Whose Coup?
One of the puzzling things about the apparent electoral theft in Iran is that one of the major storylines of the Iranian election had been former president and current bigwig Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani had earlier intervened in the campaign against Ahmedenijad. There had long been elements of tension between Ahmadenijad, a younger and more populist guy, and the old-line clerical establishment. Moussavi’s campaign, though reformist in its main thrust, also always clearly had one foot in the establishment and seemed to have some establishment support. Under the circumstances, the election theft looks like an about-face.
Brian Ulrich rounds up some different strands and speculates that what we may be looking at is a military coup that’s at least as much about consolidating the power of the Revolutionary Guards over the economy as it is about the establishment crushing the forces of reform.
76 Responses to “Whose Coup?”
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June 14th, 2009 at 11:47 am
I’m not sure I understand the part about the about-face. As I understand it, the Interior Ministry – which runs the elections – answers to the president, not the Expediency Council or the Assembly of Experts. If Ahmadinejad and his allies have engineered an election fraud, that doesn’t mean Rafsanjani is in on it. Rafsanjani appears still to be working against Ahmadinejad.
One possibility is that we are seeing a contingently pre-planned putsch by a coalition of liberal reformists and the more centrist elites around Rafsanjani. Having failed to oust the incompetent populist fool Ahmadinejad through electoral means, they have unleashed and implemented a Tehran-centered power-play and protest movement to delegitimize the election and bring political pressure to bear that will result in Ahmadinejad’s removal through other means.
June 14th, 2009 at 11:49 am
What’s most amazing is that the Israel bashers on this blog are the ones defending the Iranian authorities and denying that the election was stolen. The greatest wish of the Likud Party in Israel and the neocons in the US is that Mr. Amadinejad be returned to power. In fact, there is speculation in Israeli news outlets that Bibi has altered his speech today to concentrate on the Iranian threat posed by the alleged hijacking of the election in Iran.
June 14th, 2009 at 11:52 am
apparent electoral theft
Such phrases are often used within articles to plant a bias, a common technique of the NYT or WaPo.
Why isn’t the election just a rejection of the monied classes? Such things have happened in Cuba and Venezuela. And even before in Iran with Mossadegh and the rejection of the Shah.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Or, maybe Iran is just putting down a rebellion like any country would do. Now we’ve gone from Matt declaring he knows exactly what happened in a country thousands of miles away, to him reading the minds of the Iranian government.
This is really starting to seem like an upper-class conspiracy. All the pro-Iraq war bloggers are pushing this very, very, very hard. Almost nobody else is even talking about it. The people telling us to ‘trust them’ that this is a popular revolt are the same people who told us to ‘trust them’ on the Iraq war. These people are just reflexively hawkish.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
Maybe I’ve missed a few comments, but I don’t think I’ve seen anything like that. The commenter most strongly backing the Iranian authorities was, I think, Hector, who in no way is an Israel basher, because to him everything is pretty much about re-running the Crusades with Leninists leading the Western charge, so he wanted the U.S. to agree to send in troops to help the Iranian government smash the hipsters on the streets of Tehran, because he’s sure that a Bolivian peasant would agree.
Maybe the election was stolen. Maybe the election failed to go the way a variety of analysts claimed that they would based on not too strong of evidence.
That is not “backing the Iranian authorities”, who are tyrannical shits whatever way the election went.
And as I said before, if you have no information, then “Do the opposite of whatever Elliot Abrams and Daniel ‘Crack’ Pipes [who both back Ahmadinejad so their demonization of Iran faces not even a burp of interruption] want,” is not a bad rule to follow, and, yeah, to the barricades against the stolen elections.
There are powerful interests lining up behind all sorts of players in this Iranian situation.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
Why isn’t the election just a rejection of the monied classes? Such things have happened in Cuba and Venezuela.
Seriously? In Cuba?
June 14th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
It’s my understanding that some of the leaders of the Revolutionary Guard are extremely wealthy and comprise the core of economic insiders. Using their positions and power to advance their own economic interests.
This stuff is universal after all. If the RG leadership isn’t among the beneficiaries of it’s insider status it might be said they don’t deserve their power or maybe they couldn’t maintain it. Which gets back to the election doesn’t it?
June 14th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Shorter Matty:
As one after another of Matty’s fantasies collapses under the weight of his own lies and contradictions he must create ever more elaborate tales to lull the bunnies to sleep.
Who cares how insane it is to claim that after a few hours of vote counting the Interior Ministry called the reformists to tell them they had won but not to brag too much!
After all a movie director (!) living in Paris told Matty so!
This is why Mousavi jumped the gun and announced his victory and then called his followers into the street to riot before the polls even closed!
All perfectly normal democratic behavior!
Of course this doesn’t quite square with Mousavi’s complaint that after his premature announcement the Interior Ministry declared Ahmedenijad the winner before they had time to count the votes!
In other words, when the Interior Ministry supposedly (note the total lack of detail in the claim) declared Mousavi the winner it was all lucky ducky and good but later when they announced Mousavi the loser why there hadn’t been enough time to count the votes!
Oh dear, how to resolve that contradiction?
Oh I know! Matty will just dump it down the memory hole!
And since Matty can present no evidence for the “fraud” nor rational explanation nor evidence for the vast conspiracy he first posited then that is proof that it is a military coup which has somehow completely circumvented the religious and civilian authorities!
And tomorrow when the holes in his latest lie begin to develop? Well he will always have the Alien Conspiracy of New Hampshire to fall back on!
Matty you get funnier every day!
June 14th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Matt Yglesias, Kevin Drum, Josh Marshall.
You guys got the biggest issue of our time completely and utterly wrong because you deffered to the so-called experts. How are we supposed to trust that you’re not doing this again? You appear to be playing into the hands of the ‘bomb-Iran’ camp. Juan Cole, while better than you are, doesn’t seem to have much experience with actual elections or he wouldn’t act like his litany of common election snafus ‘proved’ the election was fraud. Now you’re acting like the Iranians should have just ignored rioting in the streets and allowed themselves to be overthrown by a right wing corporatist.
The mere fact that your explanation for what is going on flies in the face of obvious reality gets papered over. Mousavi was, for the most part, an establishment candidate. You’re suggesting that he was so dangerous the ruling council decided to let him run anyway, and then rigged the vote nobody but westerners actually expected him to have a snowballs chance in hell at winning.
If this were 1989, you’d be talking about how the evil Iraqi’s most definitely ripped babies out of incubators and smashed them on the floor while raping a bus full of nuns.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
Seriously? In Cuba?
In terms of rejection of the monied classes – yes.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
I guess I’ll stop being cautiously skeptical of evidence of fraud because it’s not really worth being called anti-semitic. Way to poison the well.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
soullite:
This is really starting to seem like an upper-class conspiracy. All the pro-Iraq war bloggers are pushing this very, very, very hard. Almost nobody else is even talking about it. The people telling us to ‘trust them’ that this is a popular revolt are the same people who told us to ‘trust them’ on the Iraq war. These people are just reflexively hawkish.
Just as you are reflexively against the West. To me the election was analogous to Obama’s except the outcome.
Obama’s support was in the cities and liberal areas, Ahmadinejad’s was in the conservative rural areas. As soon as the victor was declared the authorities shut down Facebook, text messaging, websites, etc, b/c that’s what the opposition had effectively used to organize.
No doubt the elections in Iraq and Lebanon have inspired some of the everyday people in Iran. No doubt the neocons and Israeli hawks are happy with the election’s outcome which keeps their bogeyman alive.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
Don’t forget that the Hizbullah-allied coalition (of which Hizbullah is only a small part) actually won the Lebanese elections with about 55% of the vote, but seats are awarded via the post-civil-war agreement of delegating sectarian seating and elections are often about reshuffling alliances within those delegated seats. If not for that, Hizbullah might be leading the government. I’m not endorsing that, it’s just that the coverage by the U.S. establishmentarian media didn’t emphasize that reality at all.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Poptarts, I’m reflexively against spoiled rich brats telling me how to think. That includes Matt. Judging by your ‘Obama effect’ BS and lack of any real understanding of the world, it probably means you as well. CNN is not really a source for accurate information in the muslim world. Those Lebonese elections didn’t go the way you heard it, and Ahmedinajad was always the likely winner of this election.
If support for Moussavi was so deep, why is it just college kids in Tehran who are rioting? Why aren’t there reports of this elsewhere? You guys say there is just no way Ahmedinajad won everywhere, but nobody seems to have a problem with this election both Northern Tehran.
Hell, you don’t even seem smart enough to realize I’m a westerner.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Re El Cid @ 5
I suggest that Mr. El Cid hasn’t been reading JT, Soullite, or abb1. He need go no farther then the very first comment on this thread by Dan Karvick.
They are among the biggest Israel bashers on this blog and are in bed with the likes of Frank Gaffney and Charles Krauthammer who are ecstatic over the apparent Amadinejad victory. See atttached link from Haaretz which pushes the line that his victory is good for Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1092587.html
June 14th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
Zach, thats one of the reasons I’m wary of these accusations. The full bore ‘OMG YOU MUST BE INSANE FOR NOT AGREEING WITH ME!!!!’ tone of Steve Benen, Matt Yglesias, and Juan Cole, not to mention the various commenters, is EXACTLY the ‘you dirty fucking hippie, STFU’ tone they took in march of 2003.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
SLC, it’s fucking hilarious that you actually think you have credibility on Israel.
You don’t get to compare yourself to George Wallace standing on the school house steps, what with your ’settlements today, settlements tomorrow, settlements forever!’ line and still have credibility. I don’t like trying to shut down debates with accusations of mental instability, but what the hell are people supposed to think when you believe that comparing standing up for your pet cause to standing up FOR school segregation is positive spin.
For the first week or so you showed up here, I assumed you were a parody troll.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
SLC: If you re-read Kervick’s comment, than you, or maybe not you, but a reasonable person, sees an awful lot of skepticism toward both Mousavi and Ahmadinejad as well as against particular arguments serving as proof of election fraud, but this is not a statement in favor of Iranian authorities. But I suppose none of this matters, since all you want to do is maneuver the situation so that you can regurgitate whichever of your repeated catch-phrases has caught your fancy today.
Let’s never forget that debating the quality of various arguments and evidence are not the same (as might have been said in previous eras) as being “objectively” pro- or anti- some particular political power group.
After all, even political groups we back may have supporters whose arguments are weak or unconvincing or flat out wrong, but that doesn’t make us suddenly that group’s ‘opposition’ simply because we question one or another particular argument.
I’m going to give up and go do yard work anyway, so, everyone can just have at it making this real argument into a proxy-fest.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
I hope JT and soullite will read this post from Cole, in which he discusses the “Mousavi was the elitist candidate” line and rejects it—both because these are not the issues on which elections in Iran swing, and because Ahmadinejad is not the man of the people he wishes he was. Things are terrible in Iran; if his populist appeal was vital to him getting re-elected, you’d think high unemployment would pop that bubble.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
It’s my understanding that some of the leaders of the Revolutionary Guard are extremely wealthy and comprise the core of economic insiders. Using their positions and power to advance their own economic interests.
If that’s the case, then you look towards Pakistan for a similar example, where the army has basically become a giant corporate entity. It would be depressingly familiar if the underlying motivation is bog-standard military power, though I suppose the question would be why it took so long. If that’s the case, it clearly changes the game in terms of who’s pulling the strings in Tehran.
his litany of common election snafus
Clearly, your expertise on the voting patterns and regional affinities of Iranians precedes you.
Nobody knows what’s going on out in the provinces. But even if everyone’s doing the Happy Happy Joy Joy dance for Ahmadinejad outside of Tehran, that’s somewhat beside the point in terms of what might happen next.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
@soullite – I don’t agree with everything you’re saying (specifically, I doubt you know enough to confidently dismiss the protesters as college kids) but right on with the 03/03 reference. Common sense statements like, “Hey, you know, Hans Blix has been there for years, has been given our best leads, and is yelling from the rooftops that he’s found nothing,” were ridiculed because Clinton said Saddam has WMD, too, and besides that, Scott Ritter was a pedophile. When respected voices on both sides of the political spectrum are in agreement, this sort of thing crops up.
It shouldn’t be necessary to preface every post with, “I want Moussavi to win, too,” to enter into the discussion. I wager that only a handful of the posters in this thread knew his name ten days ago (I didn’t!) but somehow we’re willing to agree that there’s certain fraud based on accepted facts about Iran (he’s an Azeri Turk; there’s no way they’d vote for anyone else there, etc) coming from trusted authorities.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Zach: In a previous thread, I inadvertently implied you were a lunatic (well, I put you at the very bottom rung of lunacy, which I meant to be, like, almost 0% lunacy). Nor are you grinding an ideological axe in the way that soullite and JT are. That said, it doesn’t seem to me like you’re really engaging with the points at hand.
First of all , I was against the Iraq War from the very beginning, since establishing our Skeptical Left-Wing Bona Fides is apparently going to be important in this discussion. And I think those of us who are skeptical of the election results are the ones who most resemble those who rejected Powell’s UN presentation. Obviously one response to Powell was “Well, that’s open-and-shut; Iraq has those weapons and they’re going in!” but another, I would say more common and just as destructive, response was “Well, what do I know about these things? Sure, if he says there are weapons, there are probably weapons.” The anti-war Left didn’t say, “Hey, if there was something wrong in what he said, the media will tell us soon; we should withhold judgment until then”—it saw that the evidence was fishy, and said so. Right now we think the Iran looks fishy, and we’re saying so—not because of what neocons are telling us (Juan Cole??), but because of what fits with our understanding. You don’t find it fishy, so let’s disagree on the merits of the case, and not cast one side as Just Like Paul Wolfowitz, yes?
For instance, “he’s an Azeri Turk; there’s no way they’d vote for anyone else there,” is a straw man: Cole is saying that, given that Azeris have disproportionately voted for their own in presidential elections in the past, the idea of him being blown out—not just defeated—in his home province, and particularly in urban areas (which, even by soullite and JT’s argument, favor him) at the very least needs explanation. If no explanation exists, then accepting it on faith is the opposite of skeptical.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Ugh, sorry for the crappy editing in my last comment. I should really avail myself of that Preview button.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:22 pm
soullite, to the extent that anybody is demonizing you, it is due to the fact that–as far as I can tell–you’ve given no proof whatsoever for your claims. There are any number of sources and pieces of evidence that suggest the election was rigged, and yelling about how Ahmedinejad is popular with the rural poor doesn’t change that.
It isn’t only “college kids in Tehran” that are protesting, for example. Watching the videos shows that there are people who clearly aren’t college kids, and anybody following the story knows that protests have also sprung up elsewhere in Iran. Yes, they are urban-based, but these sorts of protests generally are.
(JT’s claims are just incoherent, so I’ll give you that much in comparison. But this isn’t a conspiracy of the wealthy. It’s election fraud, and it’s made people angry.)
June 14th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Zach, I’ve seen pictures and footage of them. Young men and women who are clearly upper class. I’m not much older than they are, I don’t even mean it pejoratively. But there are different king of revolutionary movements, and right now this is primarily a student protest.
Expertise? no. But elections come with miscounts, misreporting, minor acts of corruption, transposition of numbers, and a whole litany of problems. That’s universal. Humans aren’t perfect beings, and Iranians are no exceptions. These kinds of problems are going to crop up in any undertaking this large. Most of the mistakes Juan Cole has pointed to are not atypical in elections where turn-out far exceeds estimates. That is kind of the basis of most of my skepticism. These guys were screaming fraud before the vote counts were over. That warrants additional skepticism, as these people are clearly wearing blinders on this issue.
I don’t care who wins. If Moussavi ends up President of Iran, you’ll see a slightly more right wing economic policy out of them. That doesn’t actually impact me much. If he were to overthrow the ayatollahs, he wouldn’t set up a democracy. He would just set up a right wing corporate dictatorship as opposed to a religious/socialist dictatorship. His history doesn’t exactly scream ‘reformer’, it screams ‘corrupt, power hungry politician’. Given that, why the hell should I care?
June 14th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
@tomemos – I agree that it looks fishy in Iran and think Cole’s points are evidence in that regard. My summary of Cole’s point was tongue-in-cheek; there’s obviously more to it and I’m not qualified to judge anything he has to say. It seems that there’s more to be said about Ahmedenijad’s likely level of support in certain areas that he governed before becoming President. Cole’s concern is good reason to be concerned, but it’s not sufficient to be convinced; at least not for me.
As far as neocons go, I’ve seen more of a unified front on the technocratic left than anywhere else (don’t really know how else to classify MY/Sullivan/TPM/Ackerman/etc). MY’s post asking, “Now just who orchestrated this fraud?” just begs the question and many others are jumping to the same conclusion.
I think it would be far wiser to call for a new election under the supervision of Jimmy Carter or some other monitor (mostly prefer Carter to piss off certain folks who are entertaining when they’re enraged). If Iran says no, more reason to be skeptical. If Moussavi opposes, reason to be skeptical of his claims. Since both are claiming supermajority support, a do-over shouldn’t affect the actual outcome. It’s an obvious solution that’s much less dangerous than encouraging a doomed rebellion.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I don’t think there’s going to be a lot of support by the Islamic Republic for Jimmy Carter’s involvement in Iran in any way whatsoever, though I understood you were making a general statement of internationally supervised elections than a particular point about Carter, but still…
Aw, hell, no more putting off yard work.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
@soullite – the protesters I’ve seen are largely young and cosmopolitan; just saying that it’s premature to assume that’s representative of the entire movement. The images of protesters don’t exactly reflect those from the rallies this week. And, besides, the current regime came into power on the back of student protests and was widely popular. It’s not something to dismiss.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
I’m still not convinced of fraud, and given the west’s history of intervention in the area, I’m keeping an open mind. There’s this story from The Guardian, this from Newsweek and Robert Fisk’s report in The Independent.
And I suspect that many in the west underestimate how much the perceived (by Iranians) western vilification of Ahmadi-nejad my have caused some blowback. Iranians are extremely proud of their culture and their long history, and a large majority of even the most radical anti-clericalists have not forgotten which side the west backed during the Iraq-Iran war.
I also suspect that a large majority feel that Iran has as much right to develop nuclear power as any other country, and are rather irritated about the west’s “jihad” against what a great many regard as a legitimate quest.
Given the absence of any scientific polling data, I think one should be careful in jumping to conclusions.
A small question: is it at all possible to refrain from ad hominem attacks?
Meanwhile, here in “free Denmark”, (AlJazeera English is avilable on cable and satellite) I’m watching AlJazeera English on satellite TV with great interest. So far, they’re being very careful.
I’m not saying that the election hasn’t been fraudulent, but I have yet to read anything to convince me that there has been.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
Nate Silver says the math on the fraud people sucks, and um….I’ll take his word for it.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
Re tomemos
It should be quite clear that Mr. Zack is a moron. To claim on a previous thread that he was surprised that Hillary Clinton, who hadn’t lived in the Chicago area for 40 years, was defeated by somebody who represented a district in Chicago in the State Legislature and the State of Illinois in the US Senate speaks poorly of his mental capacity.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Sorry about the last sentance. It should read: I’m not saying that the election hasn’t been fraudulent, but I have yet to read anything to convince me that electoral fraud has occurred.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
@El Cid – I know; it would be fun to see Khamenei and Pipes steaming about the same thing. If Carter just made the offer they’d both flip out.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
I think that most of the evidence of fraud has been insufficient .
For example, several American conducted polls showed that Azeri’s backed Ahmadenijad over Moussavi by a 3 to 1 margin(I’ll source that if anyone wants).
As someone who has done quantitative research on elections, I can say that the R^2 stuff that Sullivan had up yesterday was bullshit(All election returns produce R^2 fits that high).
And lastly, Ahmadenijad was elected Mayor of Tehran before he was president, so the idea that he would win the city doesn’t seem so absurd.
On the other hand, I still suspect there was fraud on the basis of the regime’s response. Large numbers of leaders and clercs seem to be dissenting, as are people who worked in the Central Election Committee. This seems consistent with the idea of a military coup.
The fact that the regime has refused to make their election data available for analysis(I’d be happy to try Benford’s law and other data-verification tools if they’d post it somewhere…), and seem to be reporting it inconsistently, suggests foul play.
Of course, I don’t know what’s going on in Iran. We’ll see…
June 14th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
JT’s
claims areis just incoherent.Fixed that. He spills out all these words peppered by Obafueher, Obafraud, etc.. and I have ABSOLUTELY no idea what pisses him off. He needs meds.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
Demosthenes, nobody is demonizing me but crazy-ass SLC. I’m demonizing the rest of you.
I don’t actually know you, but the rest of these folks are so-called ‘liberal interventionists’ who look for any reason to intervene in the affairs of ‘lesser’ countries. I don’t know what the hell is going on in Iran, but the idea that the Iranian government is tearing itself up over the legitimacy of it’s elections doesn’t exactly ring true to me. I’m sure there are some very interesting internal politics involved here, but they have nothing to do with democracy or reform.
I don’t trust Matt Yglesias. I don’t trust these beltway types because they lie their asses off whenever they try to interfere in the affairs of other countries. I sure as shit can’t figure out why the hell all of these very right-wing democrats all of the sudden care about this? Iranian elections are a mockery, they always have been. Moussavi has been a part of several corrupt governments in the past, he’s not exactly a beacon of hope. How the hell do we know that Matt and Juan and you aren’t getting your information from someone with ulterior motives?
If Moussavi is so god damned popular, why are the only people upset about this living in northern Tehran?
June 14th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
Re manixdk
1. Robert Fisk is a congenital liar and anti-semite and has zero credibility. He is nothing but a suckup for the most anti-Israel spokesmen he can find and Mr. Amidinejad certainly fills te bill.
2. Nobody is claiming that Iran doesn’t have the right to develop nuclear facilities for electric power generation. The complaint is over the very real supposition that they are developing nuclear weapons which it is felt would be very dangerous in the hands of the mad mullahs of Tehran. I would remind Mr. manixdk that Copenhagen is within range of Irans’ latest generation of ballistic missiles.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:53 pm
Thanks SLC; Mousavi’s lived and worked in Tehran since shortly after the revolution while Ahmedenijad governed portions of Azarbaijan during that same time. Clinton left Chicago many years before running for President while Obama served several years in Chicago and Illinois politics. The comparison isn’t perfect, but it illustrates the point and isn’t exactly evidence of my idiocy.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
You know no one gives a shit who you think is an anti-semite, SLC. If you called someone like William Luther Pierce an anti-semite, I would reflexively wonder if there wasn’t something redeeming about him. That’s the problem with using the term as a flitgun and shorthand for people who are skeptical of the justice of zionism.
June 14th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
Re soullite
Demosthenes, nobody is demonizing me but crazy-ass SLC
Let’s see here, the only mention I have made of Mr. soullite is to call him an Israel basher. Does Mr. soullite consider that to be demonizing? Is he denying that he is an Israel basher?
June 14th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
SLC,
Actually, the debate is about whether Iran can enrich uranium. International law is rather clear on the matter, Iran has the right to enrich uranium in whatever quantity they desire so long as they submit to inspections by the IAEA.
But, if Iran develops sufficient uranium enrichment capacity, then it would only take six months to a year for them to develop nuclear weapons. Israel finds this unacceptable.
Iran claims that they are not developing nuclear weapons, and their mullahs have relased Fatwas that state that the use of nuclear weapons is against Islam. Also, US intellegence reports have stated that Iran has no nuclear weapons program.
Of course, once they have Uranium Enrichment capacity, then building a nuke really is relatively trivial. Because of that, there really wouldn’t be a need for Iran to have a nuclear weapons program yet anyway…
June 14th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
Re soullite
The only mention of Mr. soullite was to label him an Israel basher. Is Mr. soullite denying that he is an Israel basher?
Re Ed Marshall
Like Martin Luther King, I consider anti-Zionism to be nothing more then veiled anti-Semitism.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
Re Zack @ 38
I may be old and I may be slow but Mr. Zacks’ comment don’t make no sense to me (plagiarized from George Patton commenting on a speech by Bernard Montgomery)
June 14th, 2009 at 2:09 pm
I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountain tops, let it echo through the valleys of God’s green earth: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews–this is God’s own truth.” The letter also was filled with grammatical errors that any halfway literate reader of King’s work should have known disqualified him from being its author, to wit: “Anti-Zionist is inherently anti Semitic, and ever will be so.” The treatise, it is claimed, was published on page 76 of the August, 1967 edition of Saturday Review, and supposedly can also be read in the collection of King’s work entitled, This I Believe: Selections from the Writings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. That the claimants never mention the publisher of this collection should have been a clear tip-off that it might not be genuine, and indeed it isn’t. The book doesn’t exist. As for Saturday Review, there were four issues in August of 1967. Two of the four editions contained a page 76. One of the pages 76 contains classified ads and the other contained a review of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s album. No King letter anywhere.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
[...] Yglesias here, here and here. Via Matt, Brian Ulrich: A coup that originated with the military rather than the clerical or lay [...]
June 14th, 2009 at 2:25 pm
Re MR SLC
MR SLC has no credibility to attack the credibility of others. That is all.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
@SLC
Mousavi left Azarbaijan 30 years ago to govern from Tehran. Ahmedenijad ascended to the Presidency from governing Azarbaijan and later Tehran.
Clinton left Chicago about 40 years ago. Obama ascended to the Presidency from representing Chicago and later Illinois.
It’s not rocket science. The favorite son rule isn’t always clear cut and even if it is, doesn’t always hold true. Maybe Cole’s right that Azeris will always vote heavily for fellow Azeris, but his say-so isn’t enough as much as I respect him.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
Yeah, but even if it was King, so what; I don’t particularly like King anyway. Preaching gets you nowhere, which exactly why that little silly personality cult was established.
He got better by 67-68, but then they killed him, so we’ll never know if he would’ve evolved into something real.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
Maybe Cole’s right that Azeris will always vote heavily for fellow Azeris…
Cole should be ashamed. This sounds extremely condescending and insulting.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
It’s quite apparent that virtually no one in this debate seems to have been reading the English-translated Iranian blogs. More the majority of the Iranian population is under the age of 25, and a huge fraction of them are on the internet. They’re virtually unanimous in claiming that the election was stolen. Moreover, the Supreme Leader himself violated the Iranian constitution by accepting the results as announced by the Ahmadinejad-controlled Interior Ministry, instead of waiting the required three days for complaints to be considered. Does anyone seriously think that the regime’s complete shut-down of cell phone and text-messaging communications is the sign of anything other than a government frightened of its own people? There are abundant signs of fraud, and now there is visible evidence of severe repression. What does this look like? It looks like what it is: an authoritarian regime has stolen an election, is suppressing dissent, and is desperately trying to pretend that everything is fine. If anyone on here can’t recognize that reality, they are living in an ideologically tendentious world created to protect their own default beliefs.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
Re Ed Mrshall
As usual, Mr. Marshall is full of shit. The comment was made in response to a question raised after a speech that Reverend King gave at Harvard Un. and had nothing to do with the Saturday Review.
When approached by a student at Harvard in 1968 who attacked Zionism, Martin Luther King responded: “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You’re talking anti-Semitism” (Seymour Martin Lipset, “The Socialism of Fools-The Left, the Jews and Israel,” Encounter, December 1969, p. 24.)
June 14th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
Does anyone seriously think that the regime’s complete shut-down of cell phone and text-messaging communications is the sign of anything other than a government frightened of its own people?
Yes, but are they frightened because they are trying to perpetrate a coup, or are they frightened because they are trying to combat a coup?
June 14th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
@Tribunus
There’s room to be convinced that Iran is governed by a tyrannical regime that violently puts down rebellions and stifles the speech of its people yet not be convinced that the election was stolen.
Also, 35% of Iranians are online and the median age is 26.4; the majority of Iranians are somewhat older than 25 and a substantial fraction of them are online. I doubt it’s a representative sample, although I hope it is.
June 14th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
As to whether the students are trying to initiate a coup, unless the army comes over to their cause, it is hopeless and they will be crushed, just as the folks in Hama were crushed.
June 14th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
“Cole should be ashamed. This sounds extremely condescending and insulting.”
Maybe you could read what he wrote and consider the evidence he presents before jerking your knee quite so violently?
June 14th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
Martin Luther King responded: “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. ”
This is not the complete quote. I was there, I heard him saying it; he added: “…and when they criticize Nazism, they mean Germans. Heil Hitler!”
June 14th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
Re abb1 @ 56
Mr. abb1 really is a funny character. But, as the blogs’ resident Mossad agent, he is effective in discrediting the anti-Zionist cause.
June 14th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
Tick-Tock
(THE CORELESS DUO)
He (CLINTON) told an Arab-American audience of (1,000) One-Thousand, people that the (U.S.) or (AIE/W) American Israeli Empire-West, is no longer just a black-white country, nor a country that is (DOMINATED BY) dominated by Christians (AND A POWERFUL JEWISH MINORITY), given the growing numbers of Muslims, Hindus and other religious groups here. (Source: CHRISTINE SIMMONS, Associated Press Writer, Bill Clinton urges Americans to be mindful of the country’s growing diversity)
There is no real difference between the Core Less Duo of The two Black Presidents beyond, one was White, the other is Black, Bill Clinton and the Media Messiah Imperial President, there is little to nothing that separates them, they are both Core Less, Self-Serving Individuals, both stand for standing on both sides of any issue, both use “diplomatic phrase making 101,” lacking in Critical Thinking, of multi flawed filled demagoguery, symptomatic of double standards prism, failure premised, charismatic, very beautifully written vocabulary, sweet nuance laced speeches, filled with platitudes, slogans of mutual respect, politically blame the Empire moments, rhetoric, lacking specific policy recommendations for dealing with any problems, geo-economic, environmental, military, political, regional, etc., trying to be all things to all people, made by, a “politics of the personal”, both having no real convictions or core of beliefs, other than in their own greatness.
(THE FACE OFF BEGINS)
Clinton said by (2050) the (U.S./AIE/W) will no longer have a majority of people with European heritage and that in an interdependent world “this is a very positive thing.” (Source: CHRISTINE SIMMONS, Associated Press Writer, Bill Clinton urges Americans to be mindful of the country’s growing diversity).
Well, that in fact may be the trend, but that is (41) forty-one years from now this is (2009) and the interests of the Global Community are more short term focused say like the next (6) Six-Months, (180) One-Hundred-Eighty-Days. Israeli (AIE/E) American Israeli Empire-East, Israeli (PM) Prime Minister Benyamin “BiBi” Netanyahu, does not talk to hear, himself speak, nor when speaking is it on self, the words have been, are, and will be speaking to the STATE OF ISRAEL, and to the good of its Jewish Peoples, Never about the interests of the individual but the STATE. The Core Less Duo have shown their cards and before (2010), the chips will fall were they may.
As the (U.S.)/(AIE/W) continues to push for peace in the area, “I think it’s really important to give the Palestinian people something to look forward to,” Clinton said to loud applause. (Source: CHRISTINE SIMMONS, Associated Press Writer, Bill Clinton urges Americans to be mindful of the country’s growing diversity).
You would expect a response to this by “BiBi” of yes the Palestinian people have everything to look forward to, but never at the expense of the STATE AND PEOPLE OF ISRAEL, I took an oath at Masada “Never Again” and again as (PM) to be the father and protector of the STATE AND PEOPLE OF ISRAEL, and these are oaths that will never be broken.
(TICK-TOCK)
The Palestinian problem will not be settled prior to (2010), but make no mistake the Clear and Present Danger posed by the Shi-ite Persian Republic of Iran, after the re-election of its President, with the centrifuges spin toward the creation of a Nuclear Treat to the STATE AND PEOPLE OF ISRAEL, will be answered with and concluded by a decisive preemptive Thermo-Nuclear Attack upon that thread. The “Happy Warrior” a noble presentment in few words, of Ho Shih, “Even if he had to suffer punishment, would not regret his conduct.” And, if nothing else “BiBi” is that “Happy Warrior”, “HARD-CORE”, “RAM-ROD SPINED,” THE INTERESTS AND PEOPLE OF ISRAEL, HIS HEART AND SOUL. (TICK-TOCK!)
June 14th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
@55, consider the evidence he presents
I don’t think so; if that was a correct summary, I don’t need to consider anything else. No matter how he justifies his conclusion, it is patronizing and insulting.
June 14th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
test
June 14th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
abb1,
Seriously? His argument is that even little known Azeri canidates have won in Azeri regions before, and so Moussavi should have done better.
I personally don’t think he is right in this case, as Ahmadenijad apparently governed in Azeri regions before, and Opinion Polls from American organisations showed him ahead of Moussavi with Azeri’s.
Still, it is a valid point. Tribalism is still alive and well, and not only in that part of the world. This is true in Israel(I’ve heard Moroccans say the only reason they’ve voted for Shas is that their leader is Moroccan. I’ve heard a similar dynamic works with Russians and Yisrael Bietenu), it’s true in Catalonia, hell, it’s still true in the United States.
The “native son” effect is well known, and has been econometricaly tested.
Anyway, you should read the piece. The author has compiled a number of points for and against the presence of electoral fraud. To be honest, I don’t think you’re qualified to discuss this issue unless you’ve at least skimmed it over.
June 14th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
Bahhh….I give up. Four times now my comment has been eaten. I’ll include no more links this time and so interested users will have to use google:
Please read Mohsen Sazegara’s 2005 essay Iran’s Road to Democracy. It’s one of the best single sources to understand the nature of the reform movement.
If this one doesn’t post I’m giving up entirely!
June 14th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
I know that this dynamic exists, I don’t doubt it for a second.
Nevertheless, to argue that non-Azeri getting more votes than Azeri among Azeris is an indication of fraud; that Azeris will always “vote heavily for fellow Azeris” – this clearly is bigoted and insulting.
What is so complicated here?
June 14th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
It doesn’t matter whether or not the election was stolen, that’s a red herring. People enjoy the right to engage in protest and even violent overthrow simply because the society isn’t free.
BTW abb, not making up shit about how the protestors when home anymore?
June 14th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
64, what? Could you rephrase it, please?
June 14th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Re: Nevertheless, to argue that non-Azeri getting more votes than Azeri among Azeris is an indication of fraud; that Azeris will always “vote heavily for fellow Azeris” – this clearly is bigoted and insulting.
If in the last US election we had gotten results showing that areas with a majority of Black voters had voted heavily for McCain rather than Obama I expect many of us would have suspected something fishy was going on– and that would not have been “bigoted and insulting”.
June 14th, 2009 at 5:17 pm
Ah, and what if Obama was white and McCain black? Then you would’ve expected them to vote heavily for McCain – is that right?
June 14th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
Re jonF & abb1
Blacks historically (at least since the Roosevelt Administration) vote democratic so even if President Osama were white (remember, he’s half white, and his African side is not descended from slaves), he would have gotten most of that vote.
June 14th, 2009 at 6:35 pm
Wow, there are so many accusations of deviation from orthodoxy that I really can’t tell who is criticizing whom.
So far as I can tell, Matt has been accused (from the left) of playing into the hands of the bomb-Iran crowd (on the right) by calling the elections a fraud.
He’s also been accused (from the left [???]) of playing into the hands of a conspiracy by Iranian economic elites trying to steal an election.
(But don’t Mousavi and the IRCG represent competing economic elites, vice Mousavi representing THE elite?)
THOSE critics are in turn being criticized (from the left?) of hating ‘the West’ (?!?!?).
Matt’s also being criticized (from the right [?]) for claiming the election was a fraud, but I’m not really sure what the justification here is.
THOSE critics are being criticized (from the right [???]) for being anti-Israel (????).
I honestly have no idea where any of you stand on any of these issues. None of you have made any sense. This is what I hear:
People who think the election was stolen support the status quo of entrenched economic elites in Iran and want the U.S. to bomb Iran those entrenched economic elites and hate Israel and possibly also the West in general and hate hippies and are spoiled elites and and and and…
June 14th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
Billy,
Not “hippies”, “hipsters”. Please.
June 14th, 2009 at 10:05 pm
Juan Cole’s follow-up is incredibly unconvincing.
June 15th, 2009 at 6:28 am
Re: even if President Osama were white
Always nice to hear from posters in an alternate reality. In this neck of the woods though the President’s name is “Obama”.
Re: People who think the election was stolen support the status quo
Which makes absolutely no sense as it’s the challenger not the incumbent who is claiming fraud here. Ahmadenijad is the status quo. Throw in the fact that he is is the Muslim equivalent of a Young Earth, End-Times, Bible-thumping, homophobic, women-barefoot-and-pregnant fundamentalist Christian and the fact that our leftists are rallying to him is bizarre beyond belief.
June 15th, 2009 at 8:55 am
Nobody’s fucking rallying to anybody in Iran here.
The simple fact is that NO ONE here has ANY actual EVIDENCE outside of claims from the Iranian opposition and some speculation about historical trends from Juan Cole that there was SUFFICIENT electoral fraud to have “stolen” the election.
It’s that fucking simple. None of you KNOW anything about this to be making pronouncements.
And for Matt to make his fucking wannabe pundit pronouncements based on SHIT for evidence – and shit for brains – is par for his course. I wish this idiot would go back to talking about transportation, it’s about the only subject he appears to have ANY fucking clue about. He certainly has none about foreign policy, let alone elections in Iran.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:04 am
JonF, 72,
I noticed that sometimes you, guys, are just as stupid as the wingnuts.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:07 am
JonF,
I don’t think Shia Islam can fairly be compared to fundamentalist Christianity. The Shia give a high place to the clergy, and believe that there is room for interpreting and reasoning about the Muslim scriptures, while Sunni tend to believe that the doors of interpretation were closed after the first three centuries. In this regard Sunni are more similar to Protestant fundamentalists who take a literalist interpretation of scripture.
While the Iranian Government’s views on women and homosexuals are of course deplorable, I’m not sure that Ahmadinejad is responsible for that. Iran’s laws on this matter supposedly derive from the Shariah, and the Council of Guardians is the one who interprets Shariah, not the president. (Correct me if I’m wrong here).
June 15th, 2009 at 6:59 pm
soullite:
” If this were 1989, you’d be talking about how the evil Iraqi’s most definitely ripped babies out of incubators and smashed them on the floor while raping a bus full of nuns.”
I’m from kuwait, and went through the (1990, not 1989) invasion. It was an experience more terrifying and brutal than anything your dumbass could ever imagine from your cushy and secure home. The story about the babies with incubators might or might not have been true, but there were MANY crimes just as appalling. But of course the left, that stands for truth and justice, is the first to mock and deny those atrocities because you’re ‘anti-war’.
Fuck you all.