it is in fact true):

There is one explanation [for Gemayel's loss/poor showing], however, that has become common wisdom in the region: Mr. Gemayel’s doom seems to have been sealed by his support from the Bush administration and the implied agendas behind its backing.

“It’s the kiss of death,” said Turki al-Rasheed, a Saudi reformer who watched last Sunday’s elections closely. “The minute you are counted on or backed by the Americans, kiss it goodbye, you will never win.”

There is quite a lot of truth in that, especially now. And in Leb Land, after the American's utterly moronic positioning on the Israeli Summer War, above all. But elsewhere as well.

The paradox of American policy in the Middle East — promoting democracy on the assumption it will bring countries closer to the West — is that almost everywhere there are free elections, the American-backed side tends to lose.

Emphasis added.

The problem is indeed the emphasised part - although not alone. There seems to be a magical, utterly unexamined belief in "secularism" and in addition that "secular allies" will bend to the slightest inane whims of the US administration.

Lebanon’s voters in the Metn district, in other words, appeared to have joined the Palestinians, who voted for Hamas; the Iraqis, who voted for a government sympathetic to Iran; and the Egyptians, who have voted in growing numbers in recent elections for the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood. “No politician can afford to identify with the West because poll after poll shows people don’t believe in the U.S. agenda,” said Mustafa Hamarneh, until recently the director of the Center for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan. Mr. Hamarneh is running for a seat in Jordan’s Parliament in November, but he says he has made a point of keeping his campaign focused locally, and on bread-and-butter issues. “If somebody goes after you as pro-American he can hurt you,” he said.

Harmaneh's a good fellow I may add. I know his family. I'd characterise him as pro West (he's also a Xian by the way).

Sheer incompetence is doing really truly impressive damage to American long-term interests, and worse yet, long-term collateral damage to wider Western interests.

Soaring rhetoric followed by blundering and then utter hyprocrisy (as in, for example the Palestinian issue and Hamas - rather than taking a divide and conquer approach to Hamas, the Americans followed the bidding of the more cretinous and frankly racist wings of the Israeli establishment, and have blundered into supporting the grossly corrupt and incompetent Fatah... because it's "secular.")

In part, regional analysts say, candidates are tainted by the baggage of American foreign policy — from its backing of Israel to the violence in Iraq. But more important, they say, American support is often applied to one faction instead of to institutions, causing further division rather than bringing stability.

Well, on this critique I'd say that's more an Israeli and Leb Land issue than elsewhere; excepting the issue of Islamist styled parties.

Arab liberals who have embraced America continue to see their influence fade in the region, as more conservative and Islamist forces continue to rise, Mr. Rasheed said. Voters invariably frown on strength coming from abroad, he said; the only legitimate sources of strength any Arab politician can turn to is based on either tribal power or religious ties.

“Last Sunday we saw that even if you are a former president running for a seat in Parliament, in a small area where everybody knows you, you can’t make it either with American support,” Mr. Rasheed said.

Emphasis added.

A few nuances: of course in the Middle East the tribal issue is important, where in the Maghreb or Egypt it is not (or not in the population centres in the latter case) - but the have community street cred is of course universal and what country in the world has a populace the directly appreciates foreign influencing of its elections? Bloody hell, the Americans are positively paranoid freaks in this area even when they have far less to worry about (as anyone who's ever had to listen to American nutters going on and on about the UN can tell you).

Now, when one has good grass-roots connexions and intelligence (as, ahem, certain countries do, but not the US which normally has fuck-all sense of the real interplay), one can perhaps play the pick-the-winners game without oneself getting severely played. Perhaps. But the Americans playing that game? Good bloody fucking luck. They got played in Iraq under their fucking noses, and still are.... Better strategy would be to cut deals with the winners, and aim to only keep out the truly unacceptable (a la Iranian Revolution: but there's a nice hint, always have friends among all the parties, as one never has permanent friends, but one does have permanent interests).

Of course Arab Liberals have had and will for the foreseeable future no fucking base at all, so they're a losing bet to start with.

For much of the past year, Lebanon has been caught in a major confrontation between the American-backed March 14th movement, which helped force Syria out of Lebanon in 2005 and won a parliamentary majority that year, and the Iranian- and Syrian-backed opposition movement led by Hezbollah and Gen. Michel Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement.

Sunday’s vote was widely seen as a bellwether for the country’s political leanings in that confrontation.

Lebanon’s Christians are generally more sympathetic to the United States than are other Arabs. But the tension between Prime Minister Fouad Siniora’s American-backed faction against an Iranian-backed one was palpable in last Sunday’s election.

Pity here the article misses that Xians are not just Xians, but come in different flavours (although in this instance that's not so relevant since they're all Maronis) - the Orthodox in my experience are for more favourable to Hezbullah and far less to the Americans due to their experiences under Israeli occupation (well and rivalry with the arrogant Maronis, and a host of other influences, and of course a truckload of other nuances that make this nothing more than a weak tendency....)

Leaving that aside, again here with the US having zero street cred (and having been perceived as encouraging Israeli bombing, and indiscriminate action), while also piling onto the Sinioura faction not only a fictional "Berlin Wall coming down" image (*ahem* as one might say, looking at Hariri's past) but also utterly delusional expectations as a point of power and leverage against Syria...

And despite an expected sympathy vote — Mr. Gemayel was running to fill the seat vacated by the assassination of his son Pierre — and the former president’s name recognition, Lebanese Christians in the mountainous Metn region, along with a smattering of Shiites and others who live there, voted for the more unlikely team: one allied to Hezbollah, seemingly sympathetic to Iran and Syria, and most of all, in opposition to America.

“Our problem with March 14th is not that they are aligned with the U.S., but it is their policies,” says Alain Aoun, a nephew of General Aoun, who says American support has magnified tensions while emboldening the ruling majority to resist compromises. “We call on the U.S. to learn from this experience; they should not take part in any internal conflict or take sides. They should support all Lebanese.”

The problem is not necessarily the support itself, Mr. Nassif said, but that it invariably skews conflicts, worsening rather than easing sectarian and ethnic tensions.

“When the U.S. interferes in favor of one party, their interference leads to an explosion,” he said. “The U.S. openly says it supports the Siniora government, but it should say we support the Lebanese government.”

Emphasis added

Embolding to resist compromise is of course the fatal mistake - hubris on the part of Siniora - although perhaps American pressure with its weak understanding of real dynamics and magical conception of its own influence in region at present.