At 4 PM Monday Iran time (or, about when it gets light here), anti-regime marches have been called in 20 Iranian cities. This is to be followed by a general strike Tuesday. The main flow of information out of Iran right now is not coming through traditional media — and especially not U.S. media — but via Twitter. Check the #iranelection Twitter feed for continuous updates. Stateside, the blog of the National Iranian-American Council has also been a good source.
Expect hundreds of thousands, if not millions, in the streets Monday. And expect crackdowns. The regime is in a hard place. They can’t give quarter to the protesters, but they also don’t want to create martyrs; the escalation of protests since Friday is very similar to the arc that brought down the Shah in 1979. This is already no longer about a disputed election, but about the legitimacy of the rule of the mullahs.
It’s also worth noting that Iran’s 2005 general presidential election was similarly suspect. Ahmadinejad was expected to finish third out of the four leading candidates, but slipped into second under dubious conditions, and then won the runoff. Is it any wonder the fundamentalists thought they could get away with fraud again this time? (After all, it worked even better for fundamentalists in Ohio in 2004 than it did in Florida in 2000…)
And speaking of American neo-cons, spiritual cousins to Ahmadinejad’s patrons, how despicable is it that the emerging narrative on wingnut sites seems to be that this stolen election is wonderful news, because it ruins Obama’s overtures and makes it more likely that Israel or even the US will launch military attacks on Iran? Rather than support the people in the streets in dozens of Iranian cities, demanding freedom and democracy, our wingnut friends want first to abandon them to Revolutionary Guard thugs (whose acts of violent suppression they’re clearly rooting for), then to bomb them. These cretins sure know how to win friends and influence people.
Welcome back ..
I have missed your posts.
There are many oddities with the Irani election. Given that the Farsi/Shia are onlyabout 50% of the population, it is hard to understand why no “minority” candidates were running.
As for the effect on the BHO/HRC foreign policy, seem to me that an illegitimate Iranian election will further drive the Arab states to work WITH Obama. Given Obama’s open hands policy, it will be very hard for Ahmadinejad to build alliances oreven maintiain his existing ones with Hezbollah.
Stupes and Pooper’s crowd. This is how they do.
Geov, what wingnut sites are you referring to? don’t doubt it, but kind of odd to make a statement like that and not even provide a single link.
Just imagine if the obama and the democrat party hadn’t spent the last 6 years demonizing bush and the iraq war…
The obama could tell the iranian people that with the help of the USA, your neighbor iraq held free and fair elections. The very same elections that your iranian government tried to undermine.
Oh well.
It’s being reported that people are raising their hands to the sky and chanting “Obama, please help us, they are killing our young children.”
Is the obama going to do something or doesn’t he care about children.
@4
Exactky what would you do? Invade?
Hi Geov. Good write-up.
I’m so proud of the Iranians. Their democratic reform movement is indigenous (self-made, not imported). Also, the opposition to their (Iranian) Cultural Revolution has largely been peaceful.
It’s important to note that Iranian democracy was derailed by the Bush Administration’s reckless labeling Iran as a member of the “Axis of Evil”. This pushed the Iranians, reluctantly, into the hard-liners camp. So this nascent democratic movement was set back at least 6 years.
Here’s to hoping the Iranians are able to make up for lost time.
That question is above my pay grade.
We can’t invade. Doesn’t iran have oil? Does the obama really want to start another war for oil? Or do you think the left wouldn’t chant “war for oil” over and over if the war was started by a democrat? Were these questions above your pay grade?
“how despicable is it that the emerging narrative on wingnut sites seems to be that this stolen election is wonderful news”
I suppose it’s no more despicable than a GOP candidate for state legislature hoping terrorists crash more planes into buildings and kill more people so he’ll have a better chance of getting elected:
“Congratulations Speaker Pelosi, now let the bombs fall where they may. My prediction: terror attack on domestic soil passenger aircraft within the next six months. Casualties in the 2-300 range. And, unfortunately, maybe that’s just what we need.”
— Posted by Mark Griswold on Sound Politics at 10:52 AM on November 8, 2006
http://blog.usefulwork.com/cgi.....ry_id=7430
@1 That’s because the mullahs have veto power over who’s permitted to run. Plenty of minorities, as well as plenty of women, were among the thousand or so that applied. None were chosen. That the hardliners would resort to election fraud against candidates they themselves vetted as permissible demonstrates the extent to which this is not about Mousavi or any other “reform” candidate, but the hopes that have been vested in them and the masses with those hopes.
@3 Sorry, I was in a hurry last night. Try this. (Note that Commentary can’t even get Ahmadinejad’s name right in the headline.) Or this.
@5: Just ignore the idiot Stamn. She has nothing useful to add to the conversation.
The point that fools like Stamn miss is that Bush pushed the Iranians to vote for Ahmadinejad in the first place. The Bush intervention in Iraq, his posturing during the last election and his aggressive (and all-provocative , no viable action) rhetoric screwed up Iran in the first place.
hey Stamm-
Obama could say right now “I do not recognize Ahmadinejad.” He could say “I support the Iranian people’s struggle for democracy, and hope the protests are peaceful. I call on the Iranian forces to not shoot on the people.”
He could say lots of things.
Is all that above your pay grade, too?
What is your pay grade?
Are you too stupid to offer ideas or solutions?
We know you can’t spell democratic correctly. Do you do that to look stupid and uneducated, or to be, and look, mean and small minded?
Are those questions above your pay grade, too?
If you think Obama should say something, don’t you think it might not help? Give the USA history of stealing elections in Iran, you know. So shutting up and being neutral might be wise. And let’s say Ahmadinejad stays in power, well we would want Obama to negotiate with him, right? Because we are not going to invade Iran. So isn’t Obama doing the right thing right now?
Oh don’t respond, I forgot, your pay grade is below everyone else’s on this site and you are uniquely disqualified from discussing solutions due to your stupidity. Sorry, I forgot! So, no response is needed.
As said by the person that wrote 62 words in response to me.
Priceless.
So, does being rich make you a better person? You must believe it otherwise you wouldn’t have made that point.
gbs is giddy over me being on welfare.
And because I’m on welfare he assumes I’m black. I wonder why?
Do you hate poor people too? Why don’t you do something to help me instead of your attempts at insulting me?
Are those questions above your pay grade?
@3 Choose any generic wingnut site and you’re there, because they’re all the same. Wingnuts are like ants, they stand around picking their noses until they’re told which direction to march, then they all march together, giving the ant salute all the way.
Let the Iranians run their country. If they want a crazy bastard at the helm, then so be it. I don’t care. Just get the hell out of the Middle East and stay out.
@4 I’m under the impression that under Bush during the last 6 years, Republicans did 98% of the demonizing.
@7 “That question is above my pay grade.”
Not to put too fine a point on it, but, so is everything else you post about.
@15 Stop driving your car so we don’t need their oil and we can.
@9 Geov
True enough but our system also limits who can and cannot run and is probably, despite BHO, getting worse as the news media become either dead or centralized.
I think we may see a test of the “Islamic Democracy” concept IF the mullahs are what they claim to be .. that is real devotees of the Constitution of Medina, they could overturn this election.
The result would be complex. There is nothing to say that an Islamic cleric controlled election would, even if democratic, lead to something like Hamas. The problem that would create is adding great credit to the ideas of Islamic Democracy and, therefore to the Muslim Brotherhood.
OTOH, if the clerics are sincere, we should be open to the possibility that Islamic Democracy might actually work.
That the hardliners would resort to election fraud against candidates they themselves vetted as permissible demonstrates the extent to which this is not about Mousavi or any other “reform” candidate, but the hopes that have been vested in them and the masses with those hopes.
Geov spews: “And speaking of American neo-cons, spiritual cousins to Ahmadinejad’s patrons…”
FUCK YOU, GEOV!
@20 John
For those of us who find misuse of eschatology confusing, is your intent to have consensual homosexual intercourse with Geov? .. or are you threatening to rape him?
BTW, is it eschatology you were practicing or some form of public leviticus?
13 Marvin, GBS is smarter than us. Remember, he owns two “luxry porches”. I’ll never forget that one as long as I live! Funny shit!
@18,
Are you going to stop driving your car, too?