Pol junkie,
Unfortunately, I do not believe the will of the people will prevail, at this time. I believe bitter seeds have been planted, but the Revolutionary Guard is truly a brutal and reactionary, well equipped force. I believe they will use whatever force they can to crush dissent.
I have been reading some speculation that the elections represent a military coup against both civilian and clerical government control. This sounds far fetched to me, but it would be truly an ugly development.
I would be thrilled to see the people of Iran show vastly more courage in defending democracy that we have lately, but I'm afraid the cost in blood would be horrendous. My heart goes out to the people of Iran. Obviously, we need to stay the Hell out of the way for a while. Our intervention would only help the reactionaries. I'm sure the Obama Aministration is very aware of this. I am also glad that they are not pretending that the "election" results are anything but questionable.
Well, he knew the job was dangerous when he took it!
Posted by DeminNewJ at June 14, 2009 07:09 AMI'm sure the U.S. will (rightfully) stay out of it. It's hard to watch knowing that if the opposition is crushed now, it could be decades before they have a chance to rise again.
Posted by CA Pol Junkie at June 14, 2009 08:41 AMThere were protest in their last election of the sport coat. These seem to be much more. This seems to be between Mousavi and the Supreme Leader Ali Khamene there. The sport coat is but a pawn. He could be anyone but... thousands of Iranians chanting not "Death to America" or "Death to Israel," but "Death to the Government."
"Why did the clergy panic? Because they saw something much larger than just Mousavi being elected. They saw the beginnings of a wave that would sweep them out of power. This started with Khatami. and it won’t stop today just because they declared a fraudulent winner. Mousavi would have been the crowbar with which to pry open the tangled nest of corruption that came into power soon after the 1979 revolution. There is enough pent-up anger in Iran’s youth to fuel a complete wipeout of the regime." With the average age in Iran at 25 right now, this protest should carry on. More and more are getting tired of the high cost of everything there. They are drilling now, drilling here, but not paying less; and not seeing any compensation for their effort in prices.
Interesting aside; there's a new poll indicating that 29 percent of Iranians hold a positive view toward the United States, down from 34 percent in February 2008. These are the voters of today. The poll comes from Yahoo/AP with the title: Poll: Few Iranians see US favorably, despite Obama. So Iranians liked President Bush better than President Obama? Now isn't that some "change".
Posted by peter at June 14, 2009 10:50 AM