Ahmadinejad Defends His 'Completely Free' Election While Iranians Riot in the Streets
I don't know what to say. Isn't rioting in the streets the appropriate reaction when your country is taken over through election fraud? What's the alternative, to reward theft? We've already seen what that did here!
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has defended his "completely free" re-election as Iran's president, amid violent clashes on the streets over claims of election fraud.
Mr Ahmadinejad condemned the outside world for "psychological warfare" against Iranians during the election.
Thousands have protested against the result, burning barricades on the streets of Tehran and clashing with police, who responded with tear gas.
Reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi urged his supporters to avoid violence.
Speaking on national television, Mr Ahmadinejad praised the Iranian people for choosing to "look toward the future" rather than returning to the past.
"This is a great victory at a time and condition when the whole material, political and propaganda facilities outside of Iran and sometimes... inside Iran, were total mobilised against our people," he said.
He blamed "foreign media" for instigating a "full-fledged fight against our people".
"Nearly 40 million people took part in a totally free election," he said.
However, the official result, which gave Mr Ahmadinejad a resounding victory - 63% of the vote against 34% for Mr Mousavi - brought the worst violence seen in Tehran for a decade, correspondents said.
The BBC's John Simpson saw secret policemen being attacked and chased away by protesters, which he says is extremely rare.
Some of the protesters in Tehran wore Mr Mousavi's campaign colour of green and chanted "Down with the dictator", news agencies report.
the theft of their country if we could figure out a way they could it from their cars. Kind of a drive-thru protest model... .
Imagine if we all flooded into our respective downtowns in our cars. The cops couldn't pepper-spray us, mounted police couldn't push us around and billy clubs wouldn't do anything. Not only that but it would shut down any area we protested in.
"Isn't rioting in the streets the appropriate reaction when your country is taken over through election fraud?"
Of course not! First, you send your political operatives in to make false charges and slow things down, then you send the question to a friendly Supreme Court and let THEM put the LOSER in as if he HAD won.
Just like America, circa 2000.
This is a snark intended mostly for upstate NY people. Could not resist.
Looks like Ahmadinejad has learned from his bosom buddy Hugo Chavez how to rig an election. No surprises here. In Iran it's Islam, in Venezuela it's "socialism"...same outcome...a dictatorship run by a belligerent power-mad idiot.
Chavez is a diappointment.
He is not a disappointment to the poor people in Venezuela he has empowered.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
If you think living a marginal life as a welfare recipient of a failing state, with bad food, horrible crime, incompetent medical care, 30% inflation and losing all your freedom is "empowerment", you are apparently grossly ignorant of real conditions in Venezuela...maybe you should go there and see for yourself (if you can survive)
Marginal by who's standard's?
There is no welfare per se, they are campesinos, they survive by subsistence farming.
The state is not failing.
Their food can be quite good although there may not a lot of it. The campesinos are very generous, they will share with you even when they have hardly enough themselves.
The crimes are against the campesinos by the Ricos.
The campesinos had no medical care, with Chåvez now they do.
This I dispute
Losing the rampant abuse of the Ricos IS empowerment.
You are the misinformed.
I have been up and down the entire west coast of South America for the better part of a year.
I did not travel tourist class. I traveled on buses and trains with the campesinos who sometimes had their chickens or the goats WITH them.
You are clearly an indoctrinated antagonist.
Have you ever been in South America at all?
Have you been anywhere else but here?
America does not resemble the rest of the world. Here we have the nightmare of suburbia.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
You think the crimes are against the campesinos? That's how ignorant you are. Street crime, murder, and kidnapping are endemic in Venezuela, against ANYBODY.
Have I ever been to South America? Yes. I have LIVED in Venezuela. My wife is Venezuelan. I travel there at least 2-3 times a year...we have a small home there, or will until Chavez's thugs steal it. (by "small" I mean 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom, a tiny kitchen and a hallway with a couch in it)
You dispute 30% inflation? Read Veneconomia.
You sound like a typical America-hater, jealous of anybody who has worked hard and has a little more than you have. You think "suburbia" is a "nightmare"? Spoiled brat.
On the one hand you say:
jealous of anybody who has worked hard and has a little more than you have.
On the other hand you say:
Spoiled brat
They would not, it seems to me, be mutually conducive.
I have worked very hard in my life, but I am not a materialist, I am an artist.
Suburbia is a nightmare, when we pass far into peak oil it will be shown to have been the greatest misallocation of resources we could have undertaken.
Here is James Kunstler on that very topic.
---
Robert Bottome of Veneconomia, it is said here ... is the brother of the main shareholder and director of RCTV, the Venezuelan television network that played an active role during the 2002 coup d'etat against Chávez ...
---
Venezuela's debt is pegged in dollars as is its oil income. The recent volatility has been hard on them as it has been on any country of that description.
The inverse relationship of oil and the dollar will continue. The dollar is a deeply flawed currency because of our profligacy and will fall. It may collapse.
The position of the oil exporters will change dramatically.
---
I don't hate America but I don't have much use for a number of Americans. Especially the imperialists.
---
I also have little use for rude people, you are rude.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
with the ball going to Alice X. Chavez is an asshole the people who ruled before him were asshole, Castro is an asshole , Batista was a bigger asshole, Daniel Ortega is an asshole , Somoza was a worthless son of a bitch, the list goes on and on Allende -Pinochet, Silva -more junta than you can throw a junta at. Lets get back to someone we can all despise Akdememtojerk and lets have solidarity to those fighting for what I think we all want, freedom to vote and security to know that it will count. We don't always get it , not even in America. That doesnt mean we shouldn't fight for it and cheer on people who do.Saludo to all who seek freedom and justice
or has he only empowered his friends, like every tin plate dictator...including bush
maybe they all learned by watching the Cons steal the election in 2000 and figured if it works in America...
is the first time we have paid attention or cared. The Ayatollahs have someone in there who does as he is told. Why screw it up with what is potentially an unknown quantity?
In Venezuela, it is Socialism.
Socialism is good.
Human nature is the problem in all systems.
Watch The War On Democracy by John Pilger here.
The USA for sixty years has routinely sought to overthrow democratically elected governments.
Hugo Chávez was one, but they failed. The poor people marched, the army took note and reapplied the constitution and the coup plotters headed for Miami.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
"human nature is the problem in all systems"????
OK, so you're not human?
I got a job that needs to get done. If you work really hard and do it well, I'll give you $10. If you do a half-assed job and screw around and end up with a mess I'll give you $10. If you sit on your fat kiester and do nothing I'll give you $10.
That, my friend, is "socialism", and if you think that job is ever going to get done, you are REALLY not human...probably from another planet.
The "democratic" election in Venezuela was anything but democratic...I know. My wife's sister worked at one of the polling places. We have photos of an entire truckload of un-counted "opposition" votes being burned. By the army. At the direction of Chavez.
Welcome to the real world.
You obviously do not have a clue what socialism is.
It is universal access to education and health care. Among other things.
Second hand anecdotes do not proof make.
Watch the War on Democracy and grow some gravitas.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Who is supposed to DO this health care and education, and all the other things you apparently think should be free of charge? The Socialist State: The doctors, educators, etc...DON'T GIVE A SHIT! Why? because they have no incentive to do a decent job.
Grow some reality.
Of course there is charge, it is paid for by the people that use the services, which is everyone. Via their organization in the form of the State.
When you take from the public sector and privatize you increase the cost.
The Germans have an excellent health care system, better than ours, it is universal. They speak very highly of it.
You are conflating Communism and Social Democracy.
Big difference.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Everyone gets what they need to live. If you want more, go get it. Actually a very simple concept.
Our own American Ricos have been talking this crap since Reagan came in. If you have $10, you unconsciously take the side of the capitalist in all things. If you want somebody to work for you, you should have labor codes and minimum wage and ooh, maybe even unions. Is there some danger for society in that? Some. What your tough-guy picture avoids is the fact that the boss can pay whatever he wants, and if someone will do the work, he'll pay the least possible, even if that makes for a penniless society of the Latin American kind with the vast slums of Venezuela, or anywhere else where your crazy view took hold.
Note that I'm only partially for Chavez.
that Capnmike gets all his information from the media. He's surely to their talking points down pat. If anyone came to North America and only watched our media, that person would assume that life has been one huge bowl of cherry ice cream here.
Romeny is saying Obama speech is not working. I think this is the best
evidence there is that his speech is WORKING!! Those people are pissed!
Our fat asses sat in front of the tube when our election was stolen!
I think the people of Iraq may prevail this time.
Iran.
Just as germaine here.
Glenn Greenwald on various topics here.
On Iran:
(4) Speaking of Iran, I don't have any idea what really happened with its presidential election -- if, as Juan Cole argues, there was widespread fraud, that would be entirely unsurprising -- but Newsweek's long-time Middle East reporter Christopher Dickey persuasively warns against the emerging assumption that the anti-Ahmedinejad views expressed by middle class and cosmopolitan Iranians and promoted by the Western press are representative of a majority of Iranians. In Brazil, if you ask middle class, professional and/or educated Brazilians what they think of President Lula da Silva, you would conclude that he is an intensely despised figure, when -- in reality -- he is profoundly popular among a majority of Brazilians largely due to the deep support from that country's poor and under-education population (much the same way that you'd get vastly disparate responses if, in 2004, you went to Manhattan and then to rural Kansas and solicited opinions of George Bush). Dickey suggests that the same dynamic exists in Iran.
The point is, a politician that poor people like is often hated by the elite, for the obvious diametrically opposed reasons.
Witness Chávez, Juan Evo Morales etc etc.
Greenwald misses the mark in talking about George Bush, the people in Kansas are not all poor, but poor or not they are more likely to fall prey to that sort of delusion.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
!
My previous comment done somewhat better here
Also from Greenwald here
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
about the legitimacy and strength of the opposition to Ahmedinejad, is mealy-mouthed and ill-informed.
The commentary Greenwald refers to by Christopher Dickey, ignores the economic mess in Iran that has affected everyone, the poor worst of all. Ahmedinejad has done nothing for them, and the country runs deficits and is in recession in spite of its huge oil wealth.
The fact is, nobody really knows what's going on in Iran. Especially today, but this has long been the case. Americans aren't much better informed about the country than they were in 1979, when the CIA completely miscalculated the depth of opposition to the US puppet Shah. 30 years of isolation, without diplomatic relations, hasn't helped the situation. Obama's speech was a good start, but nothing concrete has happened to engage with Iran.
Are there riots outside Tehran, in the countryside? Or is this only happening in the capital? Who knows?
What about the power struggle between Ahmedinejad and the Muslim clerics? Who's got the upper hand? Who knows?
Iran is not Brazil or Venezuela. The latter aren't Muslim theocracies pretending to be democracies. Iran has a huge population of educated, underemployed young people, many of whom are new voters, spread around the country. They are the major force for change, economically and politically.
The non stop US anti Iranian rhethoric has guaranteed confusion.
We guaranteed chaos beginning in 1953 with the CIA's overthrow of the duly elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mosaddeq and the installation of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi.
Here is my previous comment.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Yes, there is 50+ years of bad faith and 30 years of isolation between the US and Iran.
But that's mere background to the situation today. The only relevance it has is that the US - and the west in general - really doesn't know what's going on the ground in Iran.
This could be the beginning of a new dictatorship. If the riots continue, the result could be mass arrests, suppression of moderate political parties and cranking up the anti-Israeli rhetoric to distract the people.
It is already a dictatorship, it is Theocracy!
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Which would be ok with us if they were on our side.
I really get a kick out of the west when they throw fits about other countries not doing what they want them to do.
The US supports multiple dictators in former Russian states and has no issues when their *elections* always deliver the same results and protesters are beaten and killed.
The west are the *last* people that should be complaining.
Bush was a crazy ideologue beloved our our American Ricos, and their religious nutcase pals.
sorry Capn. Now lets get on with Iran
I walked past Harvard University today, and a large number of local Iranians were protesting this farce election- several told me internet is down in Iran, and they feel for their families back home. I was curious if this will lead to a revolution in Iran, but nobody i spoke to seemed to feel revoution was in the cards..
I hope the right wing hatred for Iran in this country is not towards the Iranian people- they want freedom as much as we do..
(I suspect it's just more right wing hatred of all Muslims)
The right wing does not care about people at all. It's money that concerns them. More money means more power to get more money. That's the right wing in a nutshell.
That describes them to a T.
They worship at the altar of the Almighty $$$$$$$$$.
too true.
What is your conceptual, continuity?
Where I was reading an article about this election in Iran.
From the report I read,msnbc I think, It stated that the Iranian govt
stifled internet access, and text messaging .
They saw how this country used the internet and modern communications during the last election here. And they cut it off.
Yep, they stole that election. They learned well from our elections in 2000 and 2004. Ahhh, America. The guiding light.
What is your conceptual, continuity?
Why else would we be torturing people?
Or mebbe because the Neocons wanted to be cool?
What is your conceptual, continuity?
Said that Obama's speech last weak assured Ahmadinejad's re-election. The opposite has occurred. Obama's visit has empowered the Iranian people that there is a new sheriff in the White House that is willing to reach out to them.
Romney refers to all Mulsims as 'Jihadists'- yet cries foul when people attack his Mormon 'religion'.
Like I've said before, Mitt Romney looks like a department store mannequin and has the brains of one too. Also, the son of a bitch has no convictions. He just takes a view of something that will give him political advantage, and then changes his opinion five minutes later.
I always thought he looks like Ted Danson.
It should be noted that Iran's hardliners were warning against a "velvet revolution" should the vote not go a certain way. In other words: The election results will be what the hardliners want and we will brutally suppress any attempt at a "velvet revolution" or in this case "green revolution".
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
reports that tell exactly how Ahmadinejad 'stole' this election? What am I missing here?
People are mad that they lost? There is at least 40% of the electorate in every election that is pissed with the outcome?
what exactly did they do?
what really happened.
>Isn't rioting in the streets the appropriate reaction when your country is taken over through election fraud?
Did it happen in America in 2000?
most people were at the mall spending money that they did not have, to furnish houses that they could not afford. Oh, my bad. That was 2004.
Obviously they want change there.
With their population being predominantly younger people because of the Iran/Iraq war, it's just a matter of time.
But time is a luxury the world doesn't have when it comes to the hardliners in Iran.
Imagine if Iran formed beneficial ties to the west. That could only be a good thing.
What is your conceptual, continuity?
Isn't rioting in the streets the appropriate reaction when your country is taken over through election fraud?
Put on proof? And don't forget Florida...
Seriously, the worst part of this issue is the OBVIOUS ethnocentrism running rampant. Here we have a very conservative, primary poor country and a populist President.
If half of the bloviators whining about this actually knew anything (or gave a fuck about) about the people of Iran, this result, legitimately achieved unless proven different, would not surprise them.
So, yes, CERTAIN PARTS, mostly middle-class urban, OF THE POPULATION WANT CHANGE. But that doesn't mean the MAJORITY does...
I agree wholeheartedly.
Where are the International election observers.
Because this or that party feels aggrieved that such and such as result did or did not occur.
Because this or that circumstance should have resulted in this or that outcome.
None of this amounts to proof in my mind.
The world needs to step back and gather facts before passing judgement.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
was over there observing and she reported from Akmenajads(whatever) bedroom that the elections were free and fair. She also said she was going down with his staff for a penentrating and probing anal ysis of his throbbing victory and she will report on his climaxing speech as is spews forth on her face and in her Twitter.
All kidding aside , she is over there and reported from his headquarter that the elections were free and fair ...just like the 2000 Flordia election
And her observation or lack thereof proves what?
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
...Andrew Sullivan, "...the president of Iran's own election monitoring commission has declared the result invalid and called for a do-over."
He links to this- but I can't read Farsi.
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
and she should know rigged elections
I will forever associate that picture with her name.
"Where are the international election observers."
Where indeed? Countries have to agree to admit observers, usually through the UN. They don't just show up.
As for "the world needs to step back and gather facts before passing judgement" - all well and good, but what about the facts we now know? Like the fact that Mousavi is under house arrest? That some of the major muslim clerics have declared the election illegitimate?
Show me the links.
The 'house arrest' so far is a rumor.
Asserting rumors as facts damages the credibility.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Look up just a bit.^
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
how do we know this?
Iran doesn't allow any foreign election observers. According to Ibrahim Yazdi, Iran's ex-foreign minister:
"There were many, many irregularities. They did not permit the candidates to supervise the election or the counting of the ballots at the polling places. The minister of the interior announced that he would oversee the final count in his office, at the ministry, with only two aides present.
"In previous elections, they announced the results in each district, so people could follow up and make a judgment about the validity of the figures. In 2005, there were problems: in one district there were about 100,000 eligible voters, and they announced a total vote of 150,000. This time they didn't even release information about each particular district.
"In all, there were about 45,000 polling places. There were 14,000 mobile ones, that can move from place to place. Many of us protested that. Originally, these mobile polling places were supposed to be used in hospitals and so on. This time, they were used in police stations, army bases, and various military compounds. When it comes to the military compounds and so on, if even 500 extra votes were put into each of the 14,000 boxes, that is seven million votes.
"Mousavi and Karroubi had earlier established a joint committee to protect the peoples' votes. Many young people volunteered to work on that committee. But the authorities didn't let it happen. Last night [that is, election night] the security forces closed down that committee. There is no way, independent of the government and the Guardian Council, to verify the results."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/thenation/20090613/cm...
Don't you mean appointed president? Like GWB in 2000? Except theirs was appointed by the ayatollahs, and ours was appointed by the Supreme Court.
If people anywhere actually gave a fek about anything we would not have the world we have now.
We just ignore the evil and the past and pretend that it never happened and that *we don't do that*.
And it does not matter if it is the US, Europe or the Middle East.
I wish my fellow human would finally get their heads extracted from their rears.
But that would first require them to realize that that is even the case.
negative reality to get their attention. Loss of jobs, loss of homes, loss of health care. Too bad that is what it takes to get some people's attention. Now do something about it all.
The election may or may not have been fair. But by your logic, Barack Obama would not be our legitimately elected president because so many wingnuts are going crazy.
Giving you the benefit of a doubt, what?
He means to say that by the amount of whining by the wingnuts the election that Obama won must have been phony.
If we look at Obama's results, it is an even closer call then in Iran.
Then it would be like what? 55 - 45%
(remember, the US uses the Electoral College system)
me off so much about our Foreign Policy over the last decade. Iran as with Mynmar (Burma) you have people with backbone and balls willing to stand up to the status quo and demand their rights, They are unarmed for the most part and facing death or at least imprisionment and being Cheneyed (tortured). What is our greatest accomplishment over the last 8 yrs for Democracy..invading Iraq...We had to in order to bring change there you say.Before we invaded when was the last time you saw street demonstrations in Bagdhad or elsewhere for that matter We were the key to their sucess, we had to provide the backbone and balls for a whole country to gain its freedom, was it worth the thousands of lives lost, changed or shattered. I will let you make up your own mind, I believe you know how I feel about wether it was worth it or not. Even Afganies were fighting when we invaded and helped them out.I would gladly fight beside those young people in Tehran just like it would have been an honor to protest alongside those red robed monks in Mynmar. Dissent in the name of freedom is a virtue, when it is against overwhelming odds and almost certain death it is without a doubt the purest form of Patriotism
To how comfortable the average person here lives. Washington D.C. is a foreign and alien place for most citizens, as far as they're concerned what goes on there doesn't change their everyday life. The media keeps them entertained with schlock like American Idol, and Who wants to... shows. The food is laced with high fructose corn syrup and other shit that makes you fat and unhealthy, and Big Pharma has a pill for just about anything that ails you. We not living in 1984 here, we're living in a Brave New World.
All of that I would say is the reason half the country bother's to vote, and why no one really did shit when Bush ran off with the election in 2000 and why the people in Minnesota have allowed Coleman to act like a 3 year old and make a mockery of the electoral system.
it would have been better if they (Iraq) had asked for our help.
if they had tried to help themselves first
Some of the protesters in Tehran wore Mr Mousavi's campaign colour of green and chanted "Down with the dictator", news agencies report.
Make of that what you will.
Learning from color revolutions
By Stephen Gowans
A common complaint made against critics of color revolutions, the Western-engineered insurrections that have brought neo-liberal governments to power in Serbia (the 5th October Overthrow), Georgia (the Rose Revolution), and Ukraine (the Orange Revolution), and have been attempted in Zimbabwe and Belarus, is that they err in minimizing the degree to which these revolutions are spontaneous, grass-roots-organized eruptions of popular anger against oppressive “regimes.”
Read on...
!
Neo-Liberal?
You got to be kidding... the only thing those *revolutions* have resulted in were pro-western pseudo-dictatorships or oligarchies.
The demonstrations in Belarus were completely ignored by the west (except for the typical 'communist' comments) and the dead protesters did not have any effect at all.
Should we really talk about Georgia or the Ukraine? The Ukraine where the 'rebel' victors split and one now cooperates with the former 'enemy' (aka. the one that tried to poison him.. with dioxin [which you can kill someone with by knocking them over the head with]).
Tank,
Neoliberal means economically liberal - laissez faire economics, also referred to as voodoo economics, trickle down economics, Reagonomics, Thatcherism, etc. Supply side economics.
Supply side economics always leads to a tsunami of oversupply from a combined oversupply of goods and a collapse in demand.
http://renjie.posterous.com/twitterers-postin...
Doing much better than CNN at reporting what is actually happening
too bad I don't read Farsi
George W. Ahmedinejad stole the election. The only thing he lacked was an Iranian Katherine Harris, a brother who was governor of an Iranian province who's votes he needed to put him over the top and a court stacked with 5 of 9 justice picks from his party to seal the deal.
But hey, Ahmedinejad maneuvered the same end result so I guess it didn't matter. More than one way to get to the center of a Tootsie pop.
Excellent! We should call him that; it'd probably make his head implode.
But then, maybe we shouldn't...
George Walker Ahmedinajad it is!
HAAaaaaaaaa. it's a beautiful thing.:)
What is your conceptual, continuity?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/13/iran...
Got to hand it to the Iranians. They're not rolling over when their presidential election got stolen.
So Iranians are rioting,... Americans, in the same situation, yawn, & turn on TV. The day that Iran becomes an example as to what to do for us,... *sheesh*!
change the channel and pass the Happy Meal.
is saying it was a coup, that the votes wern't even counted. Akmentaljerk pulled a coup.
RFE/RL: Dozens of people have been detained. Do you expect things to get worse? Do you expect more pressure?
Journalist: We’re sitting in our newsroom now. Three came from the Interior Ministry and took away a member of our newspaper staff. They just came and took away a journalist. Do you understand the depth of the tragedy? What happened in Iran is unprecedented. They've performed a coup under the cover of democracy, under the cover of elections. This has not happened before; they don’t say who they are. They don’t say it was a coup. Pakistan said it. Hitler would say he’s a Nazi. Mussolini would say, "I’m a fascist." You knew where you were standing.
A skin has been shed here. The Islamic republic has ended; from now on, it’s an Islamic regime. From now on, a republic doesn’t exist [in Iran] anymore; democracy doesn’t exist anymore. These people will not vote anymore, and [authorities] don’t need people’s votes anymore. It’s a turning point. Exactly 30 years and four months after the 1979 Revolution, the republicanism of the establishment was lost. I want you to show the depth of this tragedy. No one comes to detain you while you’re sitting in the newsroom. You don’t go to prison. Just show the depth of the tragedy.
Where was Redstate when Bush stole the American election?
http://www.redstate.com/dan_mclaughlin/2009/0...
The complete link here.
News Middle East
Iran election dispute fans unrest
Media restrictions
A range of communications have been disrupted inside Iran since election day, including those which could be used to organize protests.
Text messages could not be sent from mobile phones on Sunday, and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter were not working.
Police said 170 people had been detained
over the protests [AFP]
Several foreign news organisations complained that Iranian authorities were blocking their reporters from covering protests against Ahmadinejad's re-election.
German public television channels ZDF and ARD said their reporters were not allowed to broadcast their reports, while the Dubai-based Arab news channel Al-Arabiya said its Tehran office was shut down for a week.
Throughout Sunday, protesters opposing the election results clashed with riot police.
Police were still in the street as night fell and said they had detained 170 people over the protests.
Police have detained more than 100 reformers, including a brother of Mohammad Khatami, a former president, a leading reformer said. A police official denied Khatami's brother had been arrested.
Earlier in the day protesters had set fires and smashed shop windows, while police lashed back
What is your conceptual, continuity?
Pepe Escobar on the election. here
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
but i think now is a good time for the state dept and cia to search out the leaders of the opposition...and fund them
oh wait...bush outed the cia heads who were watching iran
never mind
They already are.
Nonviolent Imperialism: Major Revision
March 10, 2008
A revision to Michael Barker’s earlier article.
(Donations to the Iranian opposition and 'think tanks':) - I
Iran ($1.4 million) Groups funded include: Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation, American Center for International Labor Solidarity, Center for the International Private Enterprise, Civic Education and Human Rights, Institute of World Affairs, International Republican Institute, Iran Teachers’ Association, National Iranian-American Council, Vital Voices Global Partnership, and the Women’s Learning Partnership. For further discussion of the NED’s work in Iran, see here.
Makes you wonder how much credence you should give to pro-western civil society organisations, doesn't it?
.
iran was afraid of the "obama" wave
in lebanon, hizbollah was kicked out on their asses....and according to reports, this was due to the good feelings that obama is sending into the region...that america is now open to really talking
whwhwhaaahahahaha
its obama bitches...
bush is 8 years of epic fail
Comments are closed on this entry