get over it 2.0

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Confirmed and reconfirmed and reconfirmed and reconfirmed....

Believe me, I know how it feels to loathe the president... and his enforcers... but if I were Iranian I would loathe the people behind the ugly ruse that caused SO much trouble, SO much heartache, even more....
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we are not going to give up iran because mr mousavi has lied

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Frontline's completely bogus account of Neda's murder contained but a few precious lines from Press TV's Nader Mokhtari, and they were all it contained that square with what we have worked so hard to know already about this filthy travesty. They included much more from the justice-obstructing "doctor" who showed up in Iran days before and left so swiftly after Neda's murder. He couldn't look into the camera, nor his interviewer, eyes doing that sort of diffuse wobble in sync with reaching for the right spin. For instance, his story originally was that he went to the Iranian authorities about it, but left the country the next day out of fear of becoming a suspect. Here, no mention of talking to Iranian police, and couching his disappearing act in terms of choosing his integrity. A doctor who isn't a doctor but a publisher with a business in Tehran even though he lives in England... just got there six days before and decides to capitulate to his employees' wishes to go out and protest, just to keep them out of trouble... oh... I could poke holes in that shit all week....

There was another Press TV journalist on camera quite a bit. She says she quit her job with the state English language station because she couldn't bear to do that anymore... we are led to believe she did this before she was shot in the knee with a plastic bullet. I don't believe that. I can believe she would have done that after, but not before. I'm assuming she's saying all this stuff on camera because she's not in Iran. Neda's friend who is also on camera quite a bit is in Turkey. There are emails to Frontline from Neda's sister... and they have a woman saying her lines in English from those... or at least that's what we're supposed to think. Sadly, Frontline has gotten so bad I don't trust that they spoke to anyone who knew her, but you don't have to be that suspicious to see this as propagandist bunk.

Frontline's interviewees deem the Supreme Leader's injunction that reformers continuing to incite such unseemly protesting, rioting, would be responsible for the consequences as announcing that the authorities would just go ahead and kill people. Since it is very clear that the protesters were responding to continued calls from Moussavi and Karroubi and Rafsanjani, it seems really that the man was trying to tell them their lies would cost innocent people too much. But... no, no... he's a vicious dictator who kills innocent rioters for innocent reformers with innocent helpers on roofs above quiet alleys.

Frontline suddenly has Neda returning to her car from the protest, when all other accounts have her being killed but a few steps from leaving her car... on a street where there was no protest taking place. Indeed, they show a shot from high above that has, they say, Neda and her music teacher alone on the street, but we can't do anything but think so because the man has the same color shirt on. Then we are shown a bunch of crowd scenes where we catch glimpses of a gray-haired man in this same distinctive blue and white striped shirt and a few glimpses of the "woman" with him who is wearing a baseball cap and a black chador. We never do see his face in any of it until we are shown him supposedly giving forced testimony, very much thinner, that he saw no Basij at the scene. And there is no baseball cap on or even falling off the dying young woman on the street... and no chador.

Only now do we hear all this stuff about her having made all kinds of valorous proclamations about her conscience sending her into the streets. We hear malarky about some Basij guy pleading he didn't mean to kill her and getting beaten and stripped by the crowd... where there was no crowd... then they say about twenty people... but they let him go and just published his ID card on the internet... when it's very clear from the video of her death this was no drive-by... and from earlier accounts. Even here you can see the huge splat of blood from the exit on the street directly in front of her feet as she is falling backward, is being helped to fall gently backward by both her music teacher and this "bystander" doctor. They're applying the pressure to a wound directly below her neck, high on the sternum, and Neda's eyes are following the cameraman from in front of her, to the side of her and sort of sticking sideways as he moves behind her and the men holding her exit wound. All of this is perfectly consistent with a bullet entering from above and behind... a fucking sniper... the same one who got out the image of her and her music teacher alone in the street... and bystanders who were just so amazingly right on the spot so instantaneously she had not yet had the time to crumple all the way to the street from such a massive injury and within about a second of hearing the shot.

Give me a goddam break.

And good grief but we do get here a bunch of very chic pictures of this beauty we have never seen before, and hear how she spoke of her love of travel. Appears she did quite a bit of traveling, especially to Turkey, but we hear, too, that she always swore she would leave Iran even if it were her last day alive. You'll pardon me if I ponder the incongruity of such a thing when she appears to have been leaving frequently to beautiful places. If she were so determined to leave, what was wrong with any one of those trips?

So, anyway, Nader Mokhtari got in a couple lucid phrases on the final cut, taken and cleverly edited from the EDITED version of the transcript of their whole interview with him that they put up on their site, and I wanted to highlight here because most people out there will be missing this information.

[What was your view of the election and its aftermath?]

... Mr. [Mir Hossein] Mousavi is not a reformist by any stretch of the imagination. He is responsible for some acts abroad, overseas, which gave Iran a fairly bad reputation in the 1980s. His hands are bloodied. And he represents a camp which in any other society would be called the nouveau riche. They are the people who were the poor before the revolution, and they became rich through the deals they made through the black markets in the war, and they want to hang on to the wealth in the country.

And everybody has mentioned that the revolution or this uprising or these demonstrations were north of Vali Asr Square, and this is the rich part of Tehran. South of Vali Asr Square nobody came out. The real demonstrations, the popular demonstrations took place within two to three days after the presidential vote, where you had lots of people out. They were just average, ordinary people.

Now, among this came a third group that nobody knew, and they all appeared. Nobody knew who they were. ...

We know a certain amount of shooting was done by the Basij [government paramilitary force]. Part of the story was shown on Western TV. You imagine someone trying to set fire to a military base in the middle of London. You can imagine the reaction from the security forces here, and a bunch of people just broke away from the main demonstration of people who were asking for reform and started attacking this station, the 117th Basij station or volunteer force station with Molotov cocktails and tried to set it alight. ...

What happens is the ordinary people, the people who were out to demonstrate and thought that the vote had been fiddled with, pretty much gave up after three or four days, but a hard core of people stayed on the streets.

And in the first week something like 20 or 30 firearms were --

Uncovered.

Uncovered by the security forces. Now, the thing is that the firearms, they come through the Kurdistan border, and they're not that hard to come by to Iran, but it is very unlikely for ordinary people to keep such arms because it carries really heavy fines. ...

As with Neda Agha Soltan's shooting, … the bullet is not any of the calibers that are supplied to Iranian security forces. That at least we know. ...

I suppose one of the most powerful images to emerge from the weeks after the election was exactly that video, Neda getting killed. [Is it] unfortunate, do you think, that this has become one of the defining images of the conflict?

I feel unfortunate when anyone's killed in my own country within an election event. The polls conducted before the election -- even CNN polls -- gave Ahmadinejad a 2-to-1 majority. That's taking the Iran countryside into account. So when Mr. Mousavi went two hours before the count had started and declared himself the winner, well, we all thought there was something very, very weird going on over there.*

And an hour after the early results from the little townships and villages started to come in, which were overwhelmingly pro-Ahmadinejad -- they generally are because they've been helped out a lot by his government -- he declared that there had been widespread fraud in the elections.

And you see, he's an ex-premier of Iran. He's in a responsible position. He can't just go out and make claims like that willy-nilly unless he has clear, clear evidence of this happening.

No evidence has been presented. ... He had observers at every single polling station, and he said these observers had been thrown out. Now, one person was shot in Tehran, and three mobile cameras captured this. How could it be that on the night of the vote, his representatives get thrown out of 30 stations and we don't have a single second of footage of this happening? Simply because it didn't take place.

Do you feel that we've got the wrong idea in Britain and the U.S. about the level of Ahmadinejad support inside Iran?

Yes. He's the first president in Iran that did not concentrate the budget for the country purely on Tehran. We have 700 miles of motorways, 200 miles of tunnels, 40 new factories. We have three new ports. We have all sorts of projects to help people out of unemployment back to work in the countryside.

You have to know Iran. In Iran, if you want to build a road 10 kilometers long, it could take up to 10 years. He managed to do in four years what many presidents haven't managed to do in 30 years. So the level of support and the level of assistance given to the farmers, to the average folk, rank and file, was huge.

And these, I call them the nouveau riche -- I'm sorry; I do this because I come from a very old family in Iran -- they were actually the conservatives. They wanted to preserve the wealth within their own clique. Ahmadinejad is a blacksmith's son, and he is at heart a socialist. He wanted to be able to help the people, and so an awful lot of people, as you know, voted for him. It's perfectly natural.

And what really upsets me about this is that even the polls before the election conducted by reputable foreign news agencies confirmed that he was 2-to-1 ahead. Now, immediately after this claim, you know, he was vilified out of all proportion. ...

What impression, then, do you think the media coverage in Britain and the U.S. has given the average viewer in these countries about what happened in Iran during the elections?

They have given the exact opposite of what actually went on. I have lived through a revolution where a majority wants a regime out, and we had Chieftain tanks freshly supplied by Britain during the 1979 revolution every 200 meters. People would clamber up one and down the other to get to the demonstration, and the shah's Imperial Guard was just standing back, amazed at this wave of humanity going because they were determined.

And when you had an uprising or a demonstration in one town, you had it in every town. This just didn't happen. It happened in Tehran. It happened slightly in a couple of other major towns. There were minor demonstrations there, and then it died down. So the ordinary people realized they'd been fooled to a certain extent, and they went home, but a hard core stayed. ...

What about the argument that the demonstrations were not large enough because in the smaller cities it's easier to destroy the demonstration? ...

Yes. But then again, as I put it to you earlier, a majority revolution does not abide by such rules. A majority revolution is even in the smallest village. You get people coming out, regardless.

The shah's soldiers at the end did not fire in a mass scale against people, whereas it seems that, especially on the Saturday, June 20, there did seem to be mass violence against people.

In November 1978, 32 people in Tehran University died in front of my eyes in just one shooting spree by the Imperial Guard of the shah. You have no idea that during that time, about 30 people a day died across Iran, on average, during the revolution.

If the majority were unhappy with the status quo, this government would have gone, and that simply is not the case.

The people who got rich in the revolution, during the revolution and the 30 years since, their offspring, the youth, they had the money, so they want to have access to a Western way of life. They don't want to be pigeonholed into a strictly Islamic culture. It is natural for them to want more from life because they have access to it through their wealth, whereas the majority in Iran are not wealthy, so for them Islam will suffice for the time being. Do you appreciate what I'm trying to get at?

There's lower expectations in those parts of society, there's a higher expectation among the Westernized class, and therefore this is some kind of cultural struggle?

It is a cultural struggle, but it is induced in a sense. Iranians can sit there and talk to you for hours about Zoroastrianism and its offspring, Metrism, which is very close to Christianity. They can talk for hours about that, but the moment they feel threatened, they run into a mosque. Islamic culture has been with the country for 1,400 years.

So what would be a more accurate view of what happened in Iran during the elections, in your opinion?

... Mousavi is not very popular because he was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's golden boy, and he is not psychologically very stable. During the war, where 1,000 kids were dying every day at the battlefront, he would have a tiff with Ayatollah Khomeini, he would go into his house, shut his door, and he would not come out for a few months. He was the prime minister of the country, and the children were dying at the battlefront. These aren't the actions of a person who has a stable mind.

Mr. Mousavi is not liked. He has no popularity within the real forces, and he didn't win on the economic front also. The other thing that he could have done -- he could have kept this going -- easily applied for permission for peaceful demonstrations at the stadium, Azadi Stadium in Tehran or other places away from businesses, whereas the people who assembled in front of the presidential office were mainly the merchants, because their living was being hit so hard by the demonstrations. ... They put maximum pressure on the government. So in this case, during the revolution, the bazaar, the economics of the country was behind the revolution, whereas here they were totally against it because they were losing money. So this was another problem for Mr. Mousavi and his team, another angle that they had not worked on. ...

We saw some very shocking images of violence in the streets after the election that were shot by ordinary people on their phones or whatever. How do you respond to those?

You have street clashes there, and, you know, in a place as peaceful as London, you have G-20 demonstrators and a policeman suddenly flies off the handle, pushes someone, kills someone. ...

People got killed. People get killed in situations like this. When you have an ex-premier as irresponsible as Mr. Mousavi going and claiming that there's been rigged elections, that's rabble-rousing, and they pour onto the streets, and they start burning up people's property. And this happens. It's overreaction. ...

Now, there are a number of very prominent Iranians who are on trial at the moment on charges of trying to start a velvet revolution with foreign help.

Yes.

Britain specifically, North America, Israel. Do you feel that the protesters were influenced by foreign forces and foreign funds?

Yes, yes. This was just far too well planned for there not to have been. I'm not saying at government level in any way; I'm not trying to implicate perhaps British government, Israeli government. But at some level there had been very, very precise planning for what was going to happen. ...

What's the available evidence we have that this was far too well planned in advance?

The evidence does exist. I've seen some of the paperwork. I wasn't allowed to keep any of the paperwork. But ... the level of planning was not the sort of level of planning you're used to seeing in Iran. It's as simple as that. ...

Fars News had a report on its Web site that said that he'd won with 63 percent of the vote. That was about 10 p.m. on [election night].

Right. Why did Mr. Mousavi, before even the vote count had started, then claim he was the president? I have no idea. I mean, you're asking me questions which are so hypothetical I couldn't answer you.

Why did Mr. [Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei come out on Saturday when canvassers were supposed to have 72 hours to register their complaints and come out so much in favor of Mr. Ahmadinejad at a moment when the supreme leader is supposed to be above this?

What difference would it have made after the vote if he'd said who he supported? It's important for the leader not to show his support before the election for his favorite.

But he'd said five weeks before the election that Mr. Ahmadinejad should act as if he has another five years in power.

I haven't heard the comment directly, so I can't comment on that. ...

[There were] allegations saying that [BBC correspondent Jon] Leyne has been giving money to the sniper who shot her dead. You yourself talked about the caliber of bullets used. More recently there have been reports that Caspian Makan, the fiance or boyfriend of Neda, is being pushed to make a confession that she was killed by [the Mujahideen-e Khalq].

Nobody knows who killed Neda. That's the bottom line, and I wouldn't like to comment on that. I couldn't say, would it be the security forces? Why would they fire on someone in a street where there isn't a demonstration, someone out just getting some air, walking out of the car? I couldn't tell you who did it because I don't know. ...

Have you ever seen anyone shot with a high-caliber rifle?

I haven't seen, but ... the bullet goes through the person because of the high velocity it has, and the blood splash is along the direction of where the bullet traveled through the body. If you examine the video of the footage, the blood splash is immediately by her feet at the front, so the bullet hit her at the back, and it exited through the front. ...

And the bullet got her heart and her lung. Now, had the bullet just gone 3 millimeters to the side, it would have just got her lung, and she would have stayed alive; she would have lived. But it was also cut through her heart because it was a tough-caliber military bullet that was designed to kill. ... I don't see how [a] Basiji could carry a weapon of that caliber in his pocket, simple as that.

And then the problem is that the Dr. [Arash] Hejazi, who was supposed to have given her there the kiss of life, showed up to Iran five or six days just before the disturbances and he was there on the spot. And he disappeared immediately afterwards. So, you know, there are lots of questions to do with lots of things that happened in Iran.

Do you think that Dr. Hejazi was an agent provocateur?

No. But if you'd like to put together conspiracy theories, he could very well have been a conspirator if you're going to say that. ...

Dr. Hejazi has come out and he says, yeah, you know, there were two Basijis on a motorbike, I think as far as I remember, and one of them pulled out a weapon out of his pocket and shot Neda. Well, how the hell did he do that? What kind of weapon do you have that you can carry in your pocket that can fire that kind of round? So if we want to go into conspiracy theories about Neda Agha Soltan, we could talk for hours.

The fact is the video is there for sure. You see the blood splash, the moment the bullet exits the front of her chest in front of her feet and she falls backwards and she dies within seconds, and it's a terrible thing to watch someone die. ...

But I put this down: You know, within the chaos on Tehran's streets, anything can happen. Maybe my generation is slightly tougher and more used to this because we have seen an entire generation die in a war, in the eight-year war. I think it's a terrible thing to happen, but really, if you come down and get down to the base of this, ... if he [Mousavi] had not said the election had been rigged without any evidence, substantial evidence, none of this would have happened. Nobody would have died. ...

Is there anything else you'd like to add, anything we haven't covered in the interview?

Yes. I'd like to say this: that during the times of the simple reformists like [former Presidents] Mr. [Mohammad] Khatami and Mr. [Ali Akbar Hashemi] Rafsanjani, Iran's relations with the West were not on the up. They were not. Iran and the West did not move in a direction to meet eye to eye.

Whereas as I speak to you today, ... Mr. Obama has decided to scrap the plans for the missile shield, and the United States and Iran are going to start talking to each other. And that has happened during Ahmadinejad's time in office. So a bit of strength does pay off. ...

I do believe that we are entering a very, very special period, and I do believe that in the near future the relations will expand between Iran and the West, and they will improve simply because the interests of the West and regional interests of Iran are coming so close to each other that there is no alternative.

But maybe at the expense of people's human rights?

If you watch Iraq, Afghanistan and the events over the last eight years since Iraq's illegal invasion by the U.S.-led forces, I don't think human rights mean that much in the West.

I'm sure that's a double standard, but we're talking about human rights towards your own citizens.

Right. Towards your own citizens? Well, I could go into that also, but I'll spare you. ...

[Was the 1979 revolution the first velvet revolution?]

'79 was not a peaceful revolution. It was a very, very violent affair on a daily basis. I went on my bicycle to the Tehran University in November, and I was just watching -- I was 13 years old, 14 years old. They were trying to pull down a shah's statue. ...

The next thing it was like little chirps around my ears, and somebody shouted, "They're shooting," and then there was the sound of fireworks. We all lay on the floor, and then the sound of fireworks stopped, and we got up, and when we got up a large number of people didn't get up. ... Thirty-two people died on that single day on the east corner of Tehran University.

We have fought for this revolution, and we have paid heavily, and we are going to see it through to the end. And eight years of war and a million dead have toughened us up.

If this is the price we have to pay to get our own way in the region, we are prepared to pay it. There are some people who may not be prepared to pay it, but they are not the majority. If the leader goes up and calls to arms, ... he can have 20 million men under flag, and they will not ask for a penny. This is our generation.

We are not going to give up Iran because Mr. Mousavi has lied, and we're not going to give up Iran because an extremist organization has planned some kind of a coup within an election. We will not give up Iran because we paid such a heavy price to have it, and this is the voice of the majority of Iranians.

I may appear harsh. This is my country; it's my patch of land. It's all I have in this world, and I will fight for it. Accusations fly, you go to jail for three weeks, go for three years, go for 30 years. I am not going to give up my country.

* Emphasis mine. Another time this salient bit has hit the cutting room floor rather than chance it getting into the mainstream consciousness here. I really wish I could hear the entire, uncut, version of their interview with him.

Nobody's going to want to listen to him though. He's the guy who reported on the Israeli slaughter in Gaza last winter.... Uhm... you know... told the truth... on that very station for which his co-worker featured in this piece of tripe could no longer bear to work....

You can now stack this up next to the nefarious mosques and office tower and the nukes they don't have and CNN's glee over the bombs we will be using to rid Iran of its revolution once and for all.

[Note from next morning: Sorry, but I had to watch the damn program twice and the video of her death quite a few times to make sure of my impressions and what we can see actually took place, while my head was swimming from needing to sleep, so there have been some revisions this morning from what I posted last night. I actually woke up this morning thinking it could very easily be that Neda was not killed at all, that it's all just a very cruel hoax, and who could really even tell for certain, SO determined is the wealthier and better-educated sector of Tehran against the rest of their countrymen. If she wanted out of Iran that badly, what a great way to split, fake her own death.... Maybe I just hope too hard that she was in on it with the others... everyone entirely too convenient to this public relations miracle got away unharmed. Her music teacher appears to have lost about fifty pounds between the day and whenever he was taped telling the world he saw no Basiji. That might mean they didn't feed him while keeping him in some dungeon to make him confess, or it could mean it wasn't him from the git and he just came out to do the "confession" out of fear. I have no clue beyond the marked loss of bulk and the different shades of gray hair from clip to clip...? So, I'm probably just trying to comfort myself, and maybe I've been watching too many movies and seen too many photoshopped images... but, truly, from all the obvious bullshitting going on around this, it's just about as likely she helped stage it, and is happily honeymooning with her "not political" lover somewhere, as that she died on a side street in Tehran.]

put the deadly fantasies to bed

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You gotta go check out this bit that makes me feel as though my aching nerves are being bathed in mystical essences. It's not long. It's not full of puff and blow, sturm und drang, just the bluntness of the gods, a nice warm breath of the real tracing the contours of my pounding head in the long circus of hallucinations playing out on your world stage.

Between listening to Glenn and reading this short piece, I may just forget the hair on my head and sleep through the night in celebration of truth. Even the most awful truth is ultimately as kind as a bubble bath, and how my heart howls that so few know that.

i don't spoze you'd think of believing him

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Ahmadinejad tells AP he regrets protester deaths
40 mins ago

NEW YORK – Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told The Associated Press on Tuesday that he regrets the deaths of protesters in the violence that followed his country's disputed presidential elections.

But he denied that his government had any role in the killings.

Ahmadinejad said those who died were "not at fault." He instead said the responsibility lies with Iranian opposition politicians and with "European and American politicians" who he said fueled the violence.

"We believe what they did was very wrong," he said.

Pro-reform opposition has staged dramatic protests, claiming that Ahmadinejad's victory in the June voting was fraudulent. The Iranian government waged a bloody crackdown and opposition groups say at least 72 protesters were killed. Government officials maintain that only 36 people died, and Ahmadinejad repeated that claim.

"It is all very regrettable," Ahmadinejad told the AP, adding that he has directed Iran's judicial system to investigate each death. "The goverment has no role in these events."

He is a very religious man. No question about that. In fact, that is the basis for much of his unpopularity. So, in the name of truth and justice, try contemplating the thought that he is not lying. You need to drop your anger and hatred and all your opinions, everything you already think you know, and just consider that, no matter what you think of him, he may be telling the truth. You don't even have to KEEP thinking it if you don't want to. You can go back to whatever it is occupying this space in your head. Just do this as a thought experiment. A beautiful world experiment.

american-bought mole plays gandhi in iran

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Our guys must have given him some intense body guard action to get this out of him. Long as he has a bunch of frustrated Iranians to make excuses for him, it's just too tempting to resist letting that go to waste. Still, he's stupid to rely on it because the regime grabbing his sorry ass and slamming him in jail, or just shooting him, would be much better for our purposes. In fact, now we can do a Neda on him and the entire world will revile the "murdering theocracy" that "wants to nuke Israel".

He's obviously no Einstein and he's obviously no Gandhi either.

When I said he was looking like the Iranian Obama, I had no idea how precisely I'd whacked that nail on its head....

Iran's Mousavi calls for more civil disobedience

The statement from the nation's opposition leader comes two days after parliament voted to mostly approve a Cabinet of hard-liners loyal to Ahmadinejad.

By Borzou Daragahi
September 5, 2009 | 5:15 a.m.

Reporting from Beirut - Iran's leading opposition figure today called on his supporters to continue acts of peaceful civil disobedience in his first major communiqué in weeks.

Mir Hossein Mousavi also demanded that authorities launch an independent probe of Iran's disputed presidential elections and punish those who allegedly abused protesters and detainees in the unrest afterward.

"We shouldn't leave any stone unturned and live up to our commitments in our struggle against cheaters and liars," he said in a statement published to his news website, Kalamenews.com. "In pursuing our cause we should brave all the accusations, and we shouldn't duck any act of courage or daring."

Mousavi, a former prime minister, ran and lost against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a June 12 election marred by allegations of massive vote rigging that continue to roil the nation. Though Mousavi's deputies have been hauled before televised mass tribunals for questioning the results and his allies threatened with arrest by the Revolutionary Guard, he has remained unbowed.

The statement came two days after parliament voted to mostly approve a Cabinet of hard-line loyalists to Ahmadinejad, disappointing opposition figures who had hoped the battered president would be further weakened in a lengthy brawl over the formation of his government.

Ahmadinejad met today with visiting Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who voiced support for Iran's nuclear program in an attempt to counter the image of Tehran's diplomatic isolation as world powers prepare to consider a course of action.

The website of the German magazine Der Spiegel, citing unnamed diplomats, today reported that Russia and China have rejected a U.S. and West European proposal to begin discussions on upping sanctions on Iran.

Mousavi unveiled no new plan of action or strategy for his "Green Path of Hope," the grassroots political movement he announced in mid-August. But he implicitly called for a continuation of nightly rooftop anti-government chants and demonstrations. "There is no way but praying to God and calls of [Allah Akbar] in small and big gatherings with all-out efforts and endeavors," he said in the statement.

Earlier this week, Maj. Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, commander of the hard-line Revolutionary Guard, delivered a speech defining Iranian reformists such as former President Mohammad Khatami as enemies of the state.

Their refusal to back down in the face of such threats and ongoing pressure suggests no quick resolution of Iran's greatest domestic political crisis since the early years after the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

"Despite the smear campaign of the state-run propaganda machine, it is we who are calling for the restoration of confidence and peace in society," Mousavi said in his statement. "It is we who want to avoid any kind of extremism and violence."

Authorities continue to be unnerved by Mousavi's green movement. They have barred fans from entering certain soccer matches, apparently afraid that Mousavi supporters would turn the televised games into opposition rallies.

This week plainclothes security officials crushed a Ramadan supper gathering of detainees' families and supporters outside Evin Prison as well as a boisterous rally outside a downtown Tehran mosque.

Authorities announced the unprecedented first-ever cancellation of annual mid-Ramadan ceremonies at the tomb of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran's revolutionary founder, after Mousavi supporters threatened to turn the event into an opposition rally.

Now authorities nervously watch as opposition supporters announce plans to chant anti-government slogans during annual Qods Day commemorations Sept. 18, which is marked by officially sanctioned rallies against Israel.

To defuse the political crisis, Mousavi announced a nine-point plan that includes creating a fact-finding committee to investigate election irregularities, reforming electoral laws, punishing alleged violent elements in the security forces, restitution to victims of official violence, lifting pressures on independent media and barring military officials from interfering in politics.

"Now our people have felt in their skin, flesh and bones that the only way to save the country is peaceful coexistence of different tastes, walks of life, ethnicities, religions and schools of thought in this vast country whose diversity of lifestyles and communities was part and parcel of her identity since ancient times," Mousavi said.

I mean, as long as people can keep thinking Obama is a great man who will restore America to the people, and Hugo Chàvez a heartless dictator who abuses his people, why not keep playing these games to dupe the rest of the world's population?

The key to our enslavement has been perfectly cut and polished.

ahmadinejad won

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I was just whining to Homie the other night about my position on their election, and my desperation for a knowledgeable source to help me back up my assertions with more than just information from forgotten links and my instincts, and here it is. Here it is.

It's death-defyingly long, but very, very worth reading... a big help in dispelling our lethal ignorance.

We all need a very firm grip on this.

It will be a miracle if we can avert the catastrophe of an attack on Iran, and THIS is the path to that miracle.

obummerz abounding on iran

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And, I guess, while I'm about linking Arnold, I should throw this one in, too, because it just about perfectly reflects my feelings on the Rafsanjani, Mousavi, Khatami thing... only nicer....

the myth of freedom

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Homie-Banoo sent me this link. I had to snap off the video after a little while because it's a goddam sappy AT&T ad, Hallmark Greeting Cards, Barack Obama... sniff, sniff, tug at yer heartstrings, every one of your yearnings and fond memories... for cash... for votes... to sell you anything they want to sell you. We have perfected the art of making people want whatever we want them to want. It's terrifying.

We walk around in our Western "civilization" -- which still would be a good idea, but we're further from it now than when Gandhi waxed sentimental about the notion -- seeing pretty much what we want to see, ignoring pretty much what we want to ignore, and getting fed this constant diet of inducements from every portal into our awareness. We cannot conceive of the death and destruction inhering our comfortable lifestyles. We don't even think they are comfortable! We suffer plenty, and while we still can abstract about how uncomfortable billions of other people are, it still mostly doesn't dampen our resentments for our own suffering. We are blind to the FACT that our lifestyles come at the price of literally millions of lives, billions if you count the quality of their lives.

Oh, oh, what could be wrong with Iranians being free to wear what they want to wear, show affection, date, do what people do everywhere? Mostly nothing could be wrong with it. Mostly everything could be right with it.

Except the part about all the millions who suffer because some can have these great lives. The thing about the Iranian theocracy that is indispensable is that they don't let the multitudes suffer for the lifestyles of the few... or, not to the same extent, that's for sure. It would be lovely if they didn't impose all the religious fundamentalism on their population, but the very fact of helping the poor is PART of that fundamentalism. So you have the transcendentally good at the cost of observing some strictures that aren't fun, aren't so relaxed and moderate, so even-tempered about the things that lead to our Western-style bacchanalia.

It's a damn mess.

And the people who put out videos like this one are fuckers... mind-fuckers... mind-fuckers who can make you want anything it serves them to make you want. They've perfected the technique on three hundred million Americans, and millions more across the globe. It's rampant in India now. It's kicking up in China. Just hold out that carrot and the winners of the world will ignore the billions suffering for their designer shades and doctorates....

Well, let me be more blunt about it: You want more relaxed relations with the West, you give us access to your wealth-generation. THAT fucks the poor people AND the working class. Period. End of story. End of revolution. So this gauzy video with such a clean-looking, handsome even, guy, talking so reasonably and virtuously, is just a pack of evil lies, no different than the bullshit campaign spots done to catapult Obama to stardom.

It's no different than convincing you that softer toilet paper is the ONLY stuff to have, even though it costs the planet more trees and gets wads of fiber sticking to your twat. Do you realize that at least half of America hates this billowy soft toilet paper, but can't bear to buy anything more sensible because people might look down on them for it when they use their toilets? That's a fact! That's asinine! But we can't stop. It's the same mental conditioning as being used in this video that makes it reality.

It's everywhere.

And WE put it there.

On purpose and this is hardball.

Which makes it IMPOSSIBLE to fairly assess horrific news items like this... beside even the most successful attempts not being able to change the hard reality of the meta-situation that keeps Iran, all Iran, squashed like a bug, no matter which way they turn, no matter which eyes they look out of, no matter what they do.

But... they are insulted when you suggest this way that they are victims! Iranians are not victims! They're intransigent! They're full of fire! They ROCK! The problem is 100% vicious plutocrats wanting their resources, and far from being victims, they have been the most successful at keeping those pigs' mitts off them. It is a fact, though, that political instability there will bring them down, all the way down... not just the theocrats, but all Iranians....

[I'm probably going to get another blast from someone bitching about me betraying progressivism, or being an Ahmadinejad-loving protest thwarter, or something equally as irascible... but... dammit... World War Three hangs in the balance. This is NO time to be flipping out about this stuff. Eyes on the ball! Eyes on the ball! Eyes on the nuclear football....]

[Maybe part of my incredulity comes from knowing how roughly we are treated for lesser disruptions and just can't fathom how they think they have it so bad in light of the multifarious little-noted-but-horrifically-real cruelties here. Maybe my brain defaults to the notion that they don't have it nearly as bad as it's being made out to be. I don't think that is it, but I recognize it factors into my thoughts on the matter sometimes. Lots of times I'm just certain that even in the countries on earth that hate us the most, they still think life here is a million times better than it actually is.... I know a lot of those "jihadi" detainees were pretty shocked by the lack of due process. So was I. So maybe this bears on the mental processes of Iranians across the world who seem to think we're the good society and Iran's is the bad society.

So much is involved! So many mistaken conceptions all around. So little understanding for people who truly would rather NOT be subjected to the ugliness in modern Western "culture". How to live together...? How to maintain individual cultures when technology threatens to turn the whole planet into one flavor? Maybe there's no bucking it, even without evil people running the show. I just know the flavor is going to be completely unpalatable for the multitudes if we keep going this way.]

aftermath

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iranian obamanians

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<== At last I begin to see that it really is only "the left" opposing this lethal intransigence of the poor sufferers of head scarves and Western discontent fomentation. And, clearly, once fomented, the willfulness of the downtrodden Iranian is bared and hell, high water and world war cannot deter it. I cannot express vividly enough my anger and revulsion over this greed, hate and delusion. So, yes, it seems now by popular consensus, I'm a full-blooded leftist.

Iran: fighting the opposition amid intense pressure
20:47 - 27/07/2009

MOSCOW. (Pyotr Goncharov for RIA Novosti) - TV footage of demonstrations by the Iranian opposition being scattered by the police have become almost routine. What is less obvious is that they reflect the current political crisis of the Iranian administration.

Notably it is this domestic policy that determines Iran's conduct in the world arena on major issues, including the international conflict over its nuclear program.

The Iranian public is being showered with reports about resignations and dismissals. The ministers of culture, labor, public affairs, health, and intelligence had to leave their posts. However, the big sensation has been First Vice President Rahim Mashaei's forced resignation by Iran's spiritual leader Ali Khamenei.

This is a serious symptom which shows that Khamenei is no longer capable of defending his protege Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as he did before. Hence, there is a growing opposition in the ayatollah club not only to Ahmadinejad, but also to Khamenei himself. Today's rulers are being opposed by a moderate group represented by former presidents - Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Ayatollah Mohammad Khatami, and ex-Prime Minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the opposition leader.

Ahmadinejad is doing everything to save the regime but has to do this in conditions of intense international pressure.

The Barack Obama administration is hoping to hear Iran's response to its proposals to negotiate its nuclear program by September, the start of the UN General Assembly regular session, as U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced today during his talks with his Israeli counterpart Ehud Barak in Jerusalem.

Gates recalled that the United States is ready to protect Israel against the nuclear and missile threats, and will render it the necessary technical and economic support in order to strengthen its missile defense.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has already warned Tehran that if Iran does not positively react to these proposals, it will no longer be able to avoid "greater international isolation in all areas." Recently, Russia and the United States have unanimously set tough terms to Iran. At a joint briefing, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his American counterpart Hillary Clinton in Phuket, Thailand, urged Iran to reply to 'the 5 + 1' proposal as soon as possible. This is the first time Russia and the United States have demonstrated such unanimity.

Quite recently, the position was much softer. At their recent summit in L'Aquila, G8 leaders agreed to wait till September and then decide, depending on Iran's response, whether to toughen sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program or award it with bonuses.

The proposals were made to Iran in April for two reasons - in view of the natural pause in the nuclear dialogue and because of the approaching elections in Iran.

In unanimous opinion, these April proposals were more than attractive. Iran was guaranteed fully-fledged cooperation in modern nuclear technology in exchange for its renouncement of its uranium-enrichment program. Tehran had more than enough time to appreciate these proposals, and it did this in its usual manner.

Shortly after the L'Aquila summit, Tehran expressed its readiness to present a package of responses to the 5 + 1 proposals. Its Foreign Affairs Ministry assured everyone with due authority that this package will become a good foundation for Iran's talks with the West, and will reflect not only its response to the challenges to the Middle East but also its position on security and regional policy.

In addition, Iran will be ready to discuss with the West universal nuclear disarmament, a search for ways out of the global economic crisis (to be sure, on Iran's example), and other philosophical issues. The Foreign Affairs Ministry mentioned that Iran's prestige as a regional power has grown immensely after the June 12 elections. In other words, as if in an act of irony, Tehran expressed its readiness to discuss absolutely everything save the proposed versions of cooperation on its nuclear program.

What happens within the Iranian administration today shows that the April enthusiasm is decreasing, probably because of the opposition's demonstrations and a split in the ruling elite.

However, it is not yet clear what these domestic changes in Iran will result in. Is it possible that Ahmadinejad's new administration has adjusted its stand on its nuclear program? There is no answer so far.

The opinions expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.

This emphasis on the last line is mine because it's the only one in there indicating this isn't Russia's official position....

they've all cracked under the strain

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I wonder if you realize how badly some people want World War III. I have wondered long at the brilliance of the Iranians for resisting the heinous provocations we've been heaping on them for at least four years. I wonder what percentage of the population of Iran is even Iranian anymore. I wonder why the fuck humans are so blind when sight counts the most of anything.

about those mystery voters

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you can't MAKE people understand

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... and you think you're going to drop of a stroke any minute and you can't get to sleep and your skin hops and your platelets try to leave without you... but it doesn't do any good....

threatening loudly with bald-faced lies

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Do you think for an instant this isn't the run-up to an attack?

One thing can stop it. That's if the rest of the world... China and Russia and whoever else will stand up makes us stop. If someone can get pictures of thousands in the streets with green, even if they have to photoshop them, they will be waved for all they're worth. If idiots keep running out into the streets of big cities, waving Pahlavi Dynasty flags in solidarity with all those ripped-off Mousavi voters, in support of "democracy", so much the better. The more kids they can get into their Twitter disinformation scheme the better. The more pumped up they can pump the youth of the world, the less of a chance Iran stands of remaining sovereign against the plunder of plutocrats. Far from making them play the bad guys if they will insist, the kids are helping them take everything from Iran, loving their feelings of power and solidarity so much it's blanking out their sense... exactly as planned. Far from taking the warning from their counterparts in Ukraine and Georgia and elsewhere, they are falling for it just as though it hasn't already shot down the people of too many countries already.

I tell you, it's infallible!

People are lemmings.

can i get you any cream or sugar to go with your disinformation?

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Or perhaps you'd prefer it iced?

You know, there are people out here beating our heads against the wall day in and day out to help you see and understand reality, but noooooooooo.

Prize for Least Propagandistic Western Coverage in Over a Month

don't think yer revolution is a coup d'état?

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Think again.

I mean, maybe if we stop looking at it from the well-worn overthrow of Latin American leaders and shift over to the other hemisphere it will start sinking in a little better.... It's worth a try.

Note: I moved that piece over to obodhiosophie so I could read it carefully without the blare killing me and without printing it out. If you want it all formatted in the original with links to the books mentioned, or to print it, just follow the title link there and it will all mystically appear for you....

You shouldn't cop an attitude about the work involved in reading and understanding. I mean, it's too damn easy for you to get people killed, maybe millions of people killed, over your desire to reform religious bumpkins, and if you are going to insist on it, maybe you want to get a clue about the lethal implications, the mortal folly, of this action... just in case you don't want to regret it for the rest of your lives.

tie a green ribbon around this

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In an Impotent World Even the Bankrupt Can Prevail
July 20, 2009
by Paul Craig Roberts

When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Japan did not spend years preparing her public case and demonstrating her deployment of forces for the attack. Japan did not make a world issue out of her view that the US was denying Japan her role in the Pacific by hindering Japan’s access to raw materials and energy.

Similarly, when Hitler attacked Russia, he did not preface his invasion with endless threats and a public case that blamed the war on England.

These events happened before the PSYOPS era. Today, America and Israel’s wars of aggression are preceded by years of propaganda and international meetings, so that by the time the attack comes it is an expected event, not a monstrous surprise attack with its connotation of naked aggression.

The US, which has been threatening Iran with attack for years, has passed the job to Israel. During the third week of July, the American vice president and secretary of state gave Israel the go-ahead. Israel has made great public disclosure of its warships passing through the Suez Canal on their way to Iran. “Muslim” Egypt is complicit, offering no objection to Israel’s naval forces on their way to a war crime under the Nuremberg standard that the US imposed on the world.

By the time the attack occurs, it will be old hat, an expected event, and, moreover, an event justified by years of propaganda asserting Iran’s perfidy.

Israel intends to dominate the Middle East. Israel’s goal is to incorporate all of Palestine and southern Lebanon into “Greater Israel.” The US intends to dominate the entire world, deciding who rules which countries and controlling resource flows.

The US and Israel are likely to succeed, because they have effective PSYOPS. For the most part, the world media follows the US media, which follows the US and Israeli governments’ lines. Indeed, the American media is part of the PSYOPS of both countries.

According to Thierry Meyssan in the Swiss newspaper Zeit-Fragen, the CIA used SMS or text messaging and Twitter to spread disinformation about the Iranian election, including the false report that the Guardian Council had informed Mousavi that he had won the election. When the real results were announced, Ahmadinejad’s reelection appeared to be fraudulent.

Iran’s fate awaits it. A reasonable hypothesis to be entertained and examined is whether Iran’s Rafsanjani and Mousavi are in league with Washington to gain power in Iran. Both have lost out in the competition for government power in Iran. Yet, both are egotistical and ambitious. The Iranian Revolution of 1979 probably means nothing to them except an opportunity for personal power. The way the West has always controlled the Middle East is by purchasing the politicians who are out of power and backing them in overthrowing the independent government. We see this today in Sudan as well.

In the case of Iran, there is an additional factor that might align Rafsanjani with Washington. President Ahmadienijad attacked former President Rafsanjani, one of Iran’s most wealthy persons, as corrupt. If Rafsanjani feels threatened by this attack, he has little choice but to try to overthrow the existing government. This makes him the perfect person for Washington.

Perhaps there is a better explanation why Rafsanjani and Mousavi, two highly placed members of the Iranian elite, chose to persist in allegations of election fraud that have played into Washington’s hands by calling into question the legitimacy of the Iranian government. It cannot be that the office of president is worth such costs as the Iranian presidency is not endowed with decisive powers.

Without Rafsanjani and Mousavi, the US media could not have orchestrated the Iranian elections as “stolen,” an orchestration that the US government used to further isolate and discredit the Iranian government, making it easier for Iran to be attacked. Normally, well placed members of an elite do not help foreign enemies set their country up for attack.

An Israeli attack on Iran is likely to produce retaliation, which Washington will use to enter the conflict. Have the personal ambitions of Rafsanjani and Mousavi, and the naive youthful upper class Iranian protesters, set Iran up for destruction?

Consult a map and you will see that Iran is surrounded by a dozen countries that host US military bases. Why does anyone in Iran doubt that Iran is on her way to becoming another Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, in the end to be ruled by oil companies and an American puppet?

The Russians and Chinese are off balance because of successful American interventions in their spheres of influence, uncertain of the threat and the response. Russia could have prevented the coming attack on Iran, but, pressured by Washington, Russia has not delivered the missile systems that Iran purchased. China suffers from her own hubris as a rising economic power, and is about to lose her energy investments in Iran to US/Israeli aggression. China is funding America’s wars of aggression with loans, and Russia is even helping the US to set up a puppet state in Afghanistan, thus opening up former Soviet central Asia to US hegemony.

The world is so impotent that even the bankrupt US can launch a new war of aggression and have it accepted as a glorious act of liberation in behalf of women’s rights, peace, and democracy.

iran's reform movement

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Iranian opposition rails at Russia over Ahmadinejad support

On July 17, former Iranian President and influential opposition leader Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani publicly addressed the latest election crisis, arrests and the issue of freedom of expression after the Friday prayer. Nearly 1.5-2.5 million people attended his speech in Tehran.

After the speech, massive protests involving about 2 million people were held in Tehran and other major Iranian cities.

In the past few days, the Iranian government has been accusing protesters of being manipulated by U.S. and Israeli secret services. The national opposition chanted "Death to the Dictator" and "Death to Russia" during the Friday demonstrations.

The supporters of Mir-Hossein Mousavi Khameneh, who ran against Ahmadinejad in the June 12, 2009 presidential elections, are accusing Moscow of unconditionally supporting the incumbent president during the current election crisis.

Video blogs posted by Iranians showed footage of protesters burning the Russian flag.

"Iranians, although not all of them, are convinced that Russian advisors train riot police and secret services. This is complete nonsense, but the people believe it," a Russian woman living in Tehran told the online publication Gazeta.ru on condition of anonymity.

"Russia has made a mistake by supporting Ahmadinejad from the outset," said Alexei Malashenko, an expert at the Carnegie Moscow Center.

He said Rafsanjani's speech showed that he and his supporters had not yet conceded defeat, and that Moscow should adopt a wait-and-see attitude and support the winner.

The conservative Iranian press slammed Rafsanjani on Saturday, and the reformists struck back the very next day.

Iran's liberal First Vice President Esfandiar Rahim Mashai, who was appointed last Friday, resigned on Sunday, said the English-language Press TV state channel. In 2008, Mashai drew the ire of conservatives by announcing that the people of Iran were friendly toward all nations, including Israeli.

The Islamic Revolution Party, which supports Ahmadinejad, declined to comment on Mashai's resignation.
Novye Izvestia

It has become apparent to me that the leaders of this movement know full well what they are doing, that they think that if they will do business with us we will stop threatening. It was pointed out that Rafsanjani has said in the past that throwing us a few contracts will pacify us. No. Throwing Rafsanjani and Khatami and Mousavi some millions or billions will help us regain control of Iran without nuking them. These fuckers are trying to turn Iran back into a banana republic and their followers don't seem to mind, or outright can't believe it, or are completely blind, utterly unaware. Whatever. But the leaders know, and they are helping exploit this weakness they created, purposely escalating after each success in cooling the dissent, purposely trying to alienate any protection Iran might have from Russia, because it means they are fabulously wealthy for the rest of their lives, and fuck the people of Iran. Forget that there is almost no chance this could be accomplished without serious, serious, serious bloodshed to defend the revolution, and forget that it would spark World War III, all that wealth and power is almost within their grasp....

iranians take note

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And for crapsakes listen to your Supreme Leader! There are warships in position to nuke Iran, fascists hovering to take advantage of the instability. Just cool it. Just fucking cool it.

And for the rest of us, maybe we want to bookmark Angry White Kid for the translations....

my hero may have sold out for popularity with the kids

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... which I am hoping is not the case, but would seem to be from indications I've gotten.... I haven't had the spit to encounter it personally until today... my dream of killing obnoxious teens having fortified me, I guess. So, anyway, I wanted to link you to what I am just now starting to watch, in case you want to listen to a brilliant leftist probably selling out world peace for popularity. I hope not, but I think so, and am avid to find myself wrong....