Comments on: Tehran warns, ‘There will be no velvet revolution!’

By: David Crisp

David Crisp — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:13:46 +0000

I can't speak to what NPR did over the weekend, but on Thursday it had thorough, extensive coverage of the election just about all day long. Don't paint with too broad a brush.

By: Citizen

Citizen — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 15:22:46 +0000

relection-reflection

By: Citizen

Citizen — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 15:21:54 +0000

Americans suffered the oil price increase and waiting lines apropos the 73 Israeli war; and they've never had a clue–or course they will be ready for $500 barrel oil in the same sense. When it happens this time around, their Fourth Estate will again give them no causation relection, and they will pay again, and for as long, once again. Always good to keep them ignorant down on the farm, so to say. That's your 3 branches of government and the Fourth Estate doing what it does best, keeping itself in power and rich at the expenses of, and in the name of "we the people."

By: Citizen

Citizen — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 15:11:15 +0000

We need more than hope–contact your congressional reps every chance you get to stop this drum beating for war; in many locals across the US, the newspaper of record is still misquoting Iran's reelected president (erase Israel rather than the zionist regime will vanish as did the USSR), in my case, the St Petersburg Times. Nobody ever calls them on it, or they don't print the call. Sammo, sammo, the cable TV news channels.

By: Citizen

Citizen — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 15:07:05 +0000

Oh yeah, and who cares, and what justification is it, that Jews ruled the area for a time thousands of years ago? People are still alive who remember the cruel proxy Shah.

By: Citizen

Citizen — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 15:03:54 +0000

I gotta say, I agree with LeaNder here (again).

By: Citizen

Citizen — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 14:54:37 +0000

The same can be said, and it is true, regarding Hamas, which has done much more for poor Palestinians, and has been less corrupt than its Palestinian puppet competitor. Even Hitler had that going for him initially. The limousine liberal elites never learn until it is too late that the masses, the popular opinion, rises or falls with facts on their ground. The same pattern occurs over and over again. Right wing dictatorships succeed because they initially deliver beyond hypocrisy, and only later activate things worse for the masses in the end than the liberals allow hypocritically before then.

By: Marion

Marion — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 14:50:56 +0000

Western Primer on elections in developing countries Some Western principles in assessing elections in developing countries: 1) When the favored candidates win, the elections are free and fair. And when they lose, elections are certainly unfree and stolen. 2) Violent protests against elections that produce winners favored by the west, are to be strictly condemned and protesters are to be called terrorists, hooligans and mobs (can you imagine if Lebanese opposition supporters were to engage in violent protests against the election results in Lebanon), while violent protests against enemies of the US when they win elections (like in Moldova) are to be admired (and the protesters in those cases are called "democracy activists". 3) It is not against free elections to have Western governments interfere in elections and in funding candidates through Western groups for the promotion of democracy. 4) Candidates (or even dictators) who serve Western interests are automatically labeled as "reform candidates" (even the Saudi tyrant is referred to as "reform-minded"), while candidates who oppose Western economic and political interests are to be labeled enemies of reform. 5) Candidates who are not strident in their language about Israel are always favored. 6) Western observers of elections are always on hand to declare an election unfair and rigged if the favored candidates lose. 7) The corruption of pro-US candidates (like the March 14 bunch) is preferred to the non-corruption of, say, Mugabe. 8) The democratic credentials of dictators immediately improve if they change their policies toward the US and if they express willingness to serve US economic and political interests. 9) Countries where dictators do a good job in serving US economic and political interests need not hold elections. 10) If favored candidates can't guarantee electoral victory (like the PA tool, Abu Mazen whose term has expired months ago), they don't need to hold elections and will be treated as if they won an election anyway. 11) It is just not logical to assume that people in developing countries can freely ever decide to make choices that are not consistent with political and economic interests of the US. 12) Elections that are held under American and Israeli occupations are free and fair if the preferred candidates win. Posted by As'ad at 8:55 PM " target="_blank">http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2009/06/western-pri...

By: RowanBerkeley

RowanBerkeley — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 14:46:54 +0000

"Those of you who think this election was fair don't seem to have read the post." I've read it twice, and there is no concrete evidence in it (or anywhere else) that the election was rigged.

By: RowanBerkeley

RowanBerkeley — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 14:44:30 +0000

Yes — the article blithely says, "This completely rigged election," but there's no evidence of that at all. Juan Cole, for instance, just waffles around with circumstantial gueswork of his own and says he wished he knew more.