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Iranian Election: The Revolution Will Be Youtubed (pg. 23)
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| Magnetonium |
The Supreme Leader(s) of Iran, just like any other extreme authoritarian regime, think that there is a serious case of Western conspiracy / intervention directed at them, and that all those protesters were paid for by C.I.A. and British to come out on the streets. They fully don't understand that Iranian people want a modern country and society. I remember so many people on these forums were supportive of Iran and Ahmadinejad, well, where are they now?
I said it before and I'll say it again, every Iranian intention under Khamenei and his gang is evil in nature. Nuclear energy - of course its meant for weapons. Just look at how well they lie through their teeth about everything. Voting irregularities. Number of protesters. Ignoring human rights and social issues. Lying to the inspectors and the international community. Bastards. |
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| Chryz707 |
| lets not forget, controlling and limiting the internet and eavesdropping on its citizens as well... |
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| hardcore trancer |
| quote: | Originally posted by Chryz707
lets not forget, controlling and limiting the internet and eavesdropping on its citizens as well... |
Speaking of that, we talk to alot of people inside Iran since we have family and friends there. The other night we called one of them and then right after the conversation someone (from the Basij) called their house and told them if they catch them talking to anyone outside of Iran over the phone regarding Iran's situation they will be dealt with. :( :whip: |
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| Fir3start3r |
| quote: | Originally posted by hardcore trancer
Speaking of that, we talk to alot of people inside Iran since we have family and friends there. The other night we called one of them and then right after the conversation someone (from the Basij) called their house and told them if they catch them talking to anyone outside of Iran over the phone regarding Iran's situation they will be dealt with. :( :whip: |
:eek:
Lets hope they don't decide to follow through just for the heck of it...:( |
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| hardcore trancer |
Here is a sober analysis of the situation in Iran:
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http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/midd...iran_06-24.html
GWEN IFILL: Apparently absent from the unrest continuing in the streets of Tehran these last few days was the man whose declared electoral defeat started it all, Mir Hossein Mousavi.
His wife, Zahra Rahnavard, is a prominent academic who campaigned with her husband, an unprecedented step in Iranian politics. Today, she issued a statement calling for the release of those who have been arrested.
Together, they are the face of the opposition. But who are they? For more, we turn to Haleh Esfandiari, the director of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. In 2007, she was detained by the Iranian government for three months.
It's been 12 days since that election, Haleh Esfandiari. Are Mousavi and his wife now the face of the opposition?
HALEH ESFANDIARI, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars: Yes, they are. I think I would call them the accidental face of the opposition, because when Mousavi started running, he probably never thought that he would galvanize and mobilize such a huge number of people. And, you know, I believe his wife had a lot to do with this prominence of Mousavi, and she is by far more outspoken than he is.
GWEN IFILL: How is that there has been room for her to be so outspoken in a country that's so seen by Westerners as being kind of repressive when it comes to women's rights?
HALEH ESFANDIARI: She made room for herself. She just walked in -- or walked out of Tehran University hand in hand with her husband, and that was a first. She was the first president of a university, of a women university in Tehran. She's been an academic, a scholar, an outspoken advocate for women's rights.
GWEN IFILL: I gather you have actually met?
HOOMAN MAJD, Author-Journalist: Yes, yes. And I saw her about, I guess, 10, 12 days before the election itself.
And I was at the first rally that she -- the first rally of the campaign, May 23rd, which former President Khatami attended, and actually Mousavi himself didn't attend, but his wife did. And she spoke, and she gave a rousing speech and got an incredible standing ovation and people screaming for her.
She really did become, as Haleh pointed out, a real -- kind of, in a way, she was the face of the campaign for a while, more so than Mousavi himself.
GWEN IFILL: Was that anyone's intention? Was it an intention in any way for her to seemingly overshadow him? And what does that mean now?
HOOMAN MAJD: I don't think it was the intention. I think it happened, and Mousavi, I think, went along with it quite happily. I don't think he was unhappy about it.
He seems to have been, certainly, you know, encouraged her to be as vocal as she wanted to be. She was very, very vocal when I saw her, saying all kinds of things, like that her Islam doesn't allow for the government to impose its views on the people, things like that, which have never been said by any candidate today ever.
So what does this say about Mousavi? Is he now kind of absent? I want to ask you to follow up on something Haleh said. Do you think he was the accidental face?
GWEN IFILL: And today she used terms like "martial law" to describe what's going on, on the streets.
HALEH ESFANDIARI: Yes.
GWEN IFILL: So what does this say about Mousavi? Is he now kind of absent? I want to ask you to follow up on something Haleh said. Do you think he was the accidental face?
I think it was -- yes, I do. One person in Tehran told me, after the first huge demonstration, and Mousavi attending that 3 million person demonstration, he said to me, "He's probably sitting at home going (speaking Farsi) which in Farsi means, 'My god, what a mistake I made. Why did I get myself into this?'"
I think that was kind of a half of a joke. It was -- he was being half-serious there. I think there might be a little bit of that. There was a little bit of that. It was like, "Oh, my god, what have I unleashed here?"
Because I don't think there was ever the intention on Mir Hossein Mousavi's part to become this symbol, a revolutionary symbol that he has turned into in Iran.
GWEN IFILL: He didn't expect this uprising, at least?
HOOMAN MAJD: No, not to the scale that it's been.
And, you know, one thing to remember about all this and when we start talking about revolution, "revolution" is perhaps too strong of a word, because let's not forget that, even if we assume that Mousavi won this election, even if we assume that, by as large a margin as is claimed that Ahmadinejad won, that still puts 35 percent of the people with Ahmadinejad, and that's a large number of people.
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| hardcore trancer |
| Iran does posses one of the best spying technologies in the region, I believe it is very close to the one that the U.S. used on its own people after 911. They can more less hear everything and anything that comes in and out from anyones phones. We cant even talk to our relatives the way we want to these days.:mad: |
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| jerZ07002 |
| quote: | Originally posted by hardcore trancer
Iran does posses one of the best spying technologies in the region, I believe it is very close to the one that the U.S. used on its own people after 911. They can more less hear everything and anything that comes in and out from anyones phones. We cant even talk to our relatives the way we want to these days.:mad: |
apparently the US system uses totally automated software to detect keywords travelling through international phone routers based in the US. I don't think the US used that on its own people.
I'm sure Iran has very similar capabilities (maybe not as sophisticated) because 1) the software, in crude form, is available commercially, and 2) the regime controls the telecommunications network, unlike in the US where commercial interests control the telecommunications network. |
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| Shakka |
Latest from the Economist.
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Is the dream already over?
Jun 25th 2009 | TEHRAN
From The Economist print edition
The authorities may succeed in quelling the street demonstrations. But the crisis is far from over, especially as the ruling clergy quarrel among themselves
Reuters
Reuters
THE roller-coaster that liberal-minded Iranians boarded as they agitated en masse against a suspect presidential poll seemed to hit the buffers on June 20th, when a banned demonstration was met with lethal force. Millions of Iranians remain incensed by what they see as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s fraudulent victory over his main challenger, the reformist Mir Hosein Mousavi, in the election of June 12th. But far fewer now seem ready to take the risk of venting their anger on the streets. For all that, it may not take much to provoke another popular eruption. A fresh spark may yet be provided by the unusually public struggle for dominance over the Islamic Republic that has erupted within the ruling clerical establishment itself. The crisis may indeed be moving from the street to the back rooms of the mosque.
Aiming for a resolution of sorts, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, and the man who has the last say on all matters of state, issued a dramatic ultimatum in a sermon on June 19th. Addressing a huge television audience, he dropped his customary pose of impartiality in electoral politics, siding with Mr Ahmadinejad and warning Mr Mousavi’s supporters that further street protests would lead to “violence, blood and chaos.”
To the surprise of many Iranians, who do not as a rule associate reformist leaders with political courage, Mr Mousavi refused to call off a demonstration that had been planned for the next day, nor did he retract his demand that the results be annulled and the election held again. But the result was a pitifully unequal struggle between demonstrators hurling stones and tens of thousands of Revolutionary Guards and voluntary militiamen, known as the baseej, armed with truncheons, water-cannon and automatic rifles.
According to state-controlled media, a score of people have been killed. Other reports put the figure much higher, and say that several hundred have been injured. The government said that 40 brave baseej had been hurt. Some residential areas in central Tehran resembled war zones. The protesters have exalted the image of a beautiful young woman, Neda Agha Soltan, who was photographed in a demonstration in Tehran as she lay dying after being shot by an unknown assailant.
An edgy calm has now descended on the city. Protests in Tehran and other towns, such as Isfahan, Kerman, Shiraz and Tabriz, which witnessed huge displays of public dissent after the election result was announced, have since got smaller, letting the authorities tackle the people they regard as instigators of the troubles.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based lobby, more than 40 journalists have been arrested since the elections and at least 450 political campaigners imprisoned, severely limiting the ability of Mr Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, the lesser of the two reformist presidential candidates, who is also demanding fresh elections, to plan their next move or even communicate with their supporters. Several senior colleagues of Muhammad Khatami, a reformist former president, have been arrested, along with at least a dozen journalists close to Mr Mousavi’s campaign, according to a website that is tracking events.
Fearing a backlash, the authorities have so far refrained from arresting Mr Moussavi or Mr Karroubi. But they are laying the ground. Mr Mousavi has been savaged by the pro-government media and accused of helping a banned opposition group, the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, which is particularly active in western Europe. On June 21st the head of parliament’s judiciary committee said Mr Mousavi’s public statements constituted “criminal acts”. Tehran police claim to have found evidence of co-operation between “foreign elements” and agitators operating from a building that was used by the Mousavi campaign.
Neither Mr Mousavi nor Mr Karroubi had much faith in the willingness of the Guardian Council, a watchdog body itself watched over by Mr Khamenei, to investigate fairly their allegations that Mr Ahmadinejad owed his landslide victory to fraud. According to the Interior Ministry, the incumbent won 25m votes out of 39m cast, compared with 13m for Mr Mousavi and a risible 300,000 for Mr Karroubi, a former speaker of parliament. Scepticism is understandable: the council is in overall charge of running the elections, which means that it has been investigating itself.
Mr Mousavi says that the election was perverted by a multitude of procedural irregularities and by restrictions placed on his representatives’ legal right to monitor ballot boxes. These allegations, which he put in writing, have had little effect. On June 21st a spokesman for the Guardian Council announced that in 50 towns the number of ballots cast had exceeded the number of eligible voters. But it was possible, he went on, that many people had voted outside their home towns.
The council may be preparing for a modest revision of the results, giving Mr Mousavi a few more votes, probably in a few days’ time. But annulment, as Mr Khamenei made clear in his sermon, when he denied that the Islamic Republic “goes in for betrayal in the matter of the people’s votes”, seems out of the question.
Permitted little contact with their supporters, their precise whereabouts a matter of intense public speculation, Messrs Mousavi and Karroubi have managed at least to unnerve their opponents with their refusal to give up. Mr Mousavi has described defenders of Mr Ahmadinejad as “the proponents of a petrified, Taliban-style Islam” and has dismissed the idea, first expressed by the supreme leader, that the agitation was driven by foreign enemies. On June 24th Mr Karroubi defied a government ban by holding a wake for those who were killed in the violence four days earlier. But it was violently broken up.
The real new fight is less visible
So the battle for the streets may inevitably be heading for victory for Mr Ahmadinejad and the ruling clerical establishment behind him. But a titanic struggle behind the scenes, obscured by public events and often blurred by Tehran’s whirring rumour mill, may be just as crucial to the country’s future. This pits Mr Khamenei against a wily former president who until recently was often regarded as the Islamic Republic’s second-most-powerful man, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
On the face of it, this struggle is also going the supreme leader’s way, as you would expect, since between them Mr Khamenei and his president hold the main levers of civilian and military power. Mr Rafsanjani’s long silence since the election suggests he has been disheartened by the verbal attacks on him and by the arrest of several family members, including his daughter, a former parliamentary deputy, who has since been released. Mr Ahmadinejad has made no secret that he longs to see Mr Rafsanjani and members of his family charged with corruption.
So complete is Mr Rafsanjani’s eclipse, at any rate for the time being, that information on his movements and intentions now consists of hearsay. According to one account, he has been busy in the seminary town of Qom, canvassing senior clerics to back a move to sack Mr Khamenei. Another suggests he may signal his surrender to the inevitable by attending Friday’s prayers, whereas he was conspicuously absent when Mr Khamenei gave his sermon on June 19th.
In jail or at home, Iran’s reformists must be rueing their mistakes. It was Mr Rafsanjani, after all, who helped manoeuvre his old friend Mr Khamenei into the vacant supreme leader’s chair after the death of the revolution’s father, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, 20 years ago. To that end, Mr Rafsanjani helped ensure the eclipse of Ayatollah Hosein Ali Montazeri, who had been Khomeini’s heir apparent and who now, a fragile octogenarian, sends messages in support of Mr Mousavi’s cause. Later, during the presidency of Mr Khatami (1997-2005), reform-minded Iranians turned on Mr Rafsanjani with such venom that he failed even to win a seat in parliament in the elections of 2000.
Have the liberals lost?
The price of those misjudgments and divisions will be high. Ever since the Islamic Republic was set up after the revolution of 1979, revolutionary purists have had to tolerate another faction, culturally more liberal and latterly more open to relations with the West. This lot is now being squelched.
Reuters
Reuters
Khamenei ponders his supremacy
At what cost to Iran’s already tarnished image abroad? Thanks to their mobile telephones, the protesters have beamed the most gruesome images around the world. France’s president, Nicolas Sarkozy, says the “repression and violence” is “unacceptable”. Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, has expressed support for “the people in Iran who want to exercise their right to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.” Barack Obama, who had at first tried to stay aloof so as not to endanger his policy of detente with Iran, declared that he was “appalled and outraged…by the threats, beatings and imprisonments” being meted out. The protesters, he said, were “on the right side of history”.
For the many people in Tehran who had hoped that Mr Obama would help usher in a bright new chapter in relations between Iran and the West, this is depressing. Western criticism has bolstered those in Tehran whose instinct, at the first sign of trouble at home, is to seek foreign scapegoats. At the top of the list comes Iran’s favourite bugbear, Britain.
Taking their cue from Mr Khamenei, who described Britain as “abhorrent” in his sermon, Iranian officials have accused Britain’s government of sinister manipulation of events. Manuchehr Mottaki, Iran’s foreign minister, described in outlandish detail how Britain had flown in planeloads of spies (he did not explain how they had cleared immigration); he then expelled a brace of British diplomats. Iran’s foreign-ministry spokesman has depicted two foreign-based satellite television channels, BBC Persian and the Voice of America, which have been transmitting images and comment to viewers in Iran, as part of an Israeli conspiracy to break the country up.
America’s choice
Mr Obama must now decide whether to let all this affect his efforts to engage Iran. His aim is to persuade the country to forgo its contentious nuclear plan—or at least to modify it and throw it open to scrutiny. Plainly, Israel’s hawkish prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, senses a chance to help kibosh an American diplomatic initiative that discomfited him from the start.
Some Iranians who cheered Mr Obama’s policy of engagement may have changed their minds. Shirin Ebadi, a Nobel peace-prize laureate who is Iran’s best-known human-rights campaigner, has asked the European Union to freeze all political dialogue with Iran “until the violence stops and fresh elections are held.” But Russia, which Mr Obama had hoped to draw into a coalition of countries tugging Iran towards respectability, is being awkwardly indulgent of Iran’s behaviour, with a foreign ministry spokesman calling the crisis an “internal affair”. More predictably China has endorsed the election.
Unless Mr Khamenei dramatically changes heart or protests resume on an irresistible scale, reform-minded Iranians may again have to resign themselves to living without the limited democratic freedoms, including the right to elect a president from an albeit vetted field, that they had hoped to build on. A political elite shorn of its reformist element may well bolster the authoritarian and militarist ways that Iranians are already seeing in embryo: baseej militiamen on every street corner; a special court that is being set up to try arrested “hooligans”; and senior military people muttering darkly about foreign threats.
In the longer term, however, many Iranian liberals think Mr Obama’s optimism will be vindicated. The election campaign and the protests that followed have permitted Iranians to express themselves with a freedom they have not known since the revolution of 1979. They enjoyed the experience—and want more. Further, the sight of infighting among leaders who were apparently united under the binding influence of Ayatollah Khomeini, has undermined the Islamic Republic’s claim to legitimacy, and still more its claim to sanctity. “That idol has been smashed,” said a commentator in Tehran.
In any event, Mr Mousavi’s campaign is going on. If he is arrested, his supporters say they will call a general strike. At night, people around the country gather on their rooftops to shout “Allahu Akbar!” (“God is Great!”), a call dating back to the 1979 revolution that Mr Mousavi’s people have made their own. And many Iranians will fondly recall the post-election march on June 15th that as many as 2m people attended. It was impeccably well-behaved, good-humoured and entirely self-policed.
In the words of one Iranian who attended, “Before then I had lost my faith in being Iranian. We were becoming selfish, turning in on ourselves. But that march seemed to change everything. It can’t have been a dream—can it?” |
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| josh4 |
| quote: | Originally posted by Shakka
Latest from the Economist. |
Pahleeze. There was nothing original in that article from all the others. Generalized analysis and conjecture. No meat.
| quote: | | A political elite shorn of its reformist element may well bolster the authoritarian and militarist ways that Iranians are already seeing in embryo: baseej militiamen on every street corner; a special court that is being set up to try arrested “hooligans”; and senior military people muttering darkly about foreign threats. |
This is the real story. The conservatives won, they beat the reformists. What will come from this is a stronger conservative government purged of the reformist sect and sympathizers of a reformist movement.
Now the conservatives know who their enemies are and you can bet they are moving to counter them. You can go on about "oh but things are changed, the people found a voice, they will be planning." Bah. Unless the Iranian people grow a pair to stand up to (now an even stronger) conservative government I don't see any real reform being made.
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. This didn't kill the government, it will recover and repair. |
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| The17sss |
| quote: | Originally posted by josh4
This is the real story. The conservatives won, they beat the reformists. What will come from this is a stronger conservative government purged of the reformist sect and sympathizers of a reformist movement.
Now the conservatives know who their enemies are and you can bet they are moving to counter them. You can go on about "oh but things are changed, the people found a voice, they will be planning." Bah. Unless the Iranian people grow a pair to stand up to (now an even stronger) conservative government I don't see any real reform being made.
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. This didn't kill the government, it will recover and repair. |
As an actual "conservative" in the true meaning of the word, I'm wondering why you are choosing to continually use that word now to describe the regime. Seems like a veiled attempt and trying to give that word as we know it some negativity. I haven't seen anyone ever refer to the Iranian regime as "the conservative government." Why don't you stop the foolishness and just accurately call them "the oppressive, brutal, dictatorial leaders", intead of trying too hard to be politically correct? |
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| Shakka |
| quote: | Originally posted by josh4
Pahleeze. There was nothing original in that article from all the others. Generalized analysis and conjecture. No meat. |
I fail to understand your need to respond with arrogant condescension because some of us haven't yet achieved your level of enlightened super-intelligence, but I digress.
I wasn't trying to present an article that I thought was somehow a new authority or full of new information, rather it is just the most recent news piece from a non-U.S. source with a slightly different perspective. Perhaps you assumed I was.
I think we all know what the real story is Josh. I don't think we've all been waiting with baited breath for you to come and tell us what's really happening in Iran. |
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| Clovis |
| quote: | Originally posted by The17sss
As an actual "conservative" in the true meaning of the word, I'm wondering why you are choosing to continually use that word now to describe the regime. Seems like a veiled attempt and trying to give that word as we know it some negativity. I haven't seen anyone ever refer to the Iranian regime as "the conservative government." Why don't you stop the foolishness and just accurately call them "the oppressive, brutal, dictatorial leaders", intead of trying too hard to be politically correct? |
Are you serious? Coming from someone who throws the word socialist around like rice at a wedding that is ing hilarious. :stongue: :stongue:
The current regime in Iran is the conservative political body in that country.
conservatism
One entry found.
Main Entry:
con·ser·va·tism
Pronunciation:
\kən-ˈsər-və-ˌti-zəm\
Function:
noun
Date:
1832
1capitalized a: the principles and policies of a Conservative party b: the Conservative party
2 a: disposition in politics to preserve what is established b: a political philosophy based on tradition and social stability, stressing established institutions, and preferring gradual development to abrupt change ; specifically : such a philosophy calling for lower taxes, limited government regulation of business and investing, a strong national defense, and individual financial responsibility for personal needs (as retirement income or health-care coverage)
3: the tendency to prefer an existing or traditional situation to change
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conservatism |
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