For me, any sensible discussion of Iran must accept a number of facts. I will set these out as Set A and Set B. Both sets are true. But ideologues of the right routinely discount Set A, while ideologues of the left routinely discount Set B. That is why most debate on Iran is inane.
Set A
Iranian Islamic fundamentalism allied to fierce anti-Americanism was born from CIA intervention to topple democracy and keep in power a ruthless murdering despot for decades, in the interests of US oil and gas companies
Iranian anti-Americanism was fuelled further by US support for US friend and ally Saddam Hussein who was armed to wage a murderous war against Iran, again in the hope of US access to Iran’s oil and gas
The US committed a terrible atrocity against civilians by shooting down an Iranian passenger jet
Iran is surrounded by US military forces and has been repeatedly threatened to the extent that the desire to develop a nuclear weapon is a reflex
There is monumental hypocrisy in condemning Iran’s nuclear programme while overlooking Israel’s nuclear weapons
Set B
Iran is governed by an appalling set of vicious theocratic nutters
Iran is not any kind of democracy. It fails the first hurdle of candidates being allowed to put forward meaningful alternatives
Hanging of gays, stoning of adulterers, floggings, censorship and pervasive control are not fine because of cultural relativism. Iran’s whole legislative basis is inimical to universal ideals of human rights.
Iran really is trying to develop a nuclear weapons programme, though with some years still to go.
There are two very good articles on the current situation in Iran. One from the ever excellent Juan Cole. I would accept his judgement on the elections being rigged.
http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/class-v-culture-wars-in-iranian.html#comments
The other from Yasamine Mather, which puts it in another perspective.
http://www.hopoi.org/articles/elections%20June%202009.html
I am not optimistic about the outcome of the popular protest.
Jives
If you claim that the CIA is behind these protests, and you fail to support them, then you objectively (to use an old marxist term) support the present regime as far as I am concerned. Tell me you don’t and I will accept it. Technicolour, I have made no links between oppression of women and wanting to bomb Israel. Craig has already stated that Iran is aiming to become a nuclear power, and I agree. A regime that is secretive, repressive and facing internal problems (pace North Korea) is more likely to use nuclear weapons than a democracy. As for Ahmadinejad’s conciliatory tone towards the West I think you must read different information to me. This is a man who denies the Holocaust and wants to liquidate (I use the term in its Stalinist sense) Israel (or move it to Europe, and welcomed the global recession that has caused so much hardship in the West. Under his stewardship repression has increased and, as I have said before, Iran now leads the world in executing people, per capita. The Iranian people deserve a better future.
Jon I am sorry if I have used swear words (I don’t recall it), but I think you will find that I have been more abused than abusing, on a ratio of about ten to one I would say. I also try to keep posts short, in contrast to the offensive nonsense spouted by KevinB and VB.
@technicolour,
Are you and eddie the same poster?
What millions of people, are you atlking about?
The few hundreds gathered Gucci Crowds, filmed in tight camera shots are now getting presented as millions?
show me the wide camera shots, and let us debate from there on.
Yes Iran is an incredibly rich country, do you not know that either?
The real estate prices in Tehran are higher than London, for your information; for the price of an average apartment in Tehran you can buy a flat in Mayfair, London.
As for the rest of your comment, eddie deserves every insult anyone can heap upon it.
Eddie-Troll should be ignored. He gets his kicks by getting up people’s noses here. It’s the only reason he posts.
——-
The arrogance of the ‘US/UK combo’ is really appalling. Imagine the reaction if there was even a hint of Iranian “tinkering” in UK or US elections (although Diebold can do it). The self-righteous outrage would resound around the world, and Iran would be branded the most evil of evil. Again.
We don’t know for sure what the CIA may or may not have done in Iran, but the idea that they did nothing at all is not one of my options.
Ahmadinejad has indeed been conciliatory. I’ve read him carefully, and I watched his interview with Jon Snow. He didn’t deny the Holocaust, but said he questioned the numbers. He followed that by saying that the Palestinians weren’t responsible for it. (Oddly enough, the instantaneous translation that I heard at the time was not the same as what appeared on the Channel 4 website as a transcript, later.)
I don’t see anything very radical there. The question of the numbers who died in the Holocaust has been discussed on this blog before, and most people seemed to agree that there was nothing wrong with anyone suggesting further study of the figures. The ‘official’ figures are apparently disputed by scholars anyway, as I understand it.
Ahmadinejad was also wrongly quoted/translated regarding ‘wiping Israel off the map’. He never said that, and to my knowledge, the BBC admitted as much afterwards.
We are all well aware of the US capability for demonising those whom they wish to overthrow/oppress, and the gullibility of their citizens, who are easily duped by speeches and reports in the MSM — the same MSM who don’t bother their arses (neither here nor there) making a genuine effort to give their readers the truth, or even an approximation of it.
I would love to see a new generation of (freelance?) journalists who would take great pride in getting as close to the truth as was humanly possible. But I’m not holding my breath. And that’s depressing.
This looks like a pretty balanced news report:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6506536.ece
CIA blah and historical context aside, of course. Unless I’m missing something? It agrees with VamosBandidos that ‘yuppies’ srtated it off, joined by perhaps a million or so other people (excuse my use of the plural, and yes, I saw wide angled shots of packed avenues quite unlike the lame staging in Baghdad.) If it’s only a few yuppies, VB, why are the regime cutting off the media?
Mind you, it’s not that nice about Moussavi, either. This all reminds me of the Yeltsin story, actually. And look who the poor Russians are stuck with now.
@ eddie.
I don’t buy your Manichean simplification eddie,sorry.
To echo G.W.Bush at the outset of the War On Terror>” You’re either with us or with them…”
I didn’t buy that appalling simplification then and i don’t subscribe to it now.
To answer your direct question though> No i don’t at all support the current regime but nor do i support the CIA’s meddling in other countries and cultures affairs.I support the Iranian peoples right to a free democratic process.Whether the CIA can achieve that is,at best,moot to me.I have read enough history to know the CIA always work to their own agenda.
“America has no friends only interests…”
Cheers.
Abe, I know, I meant, Security Service, I think in my almost dyslexic haste I had conflated the titles Security Service with the Secret Intelligence Service. Thanks for pointing it out though.
Eddie:
“Technicolour, I have made no links between oppression of women and wanting to bomb Israel.”
“Iranians actually want more theocracy, more hanging of Gays, more oppression of women so that they can then expose 9/11 and the Holocaust as Jewish conspiracies. Then they can build their nuclear bomb and nuke Israel. Perhaps we are all Ahmadinejad now.”
So yes, you did. You probably think you were being ironic. But in attempting, no doubt, to defend the choice of freedom and democracy, you were conflating fact (the Iranian regime oppresses women/hangs gay people) with fiction (the Iranian regime/Ahmajinedad want to build a nuclear bomb and nuke Israel) and presenting both as a truth of the current regime’s mindset.
No matter what Mr Murray thinks (sure you can make your own mind up) there are conflicting reports about whether Iran is trying to develop a nuclear bomb at all, as I’m sure you know. Never mind wanting to “nuke” Israel: how would that help the Palestinians? There is no need to demonise the regime by raising spectres. You should read Ahmajindedad’s letter to Bush urging peace: its tone may surprise you.
Jon, thanks, much appreciated indeed – though it’s hard to maintain calmness sometimes!
Technicolour, I know that outside of the UK and USA, people seem to accept that the state does horrible things to people – it’s ‘secret’ but open knowledge. It’s only here that we seem to believe otherwise. The CIA had an unmarked complex but everyone knew where it was. That doesn’t mean that they didn’t do lots of covert things about which people did not know.
That the BBC won’t interview pro-regime Iranians comes as no surprise.
I’m not a fan of Ahmedinejad or theocracy, not at all, but I know how US power works and in the case of the Middle East, it is not benificent.
The movement in Iran may well have genuine aims and reasons to be deeply upset. But, in view of past experience – some of these examples I have already mentioned – I think it highly likely that it is being manipulated by the CIA.
I wonder how many of us actually know Iranian people living in Iran, I mean, individuals.
I discoursed recently – over the web – with an educated Iranian woman in Tehran who over the course of time has been critical of Ahmedinejad and the political class in general and her words to me were:
“I would rather have Ahmedinejad’s dog as president than be ruled by the USA”.
@ dreoilin: “The question of the numbers who died in the Holocaust..The ‘official’ figures are apparently disputed by scholars anyway, as I understand it.”
I hope that you were talking about a relatively small error as might occur in any estimate from documentary evidence (e.g. 5.75 instead of 5.9 million). The kind of estimates that anti-semites have promoted are typically orders of magnitude smaller, and so amount virtually to denial (which is now a crime in several European countries), e.g. Richard Williamson the right-wing cleric who claimed that the true figure was 4 or 5 % of the usual estimate.
A countervailing view:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8103292.stm
It’s good to know that someone at the BBC remains awake even after the David Kelly Affair.
Here’s the full piece: I think it’s important, it comes from international sources, including some American ones:
Poll hint at plausible Iran vote
Supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi
Supporters of Mr Mousavi may be louder rather than greater in number
The official result in Iran’s disputed presidential election could plausibly reflect the will of the people, a group of international pollsters says.
An independent poll three weeks ago had Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ahead of his closest rival by a similar 2:1 ratio.
Runner-up Mir Hossein Mousavi has claimed the election result was fixed.
The research was conducted by US-based polling organisations Terror Free Tomorrow, the New America Foundation and KA Europe SPRL.
“We found that President Ahmadinejad was leading by a substantial margin,” Ken Ballen from Terror Free Tomorrow told the BBC World Service.
The nationwide poll was conducted between 11 and 20 May and consisted of 1,001 random interviews covering all 30 provinces of Iran. It had a 3% margin of error.
Its results gave Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a 33.8% share of the vote, more than twice as much as Mr Mousavi with 13.6%, and with Mehdi Karroubi and Mohsen Rezai trailing on less than 2% and 1% respectively.
Respondents says none of the candidates in 7.6% of interviews, while 15.1% refused to answer and 27.4% said they didn’t know.
“Whether or not this would have changed, or whether Mr Ahmadinejad would hold that lead which would have translated into a victory, that’s where the unknown factors arise,” Mr Ballen said.
Cautious
According to official results Mr Ahmadinejad, the incumbent president, won 62.6% of votes cast. Mr Mousavi trailed with 33.8%.
“It’s a plausible result, but the way the Iranian government handled it raises lots of questions,” Mr Ballen told the BBC.
FROM BBC WORLD SERVICE
More from BBC World Service
His polls predicted that no candidate would pass the 50% threshold for an automatic win, and a second round would take place between the two highest finishers.
In the 2005 presidential elections, the leader in the first round, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, lost to the runner-up, Mr Ahmadinejad, in the run-off.
Mr Ballen said the independent survey was a rarity in Iran, where polls are normally carried out by state agencies.
“It is not a society that allows independent polling or exit polling or election monitors or independent monitors so its very hard to ascertain whether or not the results actually reflect the will of the people,” he said.
However, the large number of students now protesting against the results was also in keeping with the findings and did not necessarily reflect the will of the whole country, Mr Ballen said.
“The only groups we found in Iran that were supportive of Mousavi or [among whom]… he was competitive with Ahmadinejad were university students, university graduates and the highest-income Iranians.”
Other groups, such as Azeris, to whom Mr Mousavi was considered likely to appeal because of his Azeri background, also showed stronger support for Mr Ahmadinejad ahead of Mr Mousavi.
Only 16% of Azeris said they intended to vote for Mr Mousavi, compared to 31% who said they would vote for Mr Ahmadinejad.
“We need to be cautious in drawing a conclusion,” Mr Ballen said.
“We know it [the election] wasn’t free and fair but to jump to the next conclusion that Mousavi would have won with a landslide, we don’t have hard scientific evidence for that.
“But we do have evidence pointing in the other direction, that the result may have been valid.”
For anyone seriously interested in the interplay of events on the ground in Iran and external influences, then please visit and read this analysis – http://www.onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_308.shtml.
There is accurate comment there and much food for thought.
For anyone concerned about any semblace of scientic accuracy of the poll in Iran – consider these views – per. “Washington Post” – http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061401757_pf.html
For anyone concerned about any semblance of scientic accuracy of the poll in Iran – consider these views – per. “Washington Post” – http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061401757_pf.html
The article in the Washington Post is an eye-opener, and my thanks to the contributors who brought it to the readers’ attention. This is the kind of contribution we need, that increases understanding; a refreshing change from matches of profane insults and sermons on conspiracies.
Technicolour – yes I was being ironic, it seems to be the only thing that works sometimes. I have no evidence that Ahmadinejad would like to nuke Israel, but I agree with Craig that he is seeking to develop the bomb, and since he affirms a) that there are no Gays in Iran and b) that he wants to see Israel wiped off the map (and all this nonsense about translations etc is just dissembling) I think he is not to be trusted. A lot of Iranians think so too.
Should one trust any politician?
We were assured that ‘Iraq had WMD’ – but no, they didn’t. Actually, it was quite obvious that Colin Powell was the reluctant liar at the UN when he presented that shameful dossier. Uranium from Niger? False story, entirely made-up by the SIS, as Valerie Plame’s husband proved.
Did you trust Tony Blair? Alasdair Campbell?
George W. Bush?
Colin Powell?
Condoleeza Rice?
Did we trust them? What did they do?
Who exactly is wiping people off the map, right now?
Many Iranians – even some of those who voted for them – don’t trust their politicians, so perhaps they are wiser than we.
No! Otherwise, thanks Eddie, but this nonsense about translations I don’t think is just dissembling. It really matters as to whether Ahmajinedad expressed a wish to see the Israeli government (regime) wiped off the map (or “expunged from the pages of history”) or whether he wanted to annhialate (sp?) the whole Israeli population (“Israel”).
At times I might have wished the Blair regime both wiped from maps and expunged from history (I mean, how awful was it?) but this did not mean that I wished for the obliteration of the entire British people. Do you see?
I don’t know what the Iranians think (feel?). The one Iranian I know looks scared. I don’t know whether Ahmajindedad is to be trusted over a used car. I am pretty sure that no-one wants to be blown to kingdom come, which has been the suggestion behind previous US regimes’ sabre rattling.
Agreed, Suhayl. I think I would choose Ahmajinedad’s dog over most of them. Do you think we do get the leaders we deserve? It doesn’t seem so.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel
I have read up a lot on this and the only conclusion is that he is dissembling. Regime = country, no question. He seeks the elimination of Israel. Whether it is Gays, Israel or Holocaust denial he uses the same tactics over and over again – he flies a kite and then denies it, or gets his people to say that he has been mis-translated. It is transparent.
“Lost in translation”
‘Experts confirm that Iran’s president did not call for Israel to be ‘wiped off the map’. Reports that he did serve to strengthen western hawks.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/jun/14/post155
“e.g. Richard Williamson the right-wing cleric who claimed that the true figure was 4 or 5 % of the usual estimate.”
–Abe
No, I didn’t mean that at all. I was talking about the fact that the figures, of necessity, can’t be 100% accurate. I had recently been reading here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust
Are You Ready For War With Demonized Iran?
By Paul Craig Roberts (ex-Assistant Secretary of the Treasury during Reagan years)
June 16, 2009 “Information Clearing House”
— How much attention do elections in Japan, India, Argentina, or any other country, get from the US media? How many Americans and American journalists even know who is in political office in other countries besides England, France, and Germany? Who can name the political leaders of Switzerland, Holland, Brazil, Japan, or even China?
Yet, many know of Iran’s President Ahmadinejad. The reason is obvious. He is daily demonized in the US media.
The US media’s demonization of Ahmadinejad itself demonstrates American ignorance. The President of Iran is not the ruler. He is not the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. He cannot set policies outside the boundaries set by Iran’s rulers, the ayatollahs who are not willing for the Iranian Revolution to be overturned by American money in some color-coded “revolution.”
Iranians have a bitter experience with the United States government. Their first democratic election, after emerging from occupied and colonized status, in the 1950s was overturned by the US government. The US government installed in place of the elected candidate a dictator who tortured and murdered dissidents who thought Iran should be an independent country and not ruled by an American puppet.
The US “superpower” has never forgiven the Iranian Islamic ayatollahs for the Iranian Revolution in the late 1970s, which overthrew the US puppet government and held hostage US embassy personnel, regarded as “a den of spies,” while Iranian students pieced together shredded embassy documents that proved America’s complicity in the destruction of Iranian democracy.
The government-controlled US corporate media, a Ministry of Propaganda, has responded to the re-election of Ahmadinejad with non-stop reports of violent Iranians protests to a stolen election. A stolen election is presented as a fact, even thought there is no evidence whatsoever. The US media’s response to the documented stolen elections during the George W. Bush/Karl Rove era was to ignore the massive documented evidence of real stolen elections.
Leaders of the American puppet states of Great Britain and Germany have fallen in line with the American psychological warfare operation. The discredited British Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, expressed his “serious doubt” about Ahmadinejad’s victory to a meeting of European Union ministers in Luxembourg. Miliband, of course, has no source of independent information. He is simply following Washington’s instructions and relying on unsupported claims by the defeated candidate preferred by the US Government.
Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, had her arm twisted, too. She called in the Iranian ambassador to demand “more transparency” on the elections.
Even the American left-wing has endorsed the US government’s propaganda. Writing in The Nation, Robert Dreyfuss presents the hysterical views of one Iranian dissident as if they are the definitive truth about “the illegitimate election,” terming it “a coup d’etat.”
What is the source of the information for the US media and the American puppet states?
Nothing but the assertions of the defeated candidate, the one America prefers.
However, there is hard evidence to the contrary. An independent, objective poll was conducted in Iran by American pollsters prior to the election. The pollsters, Ken Ballen of the nonprofit Center for Public Opinion and Patrick Doherty of the nonprofit New America Foundation, describe their poll results in the June 15 Washington Post. The polling was funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and was conducted in Farsi “by a polling company whose work in the region for ABC News and the BBC has received an Emmy award.” – You can find their report here
The poll results, the only real information we have at this time, indicate that the election results reflect the will of the Iranian voters. Among the extremely interesting information revealed by the poll is the following:
“Many experts are claiming that the margin of victory of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the result of fraud or manipulation, but our nationwide public opinion survey of Iranians three weeks before the vote showed Ahmadinejad leading by a more than 2 to 1 margin — greater than his actual apparent margin of victory in Friday’s election.
“While Western news reports from Tehran in the days leading up to the voting portrayed an Iranian public enthusiastic about Ahmadinejad’s principal opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, our scientific sampling from across all 30 of Iran’s provinces showed Ahmadinejad well ahead.
“The breadth of Ahmadinejad’s support was apparent in our pre-election survey. During the campaign, for instance, Mousavi emphasized his identity as an Azeri, the second-largest ethnic group in Iran after Persians, to woo Azeri voters. Our survey indicated, though, that Azeris favored Ahmadinejad by 2 to 1 over Mousavi
“Much commentary has portrayed Iranian youth and the Internet as harbingers of change in this election. But our poll found that only a third of Iranians even have access to the Internet, while 18-to-24-year-olds comprised the strongest voting bloc for Ahmadinejad of all age groups.
“The only demographic groups in which our survey found Mousavi leading or competitive with Ahmadinejad were university students and graduates, and the highest-income Iranians. When our poll was taken, almost a third of Iranians were also still undecided. Yet the baseline distributions we found then mirror the results reported by the Iranian authorities, indicating the possibility that the vote is not the product of widespread fraud.”
There have been numerous news reports that the US government has implemented a program to destabilize Iran. There have been reports that the US government has financed bombings and assassinations within Iran. The US media treats these reports in a braggadocio manner as illustrations of the American Superpower’s ability to bring dissenting countries to heel, while some foreign media see these reports as evidence of the US government’s inherent immorality.
Pakistan’s former military chief, General Mirza Aslam Beig, said on Pashto Radio on Monday, June 15, that undisputed intelligence proves the US interfered in the Iranian election. “The documents prove that the CIA spent 400 million dollars inside Iran to prop up a colorful but hollow revolution following the election.”
The success of the US government in financing color revolutions in former Soviet Georgia and Ukraine and in other parts of the former Soviet empire have been widely reported and discussed, with the US media treating it as an indication of US omnipotence and natural right and some foreign media as a sign of US interference in the internal affairs of other countries. It is certainly within the realm of possibility that Mir Hossein Mousavi is a bought and paid for operative of the US government.
We know for a fact that the US government has psychological warfare operations that target both Americans and foreigners through the US and foreign media. Many articles have been published on this subject.
Think about the Iranian election from a common sense standpoint. Neither myself nor the vast majority of readers are Iranian experts. But from a common sense standpoint, if your country was under constant threat of attack, even nuclear attack, from two countries with much more powerful military establishments, as is Iran from the US and Israel, would you desert your country’s best defender and elect the preferred candidate of the US and Israel?
Do you believe that the Iranian people would have voted to become an American puppet state?
Iran is an ancient and sophisticated society. Much of the intellectual class is secularized. A significant, but small, percentage of the youth has fallen in thrall to Western sexual promiscuity, to personal pleasure, and to self-absorption. These people are easily organized with American money to give their government and Islamic constraints on personal behavior the bird.
The US government is taking advantage of these westernized Iranians to create a basis for discrediting the Iranian election and the Iranian government.
On June 14, the McClatchy Washington Bureau, which sometimes attempts to report the real news, acquiesced to Washington’s psychological warfare and declared: “Iran election result makes Obama’s outreach efforts harder.” What we see here is the raising of the ugly head of the excuse for “diplomatic failure,” leaving only a military solution.
As a person who has seen it all from inside the US government, I believe that the purpose of the US government’s manipulation of the American and puppet government media is to discredit the Iranian government by portraying the Iranian government as an oppressor of the Iranian people and a frustrater of the Iranian people’s will. This is how the US government is setting up Iran for military attack.
With the help of Mousavi, the US government is creating another “oppressed people,” like Iraqis under Saddam Hussein, who require American blood and treasure to liberate. Has Mousavi, the American candidate in the Iranian election who was roundly trounced, been chosen by Washington to become the American puppet ruler of Iran?
The great macho superpower is eager to restore its hegemony over the Iranian people, thus settling the score with the ayatollahs who overthrew American rule of Iran in 1978.
That is the script. You are watching it every minute on US television.
There is no end of “experts” to support the script. For one example among hundreds, we have Gary Sick, appropriately named, who formerly served on the National Security Council and currently teaches at Columbia University:
“If they’d been a little more modest and said Ahmadinejad had won by 51 percent,” Sick said, Iranians might have been dubious but more accepting. But the government’s assertion that Ahmadinejad won with 62.6 percent of the vote, “is not credible.”
“I think,” continued Sick, “it does mark a real transition point in the Iranian Revolution, from a position of claiming to have its legitimacy based on the support of the population, to a position that has increasingly relied on repression. The voice of the people is ignored.”
The only hard information available is the poll referenced above. The poll found that Ahmadinejad was the favored candidate by a margin of two to one.
But as in everything else having to do with American hegemony over other peoples, facts and truth play no part. Lies and propaganda rule.
Consumed by its passion for hegemony, America is driven to prevail over others, morality and justice be damned. This world-threatening script will play until America bankrupts itself and has so alienated the rest of the world that it is isolated and universally despised.
Why O Why, there is this English disease of looking for exceptions, minorities, and odd balls, and legislating/catering/citing for/from these?
eddie keeps going on about Gays, so what about Gays? Are Gays a huge majority? Is being Gay a mandatory? What the hell is the Numbers of Gays in the world?
Are the numbers of killed gays as many as the one and on half of one million killed Iraqis? or five million Iraqis made into homeless refugees?
On the other hand are the numbers of killed Gays as many as four million homeless Palestinians, because the Jewish Supremacists stole their lands, and kicked these out? Or is the numbers of these killed Gays as many as the two million Gaza residents kept in the bigest open air concentration camp in the world by the Apartheid Jewish supremacist state?
Then what the hell is this incessant moans about Gays, and bloody Jewish Supremacists, this eddie so much whines on, and, on, and, on, …….
http://tinyurl.com/n2s4mr
Ahmadinejad Won. Get Over It
///
…Western media, most American “Iran experts” overstated Mir Hossein Mousavi’s “surge” over the campaign’s final weeks. More important, they were oblivious ?” as in 2005 ?” to Ahmadinejad’s effectiveness as a populist politician and campaigner. American “Iran experts” missed how Ahmadinejad was perceived by most Iranians as having won the nationally televised debates with his three opponents ?” especially his debate with Mousavi.
… .. the same aides concluded that Ahmadinejad’s provocatively impressive performance and Mousavi’s desultory one had boosted the incumbent’s standing. Ahmadinejad’s charge that Mousavi was supported by Rafsanjani’s sons ?” widely perceived in Iranian society as corrupt figures ?” seemed to play well with voters.
… .Some “Iran experts” argue that Mousavi’s Azeri background and “Azeri accent” mean that he was guaranteed to win Iran’s Azeri-majority provinces; since Ahmadinejad did better than Mousavi in these areas, fraud is the only possible explanation.
But Ahmadinejad himself speaks Azeri quite fluently … . during the campaign, he artfully quoted Azeri and Turkish poetry ?” in the original ?” in messages designed to appeal to Iran’s Azeri community. (And we should not forget that the supreme leader is Azeri.) The notion that Mousavi was somehow assured of victory in Azeri-majority provinces is simply not grounded in reality.
///
An excellent article written by someone who actually can discern his elbow from his keyboard.
Why the west made no noise about unelected person being isntalled as PM of india-
because that man-bastard manmohan singh is a west’s stooge and he has been installed on behalf of the west on Indian public. this bastard did not win elelction nor he did any electioneering.
THE INDIAN PUBLIC HAS BEEN BOOTING OUT THE GOVTS. AFTER GOVTS. AS TERM EXPIRES BECAUSE INDIAN PUBLIC DOES NOT WANT SO CALLED LIBERALIZATION AND PIRATE CAPITALIST SUYTEM BUT THE POLITICANS INT EH PAY PACKET OF BUSIENSS MEN AND MEDIA BEING PIMPS OF CAPITAL HAVE BEEN NULLYIFYING TH ELECTION RESULT FOR LAST 15 YEARS. THIS SYSTEM WAS BROUGHT TO INDIA BY THE AMERICAN AGENT MANOHANS SINGH WHO BRIBED THE MPS TO KEEP THE NEAO LIBERAL AGENDA OF HIS UNCLELCTABLE GOVT. BOth IN 1993 and 2008. such people swear a lot by democracy aswell.!! What that has done to the indian elelction process is that it has made the result of Indian elelction as farce as of any american or british elelction result. During 60s and 70s and even 80s the Indian masses used to celebrate elcetion time as a festival of choice -the people power to take account of the polictiicans -therefore there was a large turn out of people in voting. but having seen that even after toppling the govt. the new govt from oppositon is made to act just like previous one-looking after interest of business class and corrupt traders-the Indian public is getting tired of voting and the voting tally is going down from 85% to 65 %. this is exactly what the corrupot business class want-the people to be depoliticised. and that is the tactics the Indian corrupt business sclass has imported from britian and usa. 7th october, 2008 even after the obvious faliure of free markeeters in america this americna gen manmonan singh ( a person who is not only unlelected but unelectable-he sttod for lower house of parliament but was throughly defeated by the elctorate-then he entered parliament through uppwer house-like house of lords from where he is not supposed to become prime minsiter at all-but law was circumvented for him) such is the democracy we are talking about) not been killed frhh treason but also not chastised this manmhan singh is a charlaton whose theory fits with fit with Milton Friedman’s “greed is good” Chicago School mumbo jumbo. Both Friedman and Kemp believe that what is good for the stock market is good for America, ignoring the shocking economic polarization that has divided the nation. Now, more and more people are beginning to see that Friedman was a charlatan who provided ideological cover for obscenely rich financiers and their dodgy investment scams. may 9th , 2007. This ( rejected thrice by the public in general election) prime minister(installed at american behest) manmaohan singh is trying to enter parliament again through vack door-he filled nomination through assam with help of sonai gandhi congress(of whoioch he is not a leader or person of any singificance). such is the democracy we live in. i thought democracy meansd people electing the party and primeminister to be elected through that elelctable persons. but as for american definigitn of democracy like in stooge s in afggansitana nd iraq we have an americana tooge who doe snot need to boyther wabout indian opinion because he has not been s-chosen by the indian people for the post but isntalled by a foreing country to make idnia run for foreing.es nbenefit. and we are celebrating 150 yrs of what? return of the company and corporate again?(not called ast or west india company this time but same nevertheless).. the media now decries that the polling rate in india is rapdly going down that in india where the people have always been enthusiatic to vote. doe sit not occur to media that pepel are now refusing to rubber stamp the primeminsiter sna his cabinet when the people have already rejected such lots and still unelectable person gets chosen as prime minister of foren minister(jaswant singh) with no popular support anbut only because angloamerican agents in india want that to be. For several general elections the people have rejected the so called loiberalization and wasnhington consensus policy of govet. of india but each time new govt is elected the media astrats telling that economic and foreing policy msut not change even though people have overwhelmingly voted against that. media brings erronaeous cause for defeat of incumbent govt. like secratarianism and all russbih but never mentions that people have thrown that american dictated policy being pursued by both parties. Such is the genesis of indian electorate’s disilluionment with voting -all due to corruption of media and jourtnalists along with the busisness class of india(these days traitor FICI is organising more conferences than the govt. of India for inter-ministerial meetings!. How India is being treacherously enslaved by angloamerican agents likes of (unelectable and defeated in democratic election ) this Pm manmohan singh and the english media inside india. a great misconception is that so caled liberalization and globalization was brought to india by this manmohan singh. In fact soon after victory in iraq war in febraury 1991 the bush no. first declared a new world order in which he explicitly said that he will open up the world for american business. In fact his trade seccratary immeditealy annomnuced that she will make sure that america open up the thighs of thrid world countries (Like as with a vice ) as a slwoly and surely to american business(true analogy to a rape)-that was given the name Liberalization and globalization for which the british and americans had been working since 1986. What was left for america to do was install maleable stooges inside the thrirld world countries. escpeally those types who are unelctable and have no mass base of their own– in other words who are not elelctable democratically but installed from above through media and other manipulations. this manmohan singh in india fulffiled that criteria of being unliked and unelctable insignificant person who was willing to act on arder of his american masters -if they had asked him to turn communist he would have done that.It is this traitor manmohan singh who informed america of impending Indian nuclear test in 1993 and also who openly said that iran pakistan inida pipe line would be difficlt to finance -just because his americans masters did not want that! It isa sad refletion on india that since 1986 we have has only weaklings as our prime minsiters and fincnace minsiters not to speak of non mentionable defence misnters who made sure that Indians nuclear and missle programme got stuck at 1986. ” Modus operandi of british and american scumbags –Groom an opposition candidate to run against the guy you hate, pay him well and line up your media to back him. During the campaign, sell him as the savior of the bourgeois opposition who lost their money in the revolution. Use your own pollsters and media propaganda to convince his followers that they are going to win by a wide margin. When your guy loses, scream “FRAUD!” It’s akin to yelling “FIRE!” in a crowded theatre, inflaming all those disappointed bourgeois counter-revolutionaries. Get them out on the street, setting fires, playing the victim, waving flags, ready-to-go placards, banners, women crying in front of CNN and BBC cameras and men yelling angrily ” Rubin, Summers and Geithner are credited with managing the global economy through the turbulent nineties, including the Mexican, East Asian, Russian and Latin American financial crises. This narrative glosses over the role they played in forcing countries, particularly in Asia, to liberalize financial flows. A New York Times account from February 1999 noted: “It was American officials who pushed for the financial liberalization that nurtured the speculation (even if developing nations themselves welcomed it). And it was American bankers and money managers who poured billions of dollars into those emerging markets. Then, when the crisis hit, American officials insisted on tough measures like budget cuts and high interest rates, which many economists argue made things worse.” Summers and Rubin were the point men for liberalization, which led to the rise of oligarchic billionaires and financial panics that saw huge outflows of funds, currency devaluations, mass impoverishment and Western capital sweeping in to cherry-pick industries at fire-sale prices. march, 2007 –this unelectable (and
three times defeated in democratic elections ) so called prime minieter manmohan singh is a blot on the face of democratic india. he is there aonbly because the anglosaxon powers wanted him there instead of sonia gandhi(who wouldnot have been that maelelable to english speaking world-master race as this stooge manmohan is). this manmohan singh has been very unpopular in democratic election losing even when there was a wave in favour of congress. he has not even let pujab select his d=congress pqarty for assembley election in 2007 so mucn unpol;ular he is. but he is very popular amnost the anglosaxon media and govert. therefore he is popular amonst the english media and all the angloamerican stooges theat you find in any thirld world aka allwi,Ahmed Chalabi(of iraqi traitor fame) mubarak types. manmohan singh is a yeltsin of india-very pouilar amonst enemies of india exactly because he has sold india cheap to thse amngloamericn interests. now the idito indian elites are pro=jecting this imbecile manmohan singh as some intelecutal -whoever heard of e=an economist as a scintist or intellectual espceaccilly the economist who foolws voddo ecnomy of chaicago school? even granted someone is educated what thse iditot elites of india are saying is that a geek with =zero personality and nil oratory power with no public fowwlloping should become a leader of 1.2billion people without being unecleted or despite losing elelction in genral elelctions. three times. ofcourse with no personality and a rote knowledge of chicago peudo-economics this imposter on indian poilctical scene is a cancer to the very name of democracy and decency.he is very very dishonet-he lies at he drop of hat (indo american nuyclear pact, indians defence procurements, agricultrual disaster inside india -which caters to 75% of indian population0.), this manamohsn singh has papuperized india and weakned the idnian defence forces. During the period from 1992 onwards the indian defence forces has weakened to one third of its ablity during this traitors helm at finance minsitry and primeministreship. this fellow has made indian air force virtually a camel air force.manmohan singh is responsible for tracherous indo nuclear pact and for dragging his feet over delay procumrent to indian air force jsut to please his real masters the angloamerican interests.
As ever, with Eddie the irony runs rampant.
“and since he affirms a) that there are no Gays in Iran and b) that he wants to see Israel wiped off the map (and all this nonsense about translations etc is just dissembling)”
Dissembling you say? Bloody marvellous! How free of shame you are Eddie, a true inspiration to gits everywhere.
a) Ahmadinejad did not say there are no gays in Iran, capitalised or otherwise. He merely said that Iran didn’t have gays like we in the West have gays. And he’s right! There are no men in latex short shorts, crotchless chaps, or cabaret chanteuse cocktail dresses in Tehran’s inner city. I don’t know about everyone else but me I could live with that. But what with your fixation on it Eddie, I’m half given to thinking you might want to scratch Tehran of your travel itinerary – ‘nightlife too boring’.
b) The old ‘wipe Israel off the face of the map’ chestnut is just the lie that wouldn’t die isn’t it? As for regime = country, just take it as read, Eddie, that we’re all laughing in your face. And quite right too, that being such a chronically bad argument. Why don’t you get in touch with the OED and tell them they have two entries when they only need one? I’ll say it again, what Ahmadinejad said of zionism in Israel is mirrored precisely in what Reagan said of the Soviet Union. If it’s alright for Ronny, it’s alright for Mahmoud
Speaking of ‘say it again’, that’s a thing one is doomed to do forever when it comes to our Eddie. He has his talking points (identical to the media’s funnily enough) and that’s all we’re ever going to get (just like the media). And you have tag-team partners I notice Eddie. Are they you or are they other individuals? If the latter, do you ever meet? Is there a secret handshake? Or are you in the same office?
No whinging now, Eddie. If you’ve got the game you may as well have the name. (Don’t you love it how that phrase makes way more sense arse-about like that?) Anyway, under this rubric why don’t we just call you out – you’re a disinfo spook. Protest away, say that that ain’t you etc. but we got your number mate, and your pathetic bleating won’t make a lick of difference.
Happy Clappy/Nobody- you both seem to have issues with Gay people. I assumed that most of the people on these boards were broadly speaking of the left, and therefore that you (broadly speaking) would support certain universal principles, such as human rights, freedom of thought and religion, equality for women, equality for Gay people, an acknowledgement of the horrors of the Holocaust, democracy etc. Perhaps I am wrong, in fact I know I am wrong as there seems to be as much intolerance here as among the far right, and, as I have always said the differences between the BNP and some of you lot are slight. Your regular and violent abuse of me is evidence of that.
From The Guardian – in a speech made at Columbia University September 2007.
“In Iran, we don’t have homosexuals. In Iran we don’t have this phenomenon. I don’t know who has told you we have it,” Mr Ahmadinejad said to laughter and cries of disbelief from the audience of students and university staff. Homosexuality is illegal in Iran, and sodomy punishable by death.
Is that clear enough for you? Lost in translation again?
As for wiping Israel off the map I have provided the link that sets out the discussion on that topic. Don’t you think, in your heart of hearts, that, in a country where “Death to America” has been the main government slogan for the past thirty years that “Death to Israel” (its proxy according to you) might, just might, touch a chord? Did you not see the reception that Ahmedinejad received when he returned from Geneva? So I fear it is you that is dissembling over this issue. And anyway, what if he did? According to another post above the President has no power so it is irrelevant. Cake, eat.
eddie basically keeps presenting the Obama/Brown/Zionist line time and time again on this thread.
Our hearts should bleed about the fact that some Afghan girls are not getting ‘a proper education’ but slaughtering thousands in Afghanistan on systematic and regular basis is fine……not really a moral issue at all.
Read Paul Craig Roberts above. The ‘green’ US-backed colour revolution is the mostly the Iranian high-earners yearning for a return to the days of the Shah so that they get down to looting their country properly.
genuinely independent polls before the election showed Ahminejad as the clear 2:1 leader….
……and why would iranians want to elect persons who are the preferred candidates of their greatest enemies, US/UK/Israel.
Read eddie the Troll and believe the exact opposite of every disgusting word that comes out of him.
Anyone genuinely interested should read “Unspeakable Love. Gay and Lesbian Life in the Middle East” by Brian Whitaker. It is a chilling account of tyranny, torture and murder.
I have stopped posting comments on Guido’s blog because of the smutty homophobic sneers he allows against Mandelson and other public figures who happen to be gay (which is quite irrelevant to their public performance). I’d be sorry to have to do the same here.
I think the people attacking Eddie sound far more horrible than he does.