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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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 Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 2:32 am Post subject: |
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Now that we have the 'blame it all on the international Jewish conspiracy' post out of the way (thanks, ba  ), we can get back to the real world.
Here's the most affecting of the posts I've seen today, although there were several others that were right up there.
"I will participate in the demonstrations tomorrow. Maybe they will turn violent. Maybe I will be one of the people who is going to get killed. I'm listening to all my favorite music. I even want to dance to a few songs. I always wanted to have very narrow eyebrows. Yes, maybe I will go to the salon before I go tomorrow! There are a few great movie scenes that I also have to see. I should drop by the library, too. It's worth to read the poems of Forough and Shamloo again. All family pictures have to be reviewed, too. I have to call my friends as well to say goodbye. All I have are two bookshelves which I told my family who should receive them. I'm two units away from getting my bachelors degree but who cares about that. My mind is very chaotic. I wrote these random sentences for the next generation so they know we were not just emotional and under peer pressure. So they know that we did everything we could to create a better future for them. So they know that our ancestors surrendered to Arabs and Mongols but did not surrender to despotism. This note is dedicated to tomorrow's children..."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/13/iran-demonstrations-viole_n_215189.html (4:16 PM ET)
The Sea of Green demonstration is scheduled to begin in about 1 hour. No reports of either side backing down. This is the big one. Up to now it's been ('officially' anyway) a protest against a corrupt election, a quarrel between two politicians. From today any demonstrations are a protest against the government itself. |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 3:48 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
Now that we have the 'blame it all on the international Jewish conspiracy' post out of the way (thanks, ba ), we can get back to the real world.
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I never said any such thing.
You haven't refuted any such thing out of the way, either.
Now back to your distorted view of the real world through the looking glass of mainstream media. |
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catman
Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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| Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 9:53 am Post subject: |
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| bacasper wrote: |
This may be of interest.
Iran Election and the Twitter Revolution
Posted: 2009/06/18
From: Mathaba
The greater danger comes from gullible western "MSM" news networks giving in to the temptation of false information from unlimited fake accounts set up by intelligence agencies and activists and their uncritical subservience to those who finance them for "New World Order" objectives.
Don't be a useful idiot
Let us break a few assumptions that western TV couch and internet potatoes have about Iran. For those who realize that taking a position and voicing it toward others over the Internet is a responsibility which requires some informed opinion, you'll find the links and references in this document of great assistance.
For those analysts and researchers with time and resources to do it, please use the information from the below links to compile articles that we can publish, to put into perspective the US-Israeli sponsored (and failed) coup attempt in Iran. One researcher has already done so and meets those standards of journalism which the MSM have long ago abandoned. Read it and share it!
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........and they go on and fail to make their case that this is a NWO/Zionist/Jew backed coup. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 3:33 pm Post subject: |
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| the US-Israeli sponsored (and failed) coup attempt in Iran |
As I was saying...
Significant levels of nastiness on the streets of Iranian cities on Saturday afternoon/evening. The uprising (or whatever the appropriate term) has entered a revolutionary phase now. Reports (unconfirmed) of 30 or more dead at one hospital, Basiji going into hospitals to seize the corpses, foreign embassies opening doors to the injured... Mousavi is reported to have been on the streets (again unconfirmed) saying he's prepared to be martyred.
If this one follows the playbook of '79, there will be mass memorial demonstrations 3 days, 7 days and 40 days later--at which you can expect more killings.
Everything of course depends on how large, how wide-spread and how committed the crowds are on the one hand, and how united and committed the government is on the other.
The most significant post I've seen so far today:
TEHRAN � The Iranian police commander, in green uniform, walked up Komak Hospital Alley with arms raised and his small unit at his side. �I swear to God,� he shouted at the protesters facing him, �I have children, I have a wife, I don�t want to beat people. Please go home.�
A man at my side threw a rock at him. The commander, unflinching, continued to plead. There were chants of �Join us! Join us!� The unit retreated toward Revolution Street, where vast crowds eddied back and forth confronted by baton-wielding Basij militia and black-clad riot police officers on motorbikes...
I don�t know where this uprising is leading. I do know some police units are wavering. That commander talking about his family was not alone. There were other policemen complaining about the unruly Basijis. Some security forces just stood and watched. �All together, all together, don�t be scared,� the crowd shouted...
There were about 20 of us gathered there, eyes running, hearts racing. A 19-year-old student was nursing his left leg, struck by a militiaman with an electric-shock-delivering baton. �No way we are turning back,� said a friend of his as he massaged that wounded leg."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/21/opinion/21tehran.html?_r=1&ref=global-home
Iran has been trying for a hundred years to devise a modern government. This may finally be their chance. |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2009 9:13 am Post subject: |
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Republicans really do not get how to conduct foreign-policy. Either that, or they're just playing politics.
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WASHINGTON - Republican senators criticized President Barack Obama on Sunday for not taking a tougher public stand in support of Iranians protesting the outcome of the country's contested presidential election, with one saying the president had been "timid and passive."
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Apparently, these guys think that the best strategy right now is for Obama to validate Ahmadinejad's argument that the unrest in Iran is an American plot.
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| "The president of the United States is supposed to lead the free world, not follow it," Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said on a Sunday morning talk show. "He's been timid and passive more than I would like." |
"Leader-of-the-free-world" rhetoric might play well with Cold War nostalgists on the home-front, but it's debatable how much positive impact its going to have in selling the American viewpoint to nationalist-minded movements overseas.
Given the way the GOP seems to be synchronizing their rhetoric with that of the Iranian establishment, I am half-seriously entertaining the idea that there might have been something to Gary Sick's October Surprise allegations.
link |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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catman
Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 9:17 am Post subject: |
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| Iran has been trying for a hundred years to devise a modern government. |
Was there actually election fraud in Iran? And just whose system is more "modern?"
A Hard Look at the Numbers
Posted: 2009/06/24
From: Mathaba
By ESAM AL-AMIN
Since the June 12 Iranian presidential elections, Iran "experts� have mushroomed like bacteria in a Petri dish. So here is a quiz for all those instant experts. Which major country has elected more presidents than any in the world since 1980? Further, which nation is the only one that held ten presidential elections within thirty years of its revolution?
The answer to both questions, of course, is Iran. Since 1980, it has elected six presidents, while the U.S. is a close second with five, and France at three. In addition, the U.S. held four presidential elections within three decades of its revolution to Iran�s ten.
The Iranian elections have unified the left and the right in the West and unleashed harsh criticisms and attacks from the �outraged� politicians to the �indignant� mainstream media. Even the blogosphere has joined this battle with near uniformity, on the side of Iran�s opposition, which is quite rare in cyberspace.
Much of the allegations of election fraud have been just that: unsubstantiated accusations. No one has yet been able to provide a solid shred of evidence of wide scale fraud that would have garnered eleven million votes for one candidate over his opponent.
More than thirty pre-election polls were conducted in Iran since President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his main opponent, former Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi, announced their candidacies in early March 2009. The polls varied widely between the two opponents, but if one were to average their results, Ahmadinejad would still come out on top. However, some of the organizations sponsoring these polls, such as Iranian Labor News Agency and Tabnak, admit openly that they have been allies of Mousavi,...
On the other hand, there was only one poll carried out by a western news organization...Further, it showed that Ahmadinejad had a nationwide advantage of two to one over Mousavi.
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There has not been a tradition of election fraud in Iran. Say what you will about the system of the Islamic Republic, but its elected legislators have impeached ministers and �borked� nominees of several Presidents, including Ahmadinejad. Rubberstamps, they are not. In fact, former President Mohammad Khatami, considered one of the leading reformists in Iran, was elected president by the people, when the interior ministry was run by archconservatives. He won with over 70 percent of the vote, not once, but twice.
interesting article continues at link |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 9:36 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| Since the June 12 Iranian presidential elections, Iran "experts� have mushroomed like bacteria in a Petri dish. So here is a quiz for all those instant experts. Which major country has elected more presidents than any in the world since 1980? Further, which nation is the only one that held ten presidential elections within thirty years of its revolution? |
Is this article supposed to be a joke? |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 5:36 pm Post subject: |
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| ^OK, I give. Is it not true? What country has elected more than ten presidents in the last 30 years? |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 9:08 pm Post subject: |
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No, it's because the president in Iran doesn't have all that much power so of course they can elect president after president. To make an accurate comparison you'd have to look at those second in power - vice presidents of the US and vice presidents of France and so on.
Plus the argument itself is silly. Some countries allow two terms, some allow one. Term length varies. Countries are founded at different periods in history.
The poll cited there is also old - it was conducted from May 11 to May 20, before the official election season (=when four candidates were selected to be allowed to run) even started. Before the debates where Ahmadinejad questioned Rahnavard's Ph.D, before the huge masses of people in the street every night. The poll itself also did not show anything close to a majority for Ahmadinejad - he had almost twice as much support then over Mousavi but it was well below 50%. |
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bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Jun 25, 2009 9:49 am Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
No, it's because the president in Iran doesn't have all that much power so of course they can elect president after president. To make an accurate comparison you'd have to look at those second in power - vice presidents of the US and vice presidents of France and so on.
Plus the argument itself is silly. Some countries allow two terms, some allow one. Term length varies. Countries are founded at different periods in history.
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Plus it leaves out parliamentary systems. How many elections has India had? Great Britain? Canada? Australia? Etc.
And were all those presidential elections in a routine manner? Or was there a lot of instability, and one (or more) presidents had to step down, so there was a new election to replace him?
So yes, that line of argument is VERY weak. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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