Lenin’s Tomb
Troll deleted
Shortly before election day in Iran, John Kerry came out saying that Iran has the right to uranium enrichment and that demanding it stop makes no legal or political sense. If that opinion becomes consensus of the US establishment, there's no reason to think that the US will let Israel go adventurist.
And, luckily for the people as well as the president of Iran, oil prices have been going up again, which too will have a restraining effect on the empire.
From the US ruling class point of view, there's a great deal of difference between Israel building settlements and Israel bombing Iran in terms of their potentials for endangering the oil supplies (the Gulf states and the Hormuz strait). The latter is more of an immediate problem than the former.
Besides, the US has yet to get serious about stopping settlement building and has so far shown no intention of using its economic leverage over Israel to change its behavior.
It's not a 3 to 1 vote -- it's a 2 to 1 vote. I'd venture to say that about two thirds of Iranians are in economic circumstances that tend to motivate them to prefer a populist, state-centered program than the kind of economic agenda that Mousavi proposed, with emphasis on expansion of the private sector and fighting inflation.
There's nothing romantic about poverty. Seriously, a strong focus on fighting inflation tends to bring down economic growth and thus also employment, while curtaling state expenditures on the poorer people. Those who wanted to elect Mousavi needed to convince him to develop the kind of economic program that would have taken working-class voters away from Ahmadinejad. What the reformist camp needs is a pro-working class economic program, but it can't develop one while always looking to blame only external factors, real or imagined.
19,761,433 vs. 9,841,056 (as of this writing) doesn't boil down to "3 to 1" either.
As for nationalism, in many countries it's always a factor, and in Iran today it probably is not an insignificant factor, but "serious analysts" before the election were predicting that there would be "an Obama effect" or "a Cairo speech effect" on the Iranian election, diminishing the weight of the American albatross around the neck of anyone (like the reformist camp) seen to be "pro-American," and some cited the recent Lebanese elections as an example of such an effect.
Whether or not that's true, it is at least the case that those Iranians who voted for Ahmadinejad didn't do so in the belief that they would need a strong man to stand up against Bush.
The TFT/NAF/KA survey I cited in this posting, btw, noted that the desire to have normal relations with the West isn't limited to those who preferred Mousavi, Karrubi, or Rezai.
You have no evidence that Holocaust denial is popular among Iranians. The Iranian state press (IRNA, ISNA, etc.), if you actually read it, has a lot of positive reports about the West, from new economic links to cultural ties.
"You have no evidence that Holocaust denial is popular among Iranians"
Who needs evidence when they have assertions? Certainly not Mike!
JNicolson: "Who needs evidence when they have assertions? Certainly not Mike!"
A lot of assertions fly fast and furious when it comes to a country under the spotlight due to imperial geopolitics of the moment, for sure.
As for inflation, Iran's current inflation rate is estimated to be about 18 percent. According to economists such as Ha-Joon Chang, such a rate is quite normal for a developing country. It's countries like Brazil that are pursuing a policy of abnormally high interest rates and abnormally big primary surpluses, too zealously fighting inflation, at the expense of working classes.
but serious anaylists who have been studying the entire country for years, are convinced major fraud has occurred.
Serious analysts can get things wrong. Nearly everyone missed the Shah's fall.
Still, something smells here. When they released results for 20% of the vote, it was 2 to 1 Ahmadi-Nejad. When they released the results for 47% of the vote, it was 2 to 1 Ahmadi-Nejad. At 60%, it was 2 to 1. At 80%, it was 2 to 1. Full count, still 2 to 1.
That's bollocks. I don't have a hard time believing Ahmadi-Nejad might win. I don't have a hard time believing he might win substantially.
BUT there is no way on earth his support is evenly distributed around the country. His support should have spiked when the early returns came in from the heartland, and then settled down a bit when the later-reporting precincts in the cities and non-Farsi provinces came in.
Not only was this a fix, it was a remarkably bald-faced fix.
On the good side of this, though, there is now open season on tycoon clerics. If Khamenei and Ahmadi-Nejad manage to ride this one out, Rafsanjani and his crew are gonna get purged something awful. On the whole we'll be seeing a lot less of the mullahs and a lot more of the Basij and IRGC. Unless of course the whole thing falls apart at the seams, which is about equally probable.
Slaney Black: "His support should have spiked when the early returns came in from the heartland, and then settled down a bit when the later-reporting precincts in the cities and non-Farsi provinces came in."
Why should it? There's no evidence that non-Persians preferred Mousavi to Ahmadinejad. The poll I cited in this posting, in fact, reported: "Inside Iran, considerable attention has been given to Mr. Moussavi's Azeri background, emphasizing the appeal his Azeri identity may have for Azeri voters. The results of our survey indicate that only 16 percent of Azeri Iranians indicate they will vote for Mr. Moussavi. By contrast, 31 percent of the Azeris claim they will vote for Mr. Ahmadinejad."
As for urban areas, there, too, poorer Iranians outnumber richer Iranians.
Many predicted a high turnout would favor Mousavi. I think the opposite was probably the case: the higher the turnout, the larger the number of poorer voters.
the interesting aspect of the period leading up the election was the increasing emphasis of American and British media upon an tightening race, marked by sharpening hostility between the two candidates and their supporters
there was a troubling wish fulfillment to all this, as if the US and the UK were hoping for a close contest so as to justify the intensification of violent intervention inside the borders of the country, as already manifested by US support for the terror group that launched attacks in southeastern Iran late in the campaign
in other words, it was looking increasingly suspicious that the US and the UK were about to launch a full bore destabilization campaign, something hinted at in Rafsanjani's public letter a few days ago wherein he threatened violent moderate opposition to a contested election result because of Ahmanijedad's refusal to repudiate inflammatory statements made during a debate
everyone was on board with this, apparently, even purported liberal to left opinion journals like The Nation, which ran a blog post by Richard Dreyfuss that described Ahmanijedad supporters as a virtual fascist movement, after previously profiling Mousavi and his supporters in terms of positive modernity
the distinct impression was one of an impending Orange Revolution for Iran
but this isn't the first time that The Nation has run such stereotypical crap as the items posted by Dreyfuss this week about the Iranian election, they've done it with Chavez, too
his election day post reminded me of the kinds of articles filed by journalists in recent Venezuelan elections, they always seemed to be able to find anti-Chavistas everywhere at polling stations, while Chavez supporters were as rare as Peace and Freedom Party voters here in the US
Thanks for the link to The Nation article, Richard. It's too bad that Robert Dreyfuss, who isn't against Iran per se, resorted to an alarmist term like "virtual fascist."
Again, in my view, the fundamental problem of many people, Iranian or non-Iranian, who wanted to see Mousavi elected is their lack of concern for building hegemony by winning over at the very least sizable chunks of Ahmadinejad voters through an economic program that would appeal to them. Instead, they tend to just dismiss them through name-calling.
Unlike Rafsanjani's in 2005, there were genuinely attractive aspects in Mousavi's program (such as allowing labor unions and doing away with morality police). But those aspects were tied together with economic liberalism and indifference to the need to win over working people, who may be currently conservative in many ways but can change their minds if motivated by class interests.
Yoshie: I didn't so much mean Azeris as Kurds and Lurs and other Sunnis, but that's beside the point.
No matter what the splits are, different regions of the same country simply do not vote for the same candidates in identical proportions. A real count shows volatility as the results come in, and this one didn't budge. Things swing around as small precincts with one sort of class composition report, and then another way when big precincts with another sort of class composition report. *Especially* a country with a huge rural/urban divide.
Not only that, but calling the election (with paper, non-optical-scanner ballots!) just a few hours after the polls close - something's up.
Slaney, we don't have any report that shows precinct-by-precinct breakdown yet, so volatility or lack thereof at that level can't be predicted. All we have is reports at increasing numbers of votes counted.
As for calling the election, the first person to do so was Mousavi himself, holding a press conference declaring victory (how would he know?) even before the end of polling. Iran's official agencies began releasing early results after that. But the early results were just that, showing the trends. This is the way Press TV put it: "Ahmadinejad leads Mousavi in preliminary results."
Its fascinating the degree to which the predictions are off. There is a persistant tendency to overstate the size and importance of those sections of the middle class hostile to Ahmedajad's populist rhetoric and a persistant underestimation of the size and importance of those social constituencies towards which this rhetoric is aimed. The same is true in Lebanon where analyses of the recent election ignores the fact that the victory of the 'pro-western' camp was largely the result of the sectarian voting system and General Aoun being unable to bring in the votes of that section of the christian vote he traditionally controlled: as opposed to any sea change in the popular base of Hezbollah.
The Guardian says it's 'too close to call', a 'knife-edge' election, etc:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/...-voting-
results
From the Guardian report lenin noted above:
"I am the definite winner of this presidential election," Mousavi told a press conference, where he complained of widespread regularities.
Intentional slip or just plain laziness?
I think Mousavi was complaining about irregularities (at least that is what was just reported on the 9 o'clock R4 news bulletin.)
In response to johng, I think the main constituency of reformists are at present those who might be characterized as "new middle classes," those whose sense of "middle class" status is more based on education and professions -- and young people who are their children or are studying to get into such professions -- than ownership of little shops, farms, and the like. Post-revolutionary Iran has certainly expanded this category of people, but they alone can't win.
I believe the tendency to overestimate the Mousavi camp came from the tendency to essentialize "youth" and "women," as if they were all "change agents" that the West is always looking for. But actual youth and women are various, divided by class, faith, and other factors.
Ahmadinejad himself was certainly not afraid of youth vote. He in fact proposed to lower the voting age to 15, as it was before 2006 (but the parliament didn't go along with the proposal).
Looking at the Guardian article, I just have to wonder if the editor hadn't prepared the headline before voting happened and couldn't let it go no matter what the result turned out to be.
In response to Jay, Mousavi did say "I am the winner. I am the winner with the most votes the precise results will show up later. . . . I’m definitely the winner of this election" at the same press conference where he claimed there were irregularities. (I'm citing Stratfor's translation.)
The BBC have reported that Ahmadenijad has won, but say "Police have sealed off Mr Mousavi's campaign HQ, preventing his supporters from holding a news conference."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
8098305.stm
Are we even going to entertain the possibility that the vote was rigged?
"It was a class vote"
Absolutely. According to my girlfriend (i didn't see the programme myself), Ahmadinejad's popularity amongst Iran's working class and poor was explained by BBC Newsnight as being down to the fact that he "bribes them to vote for him with welfare benefits".
So a politician who actually actively looks after the interests of the worse off in society is "bribing" them.
Presumably though, in the BBC's eyes, politicians who actively look after the interests of society's better off are just "doing what normal politicians do".
Hilariously, the Beeb's firm conviction that Ahmadinejad would lose appears to come from the likes of an interview with Iranian "dinner party" types that also appeared on Newsnight. You can imagine the BBC's narrative: "These normal everyday Iranians (including - look! - a woman who simply wants to open a chain of successful boutiques in Tehran like any reasonable entrepreneur would) are tired of four years of isolation from the world; they are keen for friendly relations with the West; they are embarrassed by Ahmadinejad's confrontational rhetoric", etcetera et-fucking-cetera....
We see this sort of thing all the time from the BBC: The firm unshakeable belief that the Westernised elites and middle classes of the world are the only "normal" people in whatever country worth listening to. It explains why, for example, they continue to regard Hugo Chavez as a monster. The fact that the 60% of the Venezuelan people who love Chavez are the country's working classes and poor, means - in the BBC's eyes - that 100% of Venezuelans hate him, since the only "normal" people in Venezuela are the 40% who do hate him: the elites, the urban professional classes with their Western consumer tastes.
In Israel-Palestine this class-ist attitude translates directly into an almost openly racist one, since those people in the territory who hold favored elite or middle class status are invariably Jewish, while the downtrodden poor are invariably Palestinian. For the BBC, instinctively siding with the Israeli Jews is perfectly natural, because - look - the Israeli Jews look like you or i: they wear fashionable clothes, live in nice houses, have dinner parties, drive nice cars, have successful careers....How dare those dreadful Palestinian youths (yobs? chavs?) disrupt an Israeli dinner party in Sderot with one of their rocket attacks? Don't they realise the importance of a successful dinner party for one's career?
You saw a good example of all this also in Michael Palin's BBC programme "The New Europe" a couple of years ago, in which the genial Python travelled ("travelling", like dinner parties, is also a staple requirement of every "normal" person's life experience) around Eastern Europe, generally demonstrating how wonderful things have become since the dark days of the Evil Communist Empire. Palin would interview civic dignitaries of places like Prague and Budapest, new entrepreneurs, prominent artists, poets, and intellectuals, and all were united in their delight at how "free" Eastern Europe is these days and how much things have changed for the better since 1989. Well no shit Sherlock. Of course things have improved for THESE people, since THEY have all the money now! But the point is that it wouldn't even occur to the BBC to ask anybody else whether things are better now, since these sorts of people are the only sorts of people that they would actually consider to be "people" at all. The BBC would be just as likely to genuinely ask an unemployed Polish coal miner for his thoughts as they would an unemployed British one. A revealing moment came when Palin took a taxi ride in Albania. The driver was a young man in his late 20s, and so had clear childhood memories of life under Communism. "But not everyone thinks things have changed for the better..." said Palin's voice-over, introducing the short scene. The taxi-driver, not in a direct interview situation, but just in his role as Palin's chauffeur to his next interview with the Mayor of Tirana or somebody, spoke of how, in his opinion, things are worse now. "There was a security in the old days that doesn't exist now; now there is a lot of crime and stress and similar things....". Palin just smiled, bemused. Some of these working class people have the strangest ideas!!
... the welfare policies of Iran right now is in a sense bribing the working class and attaching them to a populist leader running on an explicitly CAPITALIST platform.
What's your big problem with that characterization?
my thoughts on the elections were somewhat in synergy with Yoshie's. I too was dismayed that the Western media portrayed this a huge surprise:
http://theactivist.org/blog/ahma...inejad-
triumphs
How dare those dreadful Palestinian youths (yobs? chavs?) disrupt an Israeli dinner party in Sderot with one of their rocket attacks?
Richard Littlejohn did actually describe the Palestinians as 'the pikeys of the middle east'.
According to Al Jazeera, 'Trita Parsi, the president of National American Iranian Council, told Al Jazeera that the emphatic nature of the victory raised "a lot of question marks".
"There are so many inconsistencies. They are even reporting that Ahmadinejad won the city of Tabriz, which is Mousavi's home town, with 57 per cent. That seems extremely unlikely.
"How come the votes were counted so quickly, even though the polls were open six hours extra?"'
http://english.aljazeera.net/
new...1719990152.html
Now, I don't mean to be cynical, but the NIAC are funded by the National Endowment for Democracy, and anyone who knows anything about the history of US imperialism knows that the NED has been used in the past to subvert with democratic processes in favour of US economic and political interests.
Is it just me, or do other people smell subversion?
Anything that has even the slightest attachment to the National Endowment for Democracy reeks of suspicion.
I also don't necessarily trust these elections either though.
It is all pretty miserable. Where's the Iranian left when you need them.
"Is it just me, or do other people smell [US] subversion?"
I'd be surprised if there wasn't subversion, to be honest.
It's the same old story: If the candidate the West doesn't like wins an election anywhere, the West cries foul. The weird thing about this sort of reaction is that the West are invariably genuinely incredulous that their candidate has lost. "How could those people vote for Ortega/Chavez/Ahmadinejad like that? Don't they realise that he's the bad guy???"
The arrogance is breathtaking.
It's true deformed worker. But just because the west doesn't like Ahmadinejad doesn't mean I do.
I think he's a fuck of an individual and this seems a defeat really.
I'd say the effect deformed worker accurately describes (although why he has to bring his completely unfounded assertion that unemployed Polish miners want Jaruselsky back into it I don't know) is a consequence not of malice as much as access: it's much more natural for Western journalists to speak to people like themselves, people who speak English, people who live in the nice neighborhood. When they do venture out of the bubble, it's more like a visit to the zoo for them.
I agree with deformed worker that the Western media tend to listen only to people who hold views regarded favorably by the owners of the Western media, namely those who say they want a more liberal and more capitalist society.
There were exceptions, though. For instance, the left-wing junge Welt: "Wahlkarneval in Iran." Its correspondent, for instance, interviewed a street sweeper who cleans up after green rallies of the young Mousavi fans: "Es sind die »Kinder der Reichen, die sowieso schon alles haben und nicht genug bekommen können«, die hier Tag um Tag vom späten Nachmittag bis nachts um zwei, drei die Straßen friedlich okkupieren, um den »Change Iran« einzuleiten, erklärt Hojjat, einer, der am Ende der Nacht den Dreck der Jungen von der Straße kehren muß, mit säuerlicher Miene. Hier, an den Hängen des nahen Elburs-Gebirges, weiß er die Begüterten der Stadt zu Hause. »Und die, diese Leute von da droben, wählen Mussawi.« Er sei, wie die Mehrheit der Bevölkerung auch, mit Präsident Ahmadinedschad zufrieden, weil er etwas für das ganze Land tue, vor allem für die Armen. »Ahmadinedschad sagt seine Meinung, da interessieren ihn keine USA und UNO, die sowieso nichts Gutes im Schulde führen«, weiß der Straßenfeger."
My translation: "It is the 'children of the rich, who already have everything they want and still can't get enough,' that are peacefully occupying the streets here day after day from late afternoon to night, till 2 to 3 AM, to 'Change Iran,' says Hojjat, a worker who must clean up the mess left by the youth in the streets at the end of the night, with a sour face. Here, in the slope of the nearby Elburz Mountains, he knows the affluent of the city at home. 'And those people up there vote for Mousavi.' He is, like the majority of the population, happy with President Ahmadinejad, because he does things for the whole country, first of all, for the poor. 'Ahmadinejad speaks his mind because he is not interested in the US and the UN, which are anyway good for nothing."
"It's true deformed worker. But just because the west doesn't like Ahmadinejad doesn't mean I do.
I think he's a fuck of an individual and this seems a defeat really."
I quite like him. The two things that he is constantly getting accused of by the Western media ( a) Holocaust denial, and b) wanting to "wipe Israel off the map") are demonstrably false, as is now well known in Left circles.
The "Holocaust denial" charge apparently relates to something he said at an anti-Zionist conference in 2004, when he said that it was hypocritical of the West to demand the setting up of a Jewish State in the Middle East, when the Jews were overwhelmingly displaced from Europe; so why not set up a Jewish State there? (Of course the question was rhetorical. The whole point was to demonstrate the absurdity and outright injustice of setting up any state anywhere exclusively in the name of a single thnic group).
The "wiping off the map" charge apparently originates from the same conference, when Ahmadinejad said that one day the State of Israel would be "wiped from the page of time" in the same way that the USSR has now been "wiped from the page of time". The end of the USSR was not the physical destruction of the country, but the political dissolution of the Soviet state. But of course the Western media chose to interpret the words as evidence that Ahmadinejad was calling for the physical destruction of Israel.
There are some, if not many, aspects of the current Iranian state and Ahmadinejad himself that i disagree with. To pick one example, i think the above implied comparison of the State of Israel with the USSR is an almighty insult to the latter. But hey. From what i've seen and heard of Ahmadinejad he strikes me as an intelligent and rational man. His offers of peace to the West have been particularly eloquent and appear to reflect a deep and genuine desire for peace with the West. But they also contain a strong assertion of Iran's right to real independent development, and it is precisely this that the West cannot abide.
The working class and poor of Iran appear to like Ahmadinejad because he represents their economic interests. That'll do for me.
Political decisions as a Marxist are often about walking a fine line between Right Opportunism and Ultra-Leftism; between a lack of principles on one side and an inflexible dogmatism on the other. A lot of the difficulty lies in ascertaining exactly where the correct path between these Straits of Messina lies. What might be the correct decision for Marxist A might look like Right Opportunism to Marxist B, while Marxist B might look like an Ultra-Leftist to Marxist A. Fortunately, the world bourgeoisie led by the US acts in 99.999% of instances as a reliable barometer. Generally speaking, if the West doesn't like somebody, they're almost certainly deserving of our support, at least for the time being.
So i think Ahmadinejad's a nice fella.
I also agree with christian h. that the journalists' bias tends to be a matter of feeling comfortable with those whom they interview. They very seldom interview poorer working people in their own countries, so it's no wonder they don't interview such people in foreign countries. Besides, in foreign countries, many of them are dependent on local "fixers," who tend to come from the same strata as the journalists themselves.
more Dreyfuss: Rigged Election
an opposition figure tells him that it was rigged, so it must have been so
Ahmanijedad is certainly capable of this sort of thing, but something other than anecdotal evidence would be nice
Well, I didn't realize that Dreyfus would end up playing such a counter-productive role. This is disappointing. All reports of irregularities should be investigated, but they shouldn't be assumed to be true before anyone seriously looking into facts.
Generally speaking, if the West doesn't like somebody, they're almost certainly deserving of our support, at least for the time being.
My response:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m...h?v=mJ-
LHGfMuLM
Aside from all the Western media rubbish that's already been commented on, there's also the fact that Ahmadinejad is regularly referred to a a "Conservative". So Iranian Conservatives believe in the redistribution of income to the poor? If the British Conservatives adopted that as a policy I might mitigate some of my criticisms of them.
On the other hand, Ahmadinejad is not a socialist. But, since no one has claimed he was one, this doesn't seem to be relevant.
But no seriously deformed worker that's fucking retarded at best. (No disrespect)
To deformed worker, I'd say that Ahmadinejad is not anti-Jewish, nor did he say he wanted to "wipe Israel off the map," but he has to ditch his rhetoric of questioning the facts of the Holocaust, as opposed to the pro-Israeli uses to which they are put.
Chavez gave Ahmadinejad Beyond Capital by István Mészáros. Someone should give him a good book on the Holocaust.
Well said Yoshie. Someone should also tell him to fuck off as well. Preferably lots of workers.
Dreyfuss seems to suffer from a particular anxiety syndrome, one which in which he begins to experience feelings of fear, stress and, ultimately panic, when forced to engage with politically empowered proleterians and lumpenproletarians, it comes through really obviously in his Red Tide post that I linked upthread, and I commented upon it at The Nation website
indeed, one can say that The Nation as a whole seems to have this affliction, as it reveals itself periodically in stories about Chavez
anyway, fraud is certainly possible, and I remain open to the possibility, but Dreyfuss considers it even more likely than the reporters of the New York Times today!
but, it is also possible that class issues determined the outcome, as you say, and Dreyfuss dismisses it entirely
so far, what he has presented is pretty thin gruel, just he and his reformist friends talking in their echo chamber, maybe he can come up with something better, which I encouraged him to do there in a comment a few minutes ago
"But no seriously deformed worker that's fucking retarded at best. (No disrespect)"
Arf! - none taken! Fair enough, looking back over what i have just written, some of it is a bit retarded towards to the end. I suppose what i'm trying to say is that, when the Western media start loudly denouncing some foreign leader or other, my first instinct now is to think to myself "Hang on - what's the real story here?" In every case that i can think of, there is some hidden political-economic agenda that the Western media just conveniently "forgot" to mention.
I remember in (was it?) 2004 when the Western media all of a sudden started laying into Aristide in Haiti. I didn't know a thing about Haiti at that stage but it prompted me to look into it. Surprise surprise - turns out that Aristide had been trying to carry out reforms to help Haiti's poor and in doing so was seen as an intolerable threat by the US.
I think there's been a recent similar case in Madagascar. Hasn't a "pro-poor" candidate recently come to power, leading to the West suspending all aid?
To Futurecast, I'd say that, when someone like Ahmadinejad comes along, working classes need to deal with his policies and pronouncements case by case. When he raises wages, pensions, etc., or says that women should be allowed to watch football in public, workers need to come out and push him to do more in that direction. When he says dumb things about the Holocaust, workers also need to come out to protest and put an immediate stop to crackpottery.
I suppose what i'm trying to say is that, when the Western media start loudly denouncing some foreign leader or other, my first instinct now is to think to myself "Hang on - what's the real story here?"
Absolutely.
"I haven't seen one of you supposedly antiwar people even express concerns about the absolute fact that this result makes war much more likely."
Yes Mike. If only the Iranians had been good little people and voted in the way the West had instructed them to, the West wouldn't have had to drop bombs on them.
These people bring it on themselves, they really do.
Not to mention that the Iranians will have the right to defend themselves aggressively against a first strike launched by either the US or Israel.
To Futurecast, I'd say that, when someone like Ahmadinejad comes along, working classes need to deal with his policies and pronouncements case by case. When he raises wages, pensions, etc., or says that women should be allowed to watch football in public, workers need to come out and push him to do more in that direction. When he says dumb things about the Holocaust, workers also need to come out to protest and put an immediate stop to crackpottery.
I would completely agree with this strongly Yoshie. But surely that's only part of the solution?
Also required is the independent working-class analysis and whole overthrowing bit at some point. I don't see Ahmadinejad as worthy to an equal relationship with the working-class as Chavez has earned.
Although if Chavez and his institutions ever become a further brake on the Bolivarian revolution he would warrant removal from power (hard to see that happening).
Suddenly I feel like such an ultra-leftist...
According to Israeli opinionists, a reformist would have taken Iran closer to Da Bomb ( http://www.ynetnews.com/
articles...3730321,00.html ) (and, according to John Bolton, Israel should have stroke Iran during the last days of Bush, and calls it a "missed opportunity" http://online.wsj.com/article/
SB...8369503997.html ). So, since this is the main excuse for this probable war, I don't see in any way how Moussavi's victory could have made it less likely.
And, about making war, is always their fault: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spa...es/
1092238.html .
"That's precisely the problem with your mentality. As soon as I saw credible anaylists talking about the wide spread rigging, I just knew you people would pretend it was all western propaganda. You people are so predictable and selfish."
You are ALL so predictable and selfish.
It was obvious that the friends of Israel would say it was rigged, we wuz robbed, and equally obvious and predictable that the SWP would say the protests are western propaganda.
Of course, these positions were reversed in Lebanon, with the pro-Hizbollah crowd saying it's a sectarian carve-up and the Zionists saying it was a legitimate victory.
A plague on both your houses.
Troll deleted
Perhaps I was a little harsh but I feel true despair when someone falls into the hole of pro/anti westernism. It just isn't any use to folks on the left. It's the political barometer that Cruise missile liberals utilize and we should stay away from it. There is nothing inherently good about being pro or anti-western.
I suppose what i'm trying to say is that, when the Western media start loudly denouncing some foreign leader or other, my first instinct now is to think to myself "Hang on - what's the real story here?" In every case that i can think of, there is some hidden political-economic agenda that the Western media just conveniently "forgot" to mention.
That I can completely sympathize with. Also the liberal media love to lump the world into the pro and anti western dichotomy which doesn't help things.
I think there's been a recent similar case in Madagascar. Hasn't a "pro-poor" candidate recently come to power, leading to the West suspending all aid?
I seem to remember a coup about to take place but I have no idea what happened, will look into it.
It was obvious that the friends of Israel would say it was rigged, we wuz robbed, and equally obvious and predictable that the SWP would say the protests are western propaganda
Erm - where have the whole and entire SWP officially stated that the election was completely free and fair?
Many people have stated on here they wouldn't put it past the Iranian regime of doing so and neither would I.
"is that all you've got? A distortion of my comments? We're not even allowed to express a preference in an election between a hard right winger and a moderate,"
The "hard right winger" appears to stand up for the rights of the worse off in Iran, while the "moderate" appears to stand up for the rights of the better off. That would appear to be why the "hard right winger" has won. Good luck to him.
Futurecast: "I would completely agree with this strongly Yoshie. But surely that's only part of the solution? Also required is the independent working-class analysis and whole overthrowing bit at some point. I don't see Ahmadinejad as worthy to an equal relationship with the working-class as Chavez has earned. Although if Chavez and his institutions ever become a further brake on the Bolivarian revolution he would warrant removal from power (hard to see that happening)."
I completely agree with you, both on Ahmadinejad and Chavez. Even workers who prefer them to their critics cannot and should not simply follow them. They must start with their won needs and desires, set their own goals and ideals, and then see what uses they can make of figures like Ahmadinejad and Chavez. Populism is preferable to liberalism in my opinion, but it's, well, limited. And workers need to test its limits, building their own powers to eventually establish classless society.
Futurecast: "Many people have stated on here they wouldn't put it past the Iranian regime of doing so and neither would I."
There have been documented frauds in Iranian elections. (Rafsanjani, one of the main backers of Mousavi, has been shown to be guilty of it in the past.) But there are many reasons to question the claims in this particular case.
1. No one has demonstrated convincing evidence that Mousavi got a lot of support among the largest sector of the population -- working people -- to be able to claim that he was "the definite winner." In fact, the only independent pre-election poll conducted by a Western outfit (as opposed to polls conducted by partisans in Iran) showed a much higher level of support for Ahmadinejad than Mousavi.
2. Many of the same people, in and out of Iran, now claiming that the establishment rigged the election for Ahmadinejad had been saying before election day that Ahmadinejad had alienated much of the establishment.
3. Given the fact that Mousavi had been out of the political limelight for a long time before his declaration of candidacy, one might say that he did as well as he could by getting nearly 30% of votes. In any country, it's not easy getting yourself known to the electorate only in several months, up against the incumbent who is on TV all the time.
Troll deleted
Mike, have you actually looked at the study done by Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, "A Surprising Result for Inequality in 2007," which I linked to my posting? Salehi-Isfahani is no fan of Ahmadinejad, and if he voted, he probably voted for Mousavi, given his own policy preference.
Mike, have you actually investigated what was going on at polling stations to see if any "thugs" were actually there rigging elections? Something like evidence would help, the kind of evidence that AMLO produced in Mexico.
Troll deleted
Well, you obviously can't read, since this is what Djavad Salehi-Isfahani wrote: "More importantly, looking closer, I realized that the rising inequality during the Ahmadinejad years was entirely caused by deterioration during 2005-06. The change during 2006-07 (the last year for which we have data is 2007) is in the opposite direction and exactly as Mr. Ahmadinejad had promised! The figure below shows average decile growth rates for the three-year period as well as for individual years. Whereas Mr. Ahmadinejad’s first year saw inequality rise (the expenditures of the top decile grew by 1.5%, compared to minus 1.8% for the lowest decile), the following year the situation reversed and the growth rates for the lower deciles was twice that of the highest deciles."
Troll deleted
Now, here's what the United States Congressional Research Service says: "However, Ahmadinejad continues to exhibit support among lower classes and rural voters, which could potentially carry him to re-election. He has raised wages and lowered interest rates for poorer borrowers, cancelled some debts of farmers, and has increased social welfare payments and subsidies" ("Middle East Elections 2009: Lebanon, Iran, Afghanistan, and Iraq," 18 May 2009).
With all due respect i disagree with you on the matter of the A's Holocaust rhetoric. I think overall, it's paid dividends. Look at all the criticism Israel has begun to take in the US in the past few years. There had been nothing like it before 2005, but as a result of the Zionist lobby targeting all their fire on Iran's leader, they haven't had enough to go around on the domestic scene. It's not hard to make either Jimmy Carter or Ahmadinejad look like Hitler. It's when you try and do both at the same time that you start to look a little silly. For the first time in living memory(for me at least) there is room for the American elite to criticize Israel and question their 'special relationship' without the certain fear that they will be obliteradted(See Chaz Freeman).
The fact that liberals and leftists/anti war groups are too disorganized to prevent demonization of Ahmadinejad is not his fault, actually the main change in his policy towards the west has been to stop banking on these groups. pre-2005 Khatami was demonized as front front for a thoroughly evil, totalitarian society, even though he was completely agreeable. Now, even if Ahmadinejad is demonized in the main stream media, Iran certainly is not and other wings of the regime are outright lionized.
Masoud
As for trade unions, I have already said that Mousavi's policy on trade unions could have been appealing to workers if it hadn't been tied up with the advocacy of expanding the private sector, curtailing fiscal expenditures, tightening up monetary policy, etc.
Masoud: "Look at all the criticism Israel has begun to take in the US in the past few years."
Well, I think that has much more to do with Israel's 2006 war on Lebanon and 2008-2009 war on Gaza (especially the latter) than anything anyone, including Ahmadinejad, has ever said. Also, Israelis elected a lot of hard-rightists, who advocate the kind of supremacist policies (advocating the loyalty oath and the like) that are repellent to even liberal Zionists.
Yoshie,
What about during the nineties, and Israel's first invasion of Lebanon or the second intifada, or Sharon's re-election, or the Israeli lobby's championing of the Iraq war etc.. Liberman has been a fixture of Israel's political scene for yeas, and his only innovation is to speak openly about what the rest of the Israeli establishment has in mind. Israel has as far as i can remember, always been immune to criticism because such criticism has always been equated with anti-semitism and nazism. But even powerfull lobbies have limited fire-power, and these groups are forced to moderate their criticisms of more reasonable-sounding people, in order to focus the attack on Ahmadinejad.
I don't think it would wise for many other groups to emulate this kind of rhetoric, but we shouldn't be blind to why he's doing what he's doing.
Masoud: "The fact that liberals and leftists/anti war groups are too disorganized to prevent demonization of Ahmadinejad is not his fault, actually the main change in his policy towards the west has been to stop banking on these groups. pre-2005 Khatami was demonized as front front for a thoroughly evil, totalitarian society, even though he was completely agreeable. Now, even if Ahmadinejad is demonized in the main stream media, Iran certainly is not and other wings of the regime are outright lionized."
I do agree that the overall portrayal of Iran, including establishment figures, has gotten better (in the sense of being less one-dimensional), except in the case of Ahmadinejad.
Why is it in the insane world of some:
That you either want to invade Iran, or be nuked by Iran.
It hasn't come to do or die and no one wants it to, except those of course who want war.
Masoud: "Liberman has been a fixture of Israel's political scene for yeas, and his only innovation is to speak openly about what the rest of the Israeli establishment has in mind."
It's true that Lieberman and the likes of him have always been there in Israel. but I think it was like an "open secret" -- the kind of "open secret" that really embarrasses liberals (who want to believe in the myth of Israel being the most democratic in the Middle East) when it gets no longer secret and just out in the open.
"Voters were obliged to chose a candidate and fill in a code. Though Mr. Moussavi was Candidate No. 4, the code No. 44 signified Mr. Ahmadinejad.
One man who worked in the Ministry of Interior, which carried out the vote count, said the government had been preparing its fraud for weeks, purging anyone of doubtful loyalty and importing pliable staff members from around the country.
“They didn’t rig the vote,” claimed this man, who showed his ministry identification card but pleaded not to be named. “They didn’t even look at the vote. They just wrote the name and put the number in front of it.”"
"I didn’t vote for Ahmadinejad, but I think that Ahmadinejad does have many supporters. But his supporters are mainly conservative people who don’t know English and are not Web users. Please don’t assume that the Iranian Web users are representative of all the voters. The same false assumption is made by many upper-class Iranians who only see their friends and relatives in northern Tehran and foreign countries and assume that all people are against Ahmadinejad.
Ahmadinejad did very well in the debates. He also publicly criticized some very influential officials which boosted his popularity, even among people who hadn’t voted before. Btw, my impression is that Ahmadinejad’s supporters are more shy than than Mousavi’s supporters. Mousavi’s are very loud and held massive rallies in Tehran and big cities (many people were annoyed by such lavish gatherings). Ahmadinejad often fear being ridiculed by others and don’t express themselves much. This has contributed to the delusion that everybody is pro-Mousavi. — Mohammad"
sorry, all from here:
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com...ion-results/?
hp
There will be no war with Iran Mike. Israel and the US only attack countries that can't hit back and after the Iraq catastrophe and the whipping Hizbollah gave the Israelis the "West" is not going to try it on again.
In any case the US can't do diddly squat against Iraq without China's permission which is unlikely to be forthcoming.
The Internet is breaking the Zionist information blockade that is why Israel is no longer beyond criticism even in the US. You politically correct liberal imperialists are on the wrong side of history. Squeal as loud as you like.
Ironically, the people who agree with Masoud that A.'s rhetoric (and yes, he has at the very least minimized the holocaust, and he organized that conference of outright holocaust deniers) has moved people in the US to be more critical of Israel are Zionist fanatics.
It is Israeli policies (and, I believe, US policies in the ME is general, in particular the invasion of Iraq) that have led to increased criticism of Israel; at the same time, the (correct) perception that those most supportive of Israel have also been most supportive of the disastrous war in Iraq has weakened the hold of Israel supporters on the acceptable terms of debate.
One aspect of this campaign that really hasn't been mentioned are the presidential debates, which only happened in the last ten days or so of the campaign, their after math, and the affect they had on the swing voters, which i beleive were reported as 27% of the electorate in the terror-free tomorrow poll(?).
Ahmadinejad completely obliterated all of his rivals, he goaded Mousavi into defending Rafsanjani&co, and his record on corruption, and elicited the response from Karroubi that he was justified in taking 300,000$ cash from convicted fraudsters because, as a mullah, he was granted 'special permissions' to do so by none other than Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini himself. He successfully portrayed himself as the outsider who was going to clean up the state, which is the same tack he used in 2005, and basically the same one Khatami used in 1997. Iraninans have been thoroughly consistent in this regard.
Add to this the fact that he consistently managed to get the upper hand and the last word on all substantive issues that popped up, and the deep penetration of the official state media. It becomes a no-brainer to determine who the swing voters would vote for.
Masoud
I think Masoud is right about Ahmadinejad's debate skills. For people who missed them all, I recommend watching them: here are the Ahmadineajd-Mousavi debate videos in Persian and English: mrzine.monthlyreview.org/iran030609.html.
Christian,
I never said that Ahmadinejad's incendiary rhetoric moved anyone(in the west at least) to be more critical of Israel and the US. I said it opened up political space for those who were already critical to be more vocal about it, because they could mitigate their perceived treachery by condeming they bogeyman who was even scarier than they were.
When Bush invaded Iraq, let's not forget, a majority of Americans supported it. Let's not romanticize the average American's faculty for independent thought. If opinion in the West has shifted in any amount regarding the US and Israel it's because people on TV or in the Newspapers told them to think diffrenetly, and they were afforded the opportunity to do so by ritually condemning Ahmadinejad before offering those criticisms.
I think without that boogeyman to condemn, anti-war liberals would have had a significantly harder time of it. There is nothing 'fanatic' about that analysis.
P.S I don't want to get into this but Ahmadinejad has never even 'minimized' the Holocaust or 'organized a confrerence of deniers'
Masoud
Masoud, I didn't say your analysis was "fanatic". I said it was shared by "fanatic" supporters of Israel. However, I obviously misunderstood it - sorry about that. I don't agree with what you wrote in that last comment either, but I'll leave it at that.
Thanks for the link to the NYT blog, Peter. On the blog, at least, the NYT is reporting both those who allege electoral frauds and those who point out that much of the media as well as the Mousavi camp missed the feelings and opinions of working-class Iranians. It's ironic that this post-election debate is very similar to the post-election debate in 2005. It's like the mass media and reformists never learned anything after Ahmadinejad's "surprise victory" in that year.
"It's ironic that this post-election debate is very similar to the post-election debate in 2005. It's like the mass media and reformists never learned anything after Ahmadinejad's "surprise victory" in that year."
couldn't agree more
Several enthusiasts for Amadinejad on this thread tell us we should applaud his victory because he does such a great job for the workers and the poor.
By arresting and jailing their leaders, I suppose. Leaders of the Tehran busworkers union, Mansour Osanloo and Ebrahim Madadi, and five leaders of sugar workers are currently in jail. Among the heinous crimes the sugar workers’ leaders committed was that of talking to foreign journalists about working conditions.
I don’t know whether Amadinejad won fairly or not, since we haven’t yet seen the details of the fraud allegations. But it is just obscene that socialists should welcome the victory of this dangerous clown. Amadinejad in power for another five years guarantees further repression of trade unionists, women, gays, and the Sunni Arab minority.
We are told that Amadinejad has provided the poor with benefits and so is immensely popular. Much the same can be said of many demagogic right-wing or even fascist leaders in the past. Hitler and Mussolini were genuinely popular for much of their period in power.
As for Amadinejad and the Holocaust, nobody who is not a holocaust denier would ever hold an event entitled "International Conference to Review the Global Vision of the Holocaust", attended by such luminaries as the Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, David Duke.
Finally, Deformed Worker is so blissfully ignorant that he can write ”I think there's been a recent similar case in Madagascar. Hasn't a "pro-poor" candidate recently come to power, leading to the West suspending all aid?”
No, you idiot, there hasn’t. There was a coup in Madagascar, in which the Mayor of Antananarivo, Andry Rajoelina, overthrew the democratically elected President, Marc Ravalomanana. And the first reactions came, not from the west, but from African countries, with both the African Union and the Southern African Development Community suspending Madagascar from membership.
Good Lenin or one of the other brainboxes on this site interpret this graph for me. What are your thoughts?
http://tehranbureau.com/2009/06/...-election-data/
"Finally, Deformed Worker is so blissfully ignorant that he can write ”I think there's been a recent similar case in Madagascar. Hasn't a "pro-poor" candidate recently come to power, leading to the West suspending all aid?”
No, you idiot, there hasn’t. There was a coup in Madagascar, in which the Mayor of Antananarivo, Andry Rajoelina, overthrew the democratically elected President, Marc Ravalomanana."
Why be so offensive? I said i didn't know much about the situation, which is why i asked. I'm sure i remember hearing somewhere (not from the mainstream media, naturally) that the West had suspended all aid. This immediately makes me think that there's more to this situation than meets the eye, since the West virtually never (i can't even think of one case) acts out of pure principle.
I've been reading Tehran Bureau, and I know that Muhammad Sahimi desperately wanted to elect Mousavi, so I'm sorry that a good man (who has done a lot of work defending Iran's nuclear program) couldn't see his choice elected. But, as I have already pointed out above, such evidence as is available to us does not indicate Azeris preferring Mousavi due to shared ethnicity. In fact the independent poll I cited pointed in the opposite direction.
I suspect that the West suspended its aid not because of the coup but because of Andry Rajoelina's opposition to land grabs:
Madagascar Leader Axes Land Deal
Madagascar's new leader has cancelled a controversial deal for a South Korean firm to lease a vast tract of land to grow food crops.
Andry Rajoelina said he was axing the deal because the people should be consulted. Daewoo Logistics has reportedly expressed its frustration.
The plan had helped fuel popular anger against President Marc Ravalomanana, who was forced from office on Tuesday.
Imran - if that data is correct, it's extremely suspicious indeed. It is not strictly true that "Statistically and mathematically, it is impossible to maintain such perfect linear relations between the votes of any two candidates in any election — and at all stages of vote counting". However, it's extremely unlikely.
Some people on this website need to realise that the world is not black and white - but shades of grey. Just because US Imperialism hates Ahmadinejad (and they certainly claim to), doesn't make him a good guy. Every Iranian I've ever met says something along the lines of "He's just the same as Bush". He is a petty tyrant, and awful news for the people of Iran.
It will be interesting to see how this unfolds - if it unfolds.
Yoshie,
Thanks. Your initial post was very convincing.
As far as I'm aware Ahmedinejad is also a fluent Azeri speaker, well if not fluent at least very competent. Khamenei is also Azeri. Azeri father and Persian mother. The idea that Ahmedinejad couldn't win in an Azeri area is nonsense, its like saying Brown couldn't win outside Scotland. I've not noticed any Persian/Azeri racism although I have noticed racism between other ethnicities in Iran. The Tehran Bureau graph seems to be doing the rounds. Any mathematicians on here who can confirm whether there's any validity to this or is it just pure nonsense?
TheIrie - thanks, looks like our posts crossed. Perhaps we should check whether the data contained in the graph is correct.
Regarding the graphs: If the result reported at any given time were the sum of the votes counted all over the country, it lends credibility the election process.
If all the votes in some region of the country were counted first for some reason, and only after that count was done votes from other regions takne into account it may cast doubt.
This isn't the US, no time zones or different State election start-end times to worry about. Polls all closed at the same time everywhere, and we should expect vote counting and reporting to start everywhere at the same time as well.
The results were also not reported with a sufficient amount of granularity that we should expect natural random differences to have to be taken into account. The first report was on the order of a few million, it would be shocking to find a randomized sample that didn't reflect the overall trend, and subsequent reports involved only larger samples.
The only other to advance the thesis that they prove the election was faulty would be to say that the votes for some candidates should have been counted sooner than others. e.g. Ahmadinejad voters vote in districts where there are less votes to count so, these can be counted and reported sooner ergo initial strong results for Ahmadinejad should be mitigated when further results from more populous districts are reported. Personally i think that's pretty weak.
Those who want proof that there was a fraud will need to look beyond those figures.
I don't think it's a good idea for us to be seen to openly support Ahmadinejad at this time. There are protests in Iran tonight about the election fraud that have not been seen since the revolution. At least let it play out. These people are being very brave in a state that is not used to huge anti government protests.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/
2...e.html#comments
Just found this. Mored depth about the graphs.
Judy - I'm not sure who you mean by 'us', but I'm the proprietor of this blog, and the idea of me 'supporting' Ahmadinejad against the protesters is out of the question. I don't see that this is implied in Yoshie's post, either, which provides some important pointers for analysis.
I don't understand that poll. The sum adds up to 78%, and it includes all 4 candidates AND "Don't know". How is that possible?
Asked about their preference, 7.6% answered "none," and 15.1% refused to answer the question, according to the TFT/NAF/KA report
Obviously we support the protesters, they represent the politicization of a group of people in a society that is normally depoliticized.
A real student movement in Iran would need to break free of the electoral campaign of "reformist" ex-Islamist leaders and become a legitimate extra-parliamentary opposition.
God knows Iranians have a history of demonstrating their power in civic society.
In response to Judy, Nate Silver cited by Masoud has a good point: "If Moosavi truly did have the support of a majority of Iran's citizenry, the best evidence we will have of that is what happens in the streets of Tehran over the next days and weeks."
To make the protests politically meaningful at home (rather than on CNN and the like), though, the protesters don't need foreign support (which may be a minus politically) but they do need Mousavi's own endorsement and leadership.
Juan Cole sets some points about the fact the election was stolen http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/...n-
election.html . Points 1, 2, 3 and 5 don't convince me since they take the ethnic factor in a too rigid way (it has been discussed in these comments in a much more convincing way). Point 4 is discutible, and point 6 is actually a good point, IHMO. Does anybody know something more about that?
For informations about him, here's Moussavi's facebook page, in Persian http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mi...61919453?
ref=nf
Be extremely careful with statistical evidence for vote rigging. Not only is statistics often highly counter-intuitive (meaning things that seem very unlikely can well be commonplace); such evidence is made further problematic by its after-the-fact nature. It is important to remember that among any random set of data, there will be correlations. Meaning, if you take some set of data and compute its various correlation coefficients and so forth, you will in all likelihood see some particular ones that look suspicious. This in itself means nothing.
Man, these comments are ugly. This election was shamelessly rigged, and suggesting that you won't even entertain the idea just makes you look stupid. And ffs, just because he bribes the populace does not make Ahmedinajad a hero of the left or a "nice fella".
Those people on the Left who are saying we should support these protests in Iran should bear in mind the lessons of 1989. Do you imagine that if Ahmadinejad's government is toppled by these "moderates" (or worse still, if the Islamic Republic itself is overthrown by them), that we will be seeing a wonderful new 100% pure socialist government/state rushing in to fill the political vaccuum? Of course not. The replacement will be a new government or state that better represents the interests of Western capital. This is precisely why the West are actively trying their utmost to destabilise the Iranian government/state at the moment.
I don't, of course, expect everyone on here to agree with me. There are still plenty of ultra-lefts about who think that the events of 1989-91 in Eastern Europe and Russia were wonderful, despite the millions who have died or had their lives otherwise utterly destroyed as a direct result.
Until those protesting against Ahmadinejad are something like the 26th July Movement rather than the National Endowment for Democracy, i will continue to (critically) support Ahmadinejad's government, and so should all socialists.
Yes deformed worker, there are still plenty of "ultra-lefts" who think Stalinism wasn't worth defending. But even those idiots who thought the Stalinist countries were "workers states" in any way surely don't believe the same about Iran as currently constituted?
This election was shamelessly rigged, and suggesting that you won't even entertain the idea just makes you look stupid.
No one has suggested that they wouldn't entertain the idea. That's an unreasonably petulant caricature of the discussion that is taking place here.
"Yes deformed worker, there are still plenty of "ultra-lefts" who think Stalinism wasn't worth defending. But even those idiots who thought the Stalinist countries were "workers states" in any way surely don't believe the same about Iran as currently constituted?"
No i don't think the Islamic Republic of Iran is a "workers' state". Nor, for the record, do i think that the USSR by the end of the 1980s was a "workers' state" in any meaningful sense.
But that's not the point. The point is whether Iran under Ahmadinejad offers a qualitatively better life for the majority of Iranians - those of the working class and poor - than Iran under Mousavi. The answer to that is undoubtedly yes, which would explain why the majority of Iranians appear to have re-elected Ahmadinejad.
(Similarly, the relevant point with regard to 1989 is whether the situation in Russia and Eastern Europe prior to that time was better for the working class there than the situation after. The answer to that, looking at the facts of the situation, is again undoubtedly yes. If this makes me a defender of "Stalinism" - as you choose to characterise it - then i'm happy to plead guilty.)
Incidentally, a lot of people are suggesting that the Iranian election was rigged. That may or may not be the case (although my feeling is that it would be somewhat difficult to rig an election to that degree in a country like Iran, which has a far more vibrant civil society than the US, where national elections were quite clearly rigged in 2000 and 2004). But one thing we can be sure of is that whether or not it was rigged, the West were always going to cry foul if their candidate did not win.
Another thing we can be sure of is that Western commentators - due to a combination of ignorance, arrogance, and wishful thinking - were always going to overestimate Mousavi's chances of winning, and so were always going to be especially shocked and angered if and when he did not win. Iran is not Britain or America. The mass hypnosis possible with a "reform" candidate like Obama in the West is not going to fool Iranians to anything like the same degree.
"Repent now or disappear forever."
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Boohoo. After their succes in Lebanon, the Zionists weren't able to steal this one and now they're upset because the candidates they suppoted have been arrested by the authorities. Well, the working class of Iran has made itself totally clear. There was only one candidate of the poor and Iranian democracy supported him. All the scheming of the imperialists and the Western media interviews with those than grind the face of the poor in the dust have come to nothing.
The President is unique in standing up against the power of the Zionists. He did it in writing about the oppression by Israel of Germany, he did it at Durban II and he is taking action by bringing about the permanent removal of Zionism. Those that challenge his views on this are just showing their Islamophobic contempt of heroic leaders like Rantissi who have ruled on this.
The imperialists cannot stop Iran's right to nuclear defense. Zionism is finished. Al Quds will be free.
Larry, you wouldn't be saying these things with the intention of looking like a bombastic caricature, would you?
I mean, the idea that Germany is 'oppressed' by Israel is at the very least a strange one. And one could read all sorts of things into that claim too. It just looks like you're trying to make yourself out to be a bit of a nutter.
"Most people in Iran thought it was going to be a lot closer. That's why the western commentators reported this."
Oh really? These would be the same Western commentators who regularly bang on about how sick of Chavez the Venezuelan people are, despite the fact that he wins election after election after election. As i've said in an earlier post, it's not surprising that Western mainstream journalists acquire these sorts of views, since the only people they'd consider even talking to in Iran are the trendy Westernised elites and middle classes who are desperate for "reform" (= more money). The sort who frequent Facebook, ffs. I.e. most certainly NOT workers/farmers/the poor and underprivileged.
Interesting pre-election survey;
http://www.terrorfreetomorrow.or...port%
200609.pdf
"At the stage of the campaign for President when our poll was taken, 34 percent of Iranians surveyed said they will vote for incumbent President Ahmadinejad. Mr. Ahmadinejad’s closest rival, Mir Hussein Moussavi, was the choice of 14 percent, with 27 percent stating that they still do not know who they will vote for. President Ahmadinejad’s other rivals, Mehdi Karroubi and Mohsen Rezai, were
the choice of 2 percent and 1 percent, respectively.
...
Inside Iran, considerable attention has been given to Mr. Moussavi’s Azeri
background, emphasizing the appeal his Azeri identity may have for Azeri voters. The results of our survey indicate that only 16 percent of Azeri Iranians indicate they will vote for Mr. Moussavi. By contrast, 31 percent of the Azeris claim they
will vote for Mr. Ahmadinejad."
The results of the election pretty much mirror the polling data here (though, ultimately, they predicted a closer fight and a runoff, with neither winning the 50% + 1). However, there's also this element of unpredictability which could have worked both ways;
"A close examination of our survey results reveals that the race may actually be closer than a first look at the numbers would indicate. More than 60 percent of those who state they don’t know who they will vote for in the Presidential elections reflect individuals who favor political reform and change in the current system." (the vast majority of Iranian favour 'political reform and change', greater democracy, etc., 77%, which isn't incompatible with support for Ahmadinejad).
To dksu,
I think we need to look at what a president of Iran can do and what he cannot do. Electing either Ahmadinejad or Mousavi, let's face it, would not have led to a new system where the Supreme Leader gets directly elected, and the Iranian people knew that. (In fact, Mousavi's first action after alleging irregularities was to write a letter appealing to the Supreme Leader for redress. :-0)
What was in play was economy and culture, on which the two candidates did differ and which a president has the power to shape (again, only to a certain extent under the current complex system of check and balance).
"Electing either Ahmadinejad or Mousavi, let's face it, would not have led to a new system where the Supreme Leader gets directly elected, and the Iranian people knew that."
I agree. I was pointing out that the 60% 'undecided' who favour 'political reform and change', would have by no means been Mousavi voters (inevitably this would have come up), due to the broadly agreed upon notions of change throughout a vast majority of Iranian society.
http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/...n-
election.html
*whoops, rather "the 60% of those undecided", which is quite different than "the 60% undecided".
Yoshi,
Why do you think Mousavi is appealing to Khamenei to intervene in the election? Is there a faction of the clerics backing him? Is the United States involved? The whole situation is very confusing, especially since my knowledge of the internal dynamics of Iran is pretty limited.
To dksu,
I see. That makes sense. It's worth pointing out, as you say, that desire for democracy and reform doesn't equal votes for "reformist candidates," especially since that's the usual interpretation.
branigan,
Yes, there's a faction of clerics backing Mousavi: "Iran's Reformist Clerics Support Mousavi."
Exactly. And even if you take the 60% of those 27% of 'undecided' voters who were for 'political change and reform', it still wouldn't have placed Mousavi's 14% above Ahmadinejad's 34% in the poll.
Also, this is interesting;
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2...-not-
prove.html
"Statistical Report Purporting to Show Rigged Iranian Election Is Flawed"
I saw that analysis. It's useful especially since liberals like Juan Cole and Robert Dreyfuss appear to be jumping on the "it's a fraud" bandwagon even more hastily than the White House.
To respond to another question by branigan, well, it does seem strange for Mousavi to allege massive fraud and at the same time appeal to the Supreme Leader, since if a massive fraud of changing a Mousavi landslide to an Ahmadinejad landslide had indeed been committed, it wouldn't have happened without the Supreme Leader's knowledge and consent.
But from my observation this seemingly paradoxical behavior is common to many reformists, politicians as well as grassroots, in and out of Iran. They say they want freedom and democracy but they don't want to challenge the most important source of limitations to it.
As a data point, here's a Russian take from Russia Today.
And a surprisingly constructive US reaction:
U.S. monitors Iran poll, reiterates dialogue offer
Sat Jun 13, 2009 2:52pm EDT
The United States urged Iran on Saturday to resolve disputes over its presidential election peacefully, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she hoped the outcome reflected the will of the Iranian people.
The White House said it was monitoring the election closely, including reports of "irregularities," after official results showed hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected by a huge margin over reformist Mirhossein Mousavi.
"We obviously hope that the outcome reflects the genuine will and desire of the Iranian people," Clinton said on a brief trip to neighboring Canada.
Ahmadinejad's resounding victory could complicate U.S. President Barack Obama's efforts to reach out to Tehran, and will disappoint major powers seeking to convince Iran to halt nuclear work that the West suspects is aimed at making bombs.
A senior U.S. official reiterated Washington's offer for talks with Iran over a range of issues, from Afghanistan and Iraq to disputes over its nuclear program that Tehran says is for peaceful purposes.
"We encourage the Iranian government to seize this opportunity to engage directly with the United States," the senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters.
Washington is looking for opportunities to deal directly with Iran. One possibility could be at a meeting of Group of Eight foreign ministers on Afghanistan and Pakistan in Italy later this month. Clinton is expected to attend and Iran will be invited to the meeting.
The senior U.S. official said the United States was not yet ready to pronounce the outcome of the disputed election.
"We are calling for the peaceful resolution of any disputes," he added.
Troll deleted
Hate to bust your bubble Jim, but there were much more incredible protests during Khatami's first term. They were put down quite harshly, and things moved on from there. This too shall pass.
Channel four is not exactly an authority when it comes to Iranian history. Both at the very start of nineties and at the very end there were some truly scary protests. The early nineties were actually scarier because the were not the product of any organized political machine but quite spontaneous and in multiple cities.
As best as I can determine this is mostly a bunch of Tehrani teenagers gone wild, knocking over garbage cans and setting them on fire. They certainly don't have the numbers of even Mousavi's election rallies, and they are not being met by Ahmadinejad inspired counter rallies. No one knows what the future holds, but I think the potential for escalation is minimal.
Masoud
Troll deleted
Has anyone posted this yet? It was written before the elections, but: http://www.counterpunch.org/
fiyo...at06082009.html
Considering the rioting, I think there are Iranians who want someone other than Ahmadinejad(no offense, Yoshie)
Jim,
Feel free to see it your own way, but I would strongly encourage you to pick up a book on post revolutionary Iran's history when you get the chance, if you haven't done so already. It seems you are underestimating both the level of politicization and access to information of Iran's masses prior to this election, and the Regime's demonstrated savvy for staying in place.
Cheers,
Masoud
I agree with Masoud that the current protests look a lot smaller than the 18th of Tir.
Troll deleted
Jim, no one said everyone loves Ahmadinejad. In my view, based on available evidence, about a third of Iranians don't want him. That's just normal. Protests, even violent protests, are also normal. It's a society that doesn't have any protests -- like North Korea -- that is not normal.
Jim-
The statistics Yoshie posted in his original blog entry show that poverty has gone down.
Yoshie, you don't think this is the biggest upsurge in the post-"revolutionary" period?
Troll deleted
Well, the Channel 4 video is interesting in that it illustrates a typical problem of Iranian opposition politics. The host interviews two Iranians -- one, Karrubi-supporting Potkin Azarmehr, and the other, Baroness Afshar -- both of whom are critics of this election. Immediately, though, the former starts accusing the latter of being an "Islamic republic apologist"! With so much sectarianism, it's not hard to understand why they aren't winning.
Troll deleted
"There are a lot of Iranian government apologists around."
Seriously, the ABC of politics is to win more and more people over to your side, not to push people who may have a lot in common with you away from you and attribute them to your enemy's side. That only helps your enemy.
The idea is to divide the enemy's side, not your own side.
Jim,
With all due respect, you're ignorant characterization of rural Iranians borders on being offensive. They are not backwards ignoramuses who have finally caught a break because metropolitan types are finally going to start checking the internet for them and telling them which way to think. They may be poor but they are at the same time just as culturally sophisticated, and probably a good deal more honest, clear headed and politically savvy than their urban counterparts.
They were the backbone of the revolution that chased the Shah out, and have improved their lot considerably under the IRI. They helped vote in Khatami in 97 and Ahmadinejad in 05. They don't need the Internet to stay informed. Iranians of all stripes are quite politicized and are always talking and exchanging information and opinions and even protesting what they don't like, this is not a new development, even if Channel 4 hasn't clued in yet.
Masoud
My only problem with vote-buying in general is that it is rarely done on the scale and consistency that Ahmadinejad has done it in Iran.
Troll deleted
Good night Jim, and good luck
Masoud
Troll deleted.
Jim, maybe you might have a different opinion about rural Iranians once you meet and talk with them?
"They don't need the internet"? You what? Think how much of a retard we would be without the internet. Jesus!
Jim | 14 Jun, 07:23 | #
What can I say Jim? at the end of all that you've managed to put a huge smile on my face ;)
Good night once again.
And God Bless!
Masoud
Post-election violence in Iran: http://www.amptoons.com/blog/arc...olence-in-iran/
This voting malarky brings nowt but trouble. Bring back workers' councils.
The present structure in Iran is not going to change anytime soon, and there is nothing to say that there is really a better "model" out there... If people here are hoping for a secular-socialist revolution in Iran --- well it is not happening.
The protests; are there any, any current protests in Iran that can said to come from within the working class? No - they (the working class) in droves, voted for Ahmadinejad.
Wishing for "leadership" from Mousavi, to do what? You expect him to change from a neo-liberal to become pro-working class? Or, is liberal-democracy the ultimate end?
I agree with Yoshie, however, her earlier assertion, that people like Chavez, and Ahmadinejad do need to be pushed by the working class - towards specific goals that would benefit, and further empower them...(including such things as worker's control of industry etc.).
But understand that this empowerment will come in a different context, cultural and religious - than what the secular-left may want to see... It is not going to be necessarily about "social/cultural freedoms" that the liberal-left clamors about, and glorifies any western cultural influence it sees...
Mousavi, the reformists etc - are not the people to bring about real change, benefiting the working class in Iran - supporting them, or the protests is a dead end game. Ahmadinejad, and the movement he represents are the people who can, and will - address the valid issues of corruption - including those at the "clearical" level (eg. rafsenjani).
Protests aren't a dead end. The largely youth protests are politicizing a depoliticized society, the only question is whether between elections the movement will grow and expand.
Ahmadinejad is not going to be "pushed" towards worker control or socialism, the best we're going to get from it is the populist expenditure of oil wealth and subsidies on rural farming areas. Now the conservative forces that youth and women in Iran rightly opposed have a right to protest and riot on the basis of right-wing laws they are opposing regarding social norms, even without the support of a working class base.
In the end if the protests expand they might be able to force concessions from the clerics and if the movement continues (unlikely) between elections it won't be about Moussavi or an election campaign, it'll be about something greater--- there's no doubt their a great revolutionary legacy for progressive Iranians to look back upon.
The blanket assertion of "youth" and "women" - means nothing - large numbers of both voted for President Ahmadinejad (unless you want to label these voters as "ignorant" "illeterate" "rural" etc.) There is a movement within Iran - but not a secular-progressive-liberal one -
and yes things will changes. But not in the manner that secular-liberals expect them too - the protests by Mousavi's support will only delay this change. If Ahmadinejad is given he space, without the threat of flames by Mousavi/Rafsenjani, then expect large scale dmonstrations with the blessing of Ahmadinejad that will target corruption - and elite "clerics."
"Mousavi, give us our votes back" is the chant of choice on the streets of Tehran right now I just heard from some of my friends currently there. The militant parts of the protest are protesting against the whole clerical regime.
Think about what your having doubts about protesting against a right-wing, capitalist regime controlled by a clerical elite.
Trust me populists spending oil wealth in an oil rich country isn't that rare...
"If Ahmadinejad is given he space, without the threat of flames by Mousavi/Rafsenjani, then expect large scale dmonstrations with the blessing of Ahmadinejad that will target corruption - and elite "clerics."
That seems surprising to me, i haven't heard anything to that effect, care to elaborate?
Look, it really bothers me that this thread seems to give the impression that we think the win for A is also, at some level, not only a win for the Iranian working class but also for the anti-imperialist movement.
Lenin's absence for most of the discussion puzzles me too.
It's obvious that someone like Jenny seems to be reaching the the conclusion that we are "for" A, and she quite understandably doesn't like it:
"Considering the rioting, I think there are Iranians who want someone other than Ahmadinejad(no offense, Yoshie)
Jenny | 14 Jun, 04:52 | #"
and
I don't think it's a good idea for us to be seen to openly support Ahmadinejad at this time. There are protests in Iran tonight about the election fraud that have not been seen since the revolution. At least let it play out. These people are being very brave in a state that is not used to huge anti government protests.
Judy | 13 Jun, 22:24 | #
Let's make it bloody clear - A is in no way a hero for socialists, and let's have a better position on why his victory may be, but also may not be, a "good thing"
Lenin's absence for most of the discussion puzzles me too.
What, so because I'm out watching Cosi Fan Tutte or busy sleeping or reading books, this makes me a secret fan of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?
How dare you!
What, so because I'm out watching Cosi Fan Tutte or busy sleeping or reading books, this makes me a secret fan of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?
---
No. But it does make it a poor member of the blogspot community. Bloggers aren't suppose to be hyper-intellectual bibliophiles, they are suppose to be ill-informed, ranting, entertaining idiots.
Excuse me. I have to go back to reading Frontpage Mag. I hear Western civilization needs to invade North Korea.
Oh, I do apologise. Let us begin:
"Make no mistake, patriots, Mah-mooooooo-d Ahmadine-jihad is a threat to everything we in the West hold to be sacred. Liberty, Israel, human rights, 24-Hour Macdonalds' Fitness Clinics, cable television, the right to bear arms and - above all, jihadis - democracy. The only good thing about those fanatical maniacs getting hold of a nuclear weapon (Western technology, designed for civilized people who know how to use it properly) would be that Berkeley radicals might have to think about their hummus being vaporised by one of Mama Jihad's dirty bombs courtesy of an Al Qaeda wetback. And, please, don't waste your tired leftist philosophy on us, Ahmed. We didn't cause your problems. Everybody's suffering is their own damn fault, and if people want to blame America, then they only have to ask: where would your asses be without us? If it wasn't for us, you'd be speaking German, or Russian, or Islamic, or some damn thing. Hoo boy, I'm het up about this. You know those hajis are complaining now that we didn't send them some bullshit aid programme? What they hell are we doing giving aid to TERRORISTS? The problem with America is that we're TOO DAMN GOOD. Well, I say NO MORE MISTER NICE COUNTRY. Uncle Sam should hold a nice atomic barbecue as an example to all the leftists who are trying to undermine our freedom..."
My wrist aches after all that. Can I just post it now and rely on hundreds of commentators loling and pwning to add substance to this windy diatribe?
Amusing, too bad that diatribe is buried in your comment box--- lost to annals of history.
Now making use, instead of fun of, your hyper-intellecutalism-- what are you thoughts on Mansoor Hekmat?
Have you read any of his works? Is the WPI a completely marginal force?
Is the WPI a completely marginal force?
In Iran it is. In the UK, it has developed a niche through various fronts such as the Council of Ex-Muslims, and are rewarded with glowing interviews and tributes in the broadsheets. The Hekmatists essentially help cover the left flank of British Islamophobes. Partly for this reason, they are a regular feature over at the Islamophobia Watch website.
Well, shit, I seem to have found myself on the opposite side to what I thought I was on.
didn't mention - can't even spell cosi etc - must be a...no, can't be, I read books -
Look Len, I am genuinely puzzled. To me it's fucking obvious that we aren't for A.
Nor we for USA, or GB, or OZ. But there's got to be more analysis than that.
As for Hekmat - well, I know nothing about him, strikes me he was probably workerist, but come on mate, I genuinely am not sure what our position should be, but I am sure it shouldn't, or shouldn't even seem to be pro-A within Iran,nor anti-Iran and pro US, or GB, or Oz.
I'm not trying to be a fucking troll, I really can't understand why you've had so little to say when I usually feel I can rely on you for a useful direction.
Jesus.
Should have made it clear - in a confrontation between Iran and USA, GB etc - yes we are for the defeat of the alphabet imperialists. Was the election a war between etc.? I don't think so,or at least not completely, so our position is surely more nuanced.
What should it be? I don't know. Help.
Chairman lenin your guidance is obviously needed by your partisan Sergio.
--------
And as for the WPI they struck me as more atheist and secularist than anything else, but I was unaware that in the United Kingdom they pandered to right-wing elements with their rhetoric and frontgroups.
Though certainly it's the right of any one to attack their religion and the use of religion to justify chauvinism and oppression?
I'm acutely aware that this plays into the hands of neocon and right-wing forces and does provide left-cover from Islamophobia, but isn't there some middle ground.
What should radical left-wing forces within the Muslim communities in western countries do? Should they work MORE closely with ideologically flawed forces within Muslim communities attacking Islamophobia and eventually using this base to push secular, left politics instead of reactionary politics?
These may seem like stupid questions, maybe even colored with orientalism, but I have personal experience with the ultra-right and fundamentalism.
Should Islamism just be viewed as the largely the byproduct of western imperialism and the overall question of religion retreat back to "an illusion for a condition that demands illusions"? (certainly the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas at one point, the Taliban, were encouraged by Western forces to attack secular, nationalist forces)
Look Len, I am genuinely puzzled. To me it's fucking obvious that we aren't for A.
So? Who said we were 'for A'? Why don't you read what I wrote in response to Judy in this very thread?
And as for the WPI they struck me as more atheist and secularist than anything else
Being atheist and secularist doesn't entail an obsessive focus on Islam to the detriment of all other concerns, nor does it entail equating Islam with Nazism as Maryam Namazi has done.
What should radical left-wing forces within the Muslim communities in western countries do? Should they work MORE closely with ideologically flawed forces within Muslim communities attacking Islamophobia and eventually using this base to push secular, left politics instead of reactionary politics?
I wouldn't presume to say exactly what stance left-wing Muslims should take with respect to relatively right-wing or conservative Muslim groups. Whether they work closely with them or not seems to be a tactical question, depending on what they are trying to accomplish. And I don't detect a dilemma in this: socialists of whatever background work with forces to the right all the time, including more right-wing religious forces. The only way a dilemma would enter into this would be if one's supposed 'secularism' was at root based on a theological conception of politics in which the religious are the true heretics, and so on.
Should Islamism just be viewed as the largely the byproduct of western imperialism and the overall question of religion retreat back to "an illusion for a condition that demands illusions"
Well, first of all, it surely doesn't help to conflate Islamism with the ultra-right. Some strains are extremely reactionary (the Talibs, the Jamaat in Pakistan, etc), some are far less so (eg, Hezbollah). Secondly, the main sense in which Islamism is a 'byproduct' of imperialism is that Political Islam in its various forms emerged in the colonial labyrinth among other oppositional and 'renewalist' ideologies (nationalism and socialism being the main alternatives) to challenge the empires. It is true that 'the West' has occasionally made use of some Islamist groups or movements because of their anticommunism, but that doesn't explain their longevity, or any popularity they might have.
Shit, fucked up with haloscan
Try again - Len, you've conflated my comments with those of Bhaskar, who said:
"And as for the WPI they struck me as more atheist and secularist than anything else"
and with those of Jenny who seemed to me to be expressing genuine confusion.
I know next to nothing about Hekmat, who seems to be to have been workerist, and I certainly didn't say what Bhaskar said.
I really am not sure exactly what we should say about the Iranian election, but what concerns me is if we seem to be celebrating it as just a victory over USA, GB or other alphabetical imperialism. It's more complicated than that, which is why I'm looking for some sort of pointers.
Don't mix us all up together. Some of us, at least, are not sure how to nuance this stuff, and really want a bit less testy guidance.
I'm not, as Bhaskar say, your acolyte, but there are worse things
Lenin I can't find much at fault with your points.
Sergio I was just joking mate.
Have people been celebrating the election result? I've not noticed that.
I've not seen anyone arguing why the left should have supported Mousavi in this election either.
The WCPI has also played an atrocious role in the international anti-war movement, forcing coalitions in at least some countries to exclude them. In Canada their members physically attacked young Iraqis who waved the Iraqi flag on demonstrations in the lead-up to the 2003 invasion.
Sergio - I do think some people here are being a bit soft on Ahmadinejad but I don't think you can attribute that to Lenin. In any case, the issue is, rather, that the situation is complex. The US/UK/Europe would like to see a more pliant, more neo-liberal president in Iran. Mousavi is that and is the political continuation of Mohammad Khatami. Khatami made some nods towards greater openness but undermined himself and his base by his neo-liberalism, which was of greater importance to his project and that of the "reformist clerics." Ahmadinejad's popularity was/is a reaction against that neo-liberalism and, perhaps, the greater certainty provided by clear moral precepts and behaviour codes. His anti-neo-liberal politics are interwoven with his repressive social conservatism.
Social conservatism and economic populism can often go hand in hand - here in Canada our labour party, the NDP, came, in large part, out of rural areas and was often led by ministers influenced by the social gospel movement (including the first and most memorable leader, Tommy Douglas). They were not particularly progressive socially (and, actually, that wing of the party still isn't very socially progressive).
All of this is to say that without reliable eyes and ears on the ground, it would be a fool's game to pronounce anything at this moment regarding the mobilization of Mousavi supporters. Is it a movement with real potential to push forward the struggle in Iran? Or is it more akin to the "Orange Revolution" in the Ukraine, ie. really just a dispute between two wings of the ruling class and the mobilization of the mass support base each has, based upon short/medium term conjunctural interests.
If it's a movement with real potential to develop into a broad and deep challenge to the Iranian regime in a way that benefits our class, we'd support it, obviously. If it's a colour-coded "revolution" our attitude would be markedly different.
Len, you've conflated my comments with those of Bhaskar...
No, I haven't. I answered your point separaretely, and I just pointed out that your insinuation of some secret pro-Ahmadinejad enthusiasm on this blog is utterly unfounded.
I know next to nothing about Hekmat, who seems to be to have been workerist, and I certainly didn't say what Bhaskar said.
No, you didn't. That's why I was responding to what Bhaskar said in that particular case.
but what concerns me is if we seem to be celebrating it as just a victory over USA, GB or other alphabetical imperialism. It's more complicated than that, which is why I'm looking for some sort of pointers.
There'll be another post on this, but why start from false assumptions? Why start by freaking out about some supposed 'support for A' when it has no obvious basis in fact?
Lenin: "It is true that 'the West' has occasionally made use of some Islamist groups or movements because of their anticommunism, but that doesn't explain their longevity, or any popularity they might have."
And, in Iraq, you could just reverse the nouns in this sentence - the "West" has occasionally made use of some communist groups because of their anti-islamism...etc.
Sections of any oppositional movement can generally be bought off because of their misconception as to how change comes about. That applies to our movement as much as to Islamism. And the lines blur along the edges - the Islamism of Dr. Ali Shariati is very close to Marxism in its conception of the role of struggle against elites in Islam. Similar to liberation theology in Latin America.
Juan Cole has another post up on his blog defending the western media from critics who say they only talked to the middle class in North Tehran.
http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/...in-
iranian.html
It still seems to me like he's ignoring class entirely, though. Didn't Khatami win in 1997 because he got rural Iran to vote for him?
Also, just how big was the portion of the reformist youth vote who abstained in 2005. Was it capable of swinging the election like Cole claims?
What you won't be hearing about from the BBC....
Has anyone seen the footage of the election aftermath on Press TV? The main square in Tehran is packed to the rafters (think London 15/02/03) with Ahmadinejad supporters.
I think a few people on here need to stop conflating socialism with liberalism. Once again: the working class in Iran - socialism's definitive constituency there, one might have thought - evidently backed Ahmadinejad in droves.
Might i suggest that the Mousavi-supporting "socialists" on here try actually listening to the Iranian working class and crediting them with some intelligence? A bunch of "I-wish-i-was-a-punkrocker-with-flowers-in-my-
hair-I-want-the-freedom-to-drink-Coke-and-go-on-
Facebook-for-ever-and-ever" middle class twenty-somethings throwing a hissy fit in Tehran because they missed out on their "Obama moment" might fit into the NewLabour/BBC definition of socialism, but it doesn't fit into the Marxist one.
Yoshie accuses Juan Cole of "jumping on the "it's a fraud" bandwagon even more hastily than the White House".
But Cole's arguments are perfectly coherent, and draw logical conclusions from the gross anomalies in the election result.
Of particular interest re the extraordinary speed with which the results were announced, and the claim that Amadinejad won by much the same margin over the entire country.
Would Yoshie believe a British election result in which the Tories won by the same margin in Scotland as they did in Surrey?
deformed worker:
so your "Marxist" conception of socialism is supporting whatever populist has the working class' support at any given moment?
We may be seeing politicization in a depoliticized, ultra-conservative, capitalist society.
Your vitriol for the youth of Iran is reprehensible. The freedoms they seek aren't "bourgeois" at all. In Iran workers' can't freely organize independently as a class in trade unions, they're freedom of speech and expression are hindered, I could go on and on.
Why so much hatred for people that don't like the current lot of things in Iran?
“Why start by freaking out about some supposed 'support for A' when it has no obvious basis in fact?”
You really have to calm down a bit. Must be all that opera. I didn’t speak about “supposed support for A”, but about what could SEEM – got that SEEM – not just seem COULD seem.
“Len, you've conflated my comments with those of Bhaskar...
No, I haven't. I answered your point separaretely,”
Yes you have. You put them together as one point. Shit, we all make mistakes, and you did.
“Look Len, I am genuinely puzzled. To me it's fucking obvious that we aren't for A.
So? Who said we were 'for A'? Why don't you read what I wrote in response to Judy in this very thread”
We all make mistakes. This was mine. I hadn’t noticed your reply to Judy, but even so, it looks a bit scant to me:
“Judy - I'm not sure who you mean by 'us', but I'm the proprietor of this blog, and the idea of me 'supporting' Ahmadinejad against the protesters is out of the question. I don't see that this is implied in Yoshie's post, either, which provides some important pointers for analysis.”
Can do better. Try not to SEEM. We haven’t all had the ben…No, that’s as flip as some of your comments. Jesus, when you piss of your supporters – yeah, acolytes – it’s time for a bit of self-crit
There really are some of us who are both against imperialism and A (you’ve probably noticed I’m not confident about spelling his name), and also know that the main enemy is at home, etc. This is a complex argument, which I want to get right (yes, left, then).
Try not to be so fucking operatic - save your anger for those who want to be on the other side, not for those of us who don't, be it our fault for being stupid or not.
Help to give us the arguments when we ask for them
"Your vitriol for the youth of Iran is reprehensible."
No, Bhaskar, YOUR vitriol for the youth of Iran is reprehensible. You don't even acknowledge the existence of most of them - those of the working class and poor, for whom the election of Ahmadinejad makes a real difference to their lives. The only youths you are willing to consider as real people at all are the those of the elite and middle class.
And no, of course i'm not saying that i would reflexively agree with EVERY conceivable type of populist appeal to the working class, as i'm sure you know full well.
Hold up, deformed worker. It is quite possible that the votes were rigged - we don't know whether they were or not yet. Secondly, while I don't think Mousevi is the kind of person the Left should be supporting, I'm not sure that even if Ahmadinejad did win fairly that would mean socialists should back him instead. Different interests are evidently being hitched to opposed factions in the Iranian ruling class, neither of which should get the support of socialists. If the working classes did prefer Ahmadinejad because they reject the neoliberal alternative, it doesn't mean there isn't a problem with political repression and trade union bashing that comes from the majority conservative bloc. The sad truth is that the Iranian left is terribly weak, and has been since being outmaneouvred and essentially smashed following the Iranian Revolution. We should welcome anything that might strengthen them, and it may well be the case that if these protesters (whom we can't just assume are puppets for a 'colour-coded revolution' or some such venture) force the Iranian state to make concessions on political rights, it will become easier for the organised working class and the left as whole.
"Hold up, deformed worker. It is quite possible that the votes were rigged - we don't know whether they were or not yet. Secondly, while I don't think Mousevi is the kind of person the Left should be supporting, I'm not sure that even if Ahmadinejad did win fairly that would mean socialists should back him instead. Different interests are evidently being hitched to opposed factions in the Iranian ruling class, neither of which should get the support of socialists. If the working classes did prefer Ahmadinejad because they reject the neoliberal alternative, it doesn't mean there isn't a problem with political repression and trade union bashing that comes from the majority conservative bloc. The sad truth is that the Iranian left is terribly weak, and has been since being outmaneouvred and essentially smashed following the Iranian Revolution. We should welcome anything that might strengthen them, and it may well be the case that if these protesters (whom we can't just assume are puppets for a 'colour-coded revolution' or some such venture) force the Iranian state to make concessions on political rights, it will become easier for the organised working class and the left as whole."
That's better. Continue.
Oh, you're satisfied now? Because my entire output is written with you in mind. It would be devastating if you hadn't just said that what I wrote was 'better'.
Lenin,
Couldn't agree more. And of course it's logically possible that the results were rigged. But, for God's sake, let's apply a little bit of critical judgement to the whole situation in general shall we?
A few points:
1. The Western media have taken a noticeably different tack towards Iran since Obama took office. Criticism of Iran as a rogue state in general has noticeably narrowed in focus to criticism of Ahmadinejad in particular (which has remained as vitriolic as it had ever been).
2. The Western media in the run-up to this election have been going on about how Mousavi represents "hope for reform" in Iran, etc etc etc.
3. Mousavi's election campaign took on a "colour code" - green - which was said, so our media told us, to represent the "hope for all the young people of Iran who long for change and normal relations with the West", etc etc. Now where have we seen this before?
4. Obama recently gave a much-publicised speech in Egypt which, though hardly saying anything of substance, was instantly hailed by credulous starry-eyed left-liberals everywhere as the beginning of a new dawn in US policy toward the Middle East.
5. Joe Biden has today come out and added his voice to the loud clamouring of the Western media that Ahmadinjad's election was rigged.
6. Ahmadinejad was elected in 2005 on a left-populist ticket. Domestically he provides material benefits for the country's working classes and poor. (Ok, Iran isn't some sort of workers' paradise - not by a long way. But has perfect socialism ever existed anywhere in a world where the bourgeoisie are still in charge? Lenin's tenure as Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars wasn't perfect socialism either. That doesn't mean it wasn't a massive advance for the working class and deserving of the support of socialists everywhere.)
7. In foreign policy Ahmadinejad has been a vocal and influential critic of US imperialism, probably the most conspicuously vocal such statesman in the world alongside Castro and Chavez. These are not trivial things in a world where Third World leaders are invariably so in the pocket of the US that they are unwilling and/or unable to speak out. He has pursued a foreign policy that stands up for Iran's right to real independent development.
Now, let me put a hypothesis to you: The incoming Obama administration looked at Iran, saw there was an election coming up, and thought that US interests would best be served by not - for now - constantly condemning Iran per se, but by doing everything possible to secure the election of Mousavi. Cue massive media psy-ops of the kind i've mentioned above: colour-coded opposition movement appealing to trendy middle-class youth, big "landmark" speech on the Middle East by Changeman during the run-up to polling, etc etc. If, after all this, Mousavi still didn't win, well then the US would simply say that Ahmadinejad's election had been rigged.
And after all, the US wouldn't tell lies, would they? Jeeeeezus wept!
such wit from a man who chose as creative a pseudonym as "lenin" :)
WTF could "left-wing Muslim" possibly mean? What an hysterical oxymoron. But looking over this site, it is one that is readily accepted.
Are you people on drugs?
Jock - are you a racist? or just an ignoramus in the more general sense?
If you can link my comment to what a "racist" is, I will give you some time. Otherwise, you need some serious time in Political Analysis and Concepts 101 before you post again.
Jock - this is a preface to me telling you, rather forcefully, to fuck off. I know, and have known many left-wing Muslims. I also know that some left-wing Muslims run rather good blogs. I have spoken to meetings of Muslim activists where my left-wing politics have been well-received. If you have some hang-up about Muslims, I suggest you air it elsewhere. For my part, I am happy to be among radical Muslims, socialist Jews, communist Zoroastrians, marxist Buddhists, liberation Christians, etc.
Now, as promised, here it is: FUCK OFF.
what about cthulhite communists len?
Cthulhites are reactionary bastards.
Jock - you're generalization, based upon western imperialist promoted misrepresentations, that Islam is an especially reactionary ideology. Your stupid comment shows you are utterly ignorant of history and of the wide variety of positions within Islamic thought.
There was a party of hundreds of thousands of supporters in Iran, the People's Mujahideen, that fused Islam and Marxism. The thinker Ali Shariati, was a leftist Muslim. The Baku Congress of 1920 was based upon an alliance of Bolsheviks and leftist Muslims. The FLN in Algeria fighting against French colonialism drew upon Islam. Etc. Etc. Etc.
What? Bugger off, that's a contradiction in terms. Cthulhite communists! Pah! I spit on the Cthulhites and look forward to their extraordinary rendition.
In response to Paul regarding my comment on Juan Cole's blog entry, I looked carefully at both what he is saying and many comments left on his blog (many of which questioned six points raised by Cole), and my conclusion is that he doesn't have a smoking gun. So, that is why I believe that, for foreigners who don't have the right to vote in Iran, the response of the White House, which to my surprise has been cautious and constructive so far, is correcter than some liberals who are calling for international non-recognition of the second Ahmadinejad administration.
Maybe deformed worker could point to the "Moussavi supporters" he alleges have infested this blog? Oh wait he can't, because there aren't any. There are, admittedly, some who don't share his childish second campism or don't join him in slagging off a large number of protesters simply because the Western media (who deserve every bit of vitriol) like them.
Let's use our critical faculties, indeed. Let's refrain from summary judgment until we have more information. Or we could follow deformed worker's lead and simply imagine a scenario where everyone in Iran who doesn't love A. is a pawn of Obama's.
musawwir: "The present structure in Iran is not going to change anytime soon, and there is nothing to say that there is really a better 'model' out there...."
I agree that the secular Left has no ready-made "model" to offer to the Iranians. Looking over a long history of socialism, I think that the conflicts in Iran are not unique to the Islamic Republic but rather common to all revolutionary states: conflict between Revolution and Its Discontents, so to speak. (Some socialists recognize this point of similarity; others don't.) Those of us who reject liberalism, whether we are Muslims or secular socialists, must grapple with how best to handle conflicts that are endemic to any process of social revolution.
Examining the history of both Islamic and socialist movements, I suggest that a better way to handle such conflicts is not to try to eradicate them but to try to see both ends of conflicts as containing partial truths that must be brought to a higher level through the conflicts.
In other words, a living revolution needs an expansive space for conflicts.
musawwir: "The protests; are there any, any current protests in Iran that can said to come from within the working class? No - they (the working class) in droves, voted for Ahmadinejad. Wishing for 'leadership' from Mousavi, to do what? You expect him to change from a neo-liberal to become pro-working class? Or, is liberal-democracy the ultimate end?"
These are three important questions. Let me try to answer them.
First, Moussavi supporters are largely richer and better educated than Ahmadinejad supporters. That is why I said the vote was again a class vote. However, any revolution needs its intellectuals. In the past, a socialist state has tended to eventually alienate intellectuals, the category of people expanded through the very success of mass education ushered in by the socialist revolution. I encourage the leadership of the Islamic Republic and their supporters to look at that history and take it as a negative example not to emulate. They need to find a better way.
Second, I personally don't think that Mousavi will offer leadership (or if he did it would be a pro-working class kind). However, many Mousavi supporters have that illusion. Sometimes, the only way to discover the truth is to work through one's own illusion and see its untruth (this is a hard way, but it's often the only way unfortunately).
Third, I reject liberal democracy and encourage others to reject it, too. But in our rejection, we must also understand why the model of "freedom" offered by liberal democracy exercises such a powerful hold on the minds of many, especially intellectuals. Only through a deeper understanding of attractions of liberal democracy can we offer a better political principle than liberal democracy.
To musawwir and others, regarding one past example of conflicts within a revolutionary process -- conflict between Revolution and Its Discontents; conflict between masses and intellectuals; conflict between different factions of intellectuals -- I recommend we look at Joel Andreas' study of the Cultural Revolution in China. For example, "Battling over Political and Cultural Power during the Chinese Cultural Revolution."
Yoshie your total disregard for liberalism's best aspects is disconcerning. We all know that liberalism's limits and failings, but I hope your not suggesting "proletarian rule" without multi-party plurality, freedom of expression, freedom for independent trade unionship, etc
Because without these things you inherently have a depoliticization of society, society becomes counterrrevolutionary and conservative and the tendency is towards bureaucratization.
Lenin says: "I just pointed out that your insinuation of some secret pro-Ahmadinejad enthusiasm on this blog is utterly unfounded."
The only socialist who is (apparently) unconditionally enthusiastic about Ahmadinejad -- and emphatically pubic about it -- that I know is Hugo Chávez: "The Iranian leader recognized the importance of the struggle that this electoral conjuncture represented, which the Venezuelan leader said is 'a very big and important victory' for the peoples who are fighting for a better world" ("President Chávez Congratulates Ahmadinejad on His Reelection," VTV, 13 June 2009).
Bhaskar,
I'm not suggesting that we disregard best aspects* of the liberal tradition. Far from it. We must thoroughly understand liberalism and come up with something better. In my view, liberal democracy depoliticizes people as much as the dictatorship of the one party.
* The best aspects -- the most important of which is habeas corpus -- of liberal democracy have, btw, already been discarded by liberal democratic states in the course of the war on terror. I suggest it take enemies of liberalism to save the best of liberalism from liberals.
Of course, I'm not in disagreement with you. When I debate with liberals and others without radical views I normally present my socialism as attempting to add to fully realize democracy through worker management and the dealienation of labor. Of course this implicitly rejects capitalist ownership and the superstructures which rest upon it.
I don't think that either of these candidates is good for the left. With Ahmanijedad, there is a perverse sense of empowerment for proleterians and lumpenproleterians, but it is essentially defensive in nature, both tied to the theocracy through clientelism. Meanwhile, with Mousavi, there is the social and economic elitism of intellectuals and the middle class, with workers and the poor likely to be cut loose into a more ruthlessly competitive life that renders organization around class identity even more improbable.
It is a dilemma to which I do not have an answer, because it is pretty much the one faced by the left all over the world, how to reinvigorate a sense of class identity and political purpose in the current climate of alienation and economic duress. In Iran, Ahmanijedad is basically a defensive reaction to the problem. In the US, as explained by Thomas Frank, a lot of lower middle class Americans embraced fundamentalism as expressed by the Republicans because they recognized that the Democrats no longer offered them the protection of progressive economic policies.
A couple of things, though. I thought that Cole's political analysis was fairly decent, the "reformers" don't have the will to challenge the regime over the result because of their memory of the brutal repression of the 1980s, and will not gain sufficient power to do so until a new generation emerges over the next couple of decades. Of course, being a liberal, he neglected to mention that the "reformers" will have to develop a more inclusive economic program.
Also, as a side note for Yoshie: in regard to your mention of the Andreas article, his new book, Rise of the Red Engineers is excellent, if you haven't read it already.
Yoshie: How would you define liberal democracy?
Richard: "I don't think that either of these candidates is good for the left. With Ahmanijedad, there is a perverse sense of empowerment for proleterians and lumpenproleterians, but it is essentially defensive in nature, both tied to the theocracy through clientelism. Meanwhile, with Mousavi, there is the social and economic elitism of intellectuals and the middle class, with workers and the poor likely to be cut loose into a more ruthlessly competitive life that renders organization around class identity even more improbable."
Both sides represent mixed bags. One way to look at them is the way you do above, seeing negatives in both sides. We must keep that in mind, for one possible outcome of the ongoing conflicts is a combination of the worst aspects of both (which is what has happened in China as well as other former socialist states).
However, another way to look at them, which we should also keep in mind, is that each side has its positives.
What I would try to do if I were in Iran is to seek to help initiate the kind of social struggle that could combine the positive, rather than negative, aspects of both -- e.g., a struggle against the revision of the constitution that initiated the process of privatization. Such a struggle can realign the forces in a pro-working class direction, aligning some of the Mousavi-supporting intellectuals on the side of workers and exposing others as mere neoliberals, getting some of the Ahmadinejad-supporting proletarians to test Ahmadinejad on the level of his commitment to economic justice. (This, of course, must remain an idea since I do not live in Iran and I can't put it in practice.)
Jenny: "Yoshie: How would you define liberal democracy?"
Liberal democracy in a nutshell: a state of equal rights and freedoms to exploit others and get exploited by others, each according to his or her ability.
Richard: "Also, as a side note for Yoshie: in regard to your mention of the Andreas article, his new book, Rise of the Red Engineers is excellent, if you haven't read it already."
Yes, I recommend the book, too. I only posted the article I posted because it's available online for free. :->
Yoshie, thank you for your reading recommendation - I will bookmark and read the article. I think you have made some very important points with respect to revolutionary stages.
I think that with respect to alienating/pushing away the intellectuals, there is a bit of a difference between China (and other socialist revolutions) and the Islamic Revolution of Iran.
In Iran, the university is only one place where the intellectuals are present, and that is what gets the most coverage in the "west" and the "students" are defined in the western press as university students ---
The other intellectual environment in Iran is the Hawza - the religious seminaries, and while sections of them might not care for Ahmadinejad, or what he represents, - most are on board, and have not been alienated. The same is true of the Hawza students, who are not only Iranians, but come from a very large number of countries to study there - esp. the numbers went up after the revolution.
The Hawza is, by the way, no longer a place of rote learning (as it had become) - it has, for lack of a better term, "modernized," and now also includes large numbers of women - and the studies include a wide variety of religious-philosophical topics. With respect to Hawza women students, at least Ayatullah Fadhlullah has made a statement that he sees no problem with a woman attaining the highest position of Shi'a religious authority of a marja (equivelent of Ayat. Sistani's position - for those who don't know - there are maybe 10-15 men who are recognized to have attained this position at this time).
Having said that, I agree that the university technocratic intellectuals should also not be pushed away - But Ahmadinejad's movement does need breathing room, he cannot really do much if he is pressured from both the conservative elements ala Rafsenjani, and the liberal elements - although these both sides seem to have merged (btw - i don't regard Ahmadinejad as "conservative"). But I'll read the article - and try to learn more about this important process.
Today in Iran, millions came out to see Ahmadinejad's victory speech - during that speech they were shouting slogans against Rafsenjani. Iranians - working class Iranians - are well aware of the corruption amongst the "clerics" and the upper crust non-clerics. I don't think they are going to just let this corruption go - not after the kind of bold promises Ahmadinejad has made now.
Just one more thing - that even with respect to the technocratic university intellectuals (and by this i mean engineers - economists etc.) - there is also a division amongst them - i.e. there are very large numbers of religious technocrats who are supportive of the revolution, and Ahmadinejad, and may have also studied in the Hawza. (I don't mean to imply that every thing is just rosy, just so that the discussion is in perspective, and as accurate as possible)
city-by-city breakdown published:
http://spreadsheets.google.com/c...sgF018Xig&
hl=en
http://www.moi.ir/Portal/Home/Sh...a3-
38f5e17309c9
link via fivethirtyeight.com
Seems no one is providing coverage of the victory rally. Any estimates on numbers?
http://spreadsheets.google.com/c...sgF018Xig&
hl=en
Looking at this, it doesn't seem to be the case that the results for Ahmedinejad and Mousavi are the same the lengthe and breadth of the land. In fact, a cursory galnce shows places where Mousavi beat Ahmedinejad.
So that deals with one objection. It doesn't, of course, prove that the results haven't been fixed, just that one of the "proofs" has been shown not to be the case.
Anyone know enough about Iran to interpret these results? In particular, I'd quite like to know the class makeup of the areas where Mousavi did well vs those areas where Ahmedinejad won.
Juan Cole has another post up on his blog defending the western media from critics who say they only talked to the middle class in North Tehran.
Cole is talking jibberish. An excerpt from his post:
Some comentators have suggested that the reason Western reporters were shocked when Ahmadinejad won was that they are based in opulent North Tehran, whereas the farmers and workers of Iran, the majority, are enthusiastic for Ahmadinejad. That is, we fell victim once again to upper middle class reporting and expectations in a working class country of the global south.
I have listened to US radio reports on the election results for the better part of the day, and if post-election reporting is consistent with pre-election analysis, the press certainly did fall 'victim to upper middle class reporting and expectations'. As an example, a five-minute post-headline report from Tehran on NPR this morning managed to interview two opposition protesters, both of whom spoke flawless English, while the majority of voters (assuming results are accurate) were represented by a translation of Ahmadinejad's retort to the protests. Apparently no Ahmadinejad supporters could be located for comment. And the stereotypical symbolism was employed as one soft spoken Mousavi supporter, nearly in tears, reported that she was shocked to witness one of her friends being chased by riot police into a restaurant, apparently a sanctuary of sorts in her world view.
marc b:
Way to back up your arguments. And not that it matters, but many people on the street are not protesting for any particular candidate but for basic freedoms and human rights.
You didn't engage with anything of substance with Cole's and the only thing you brought to this discussion was your apparent disdain for soft-spoken female Iranians and support for fascist riot police (from a capitalist state no less).
without wading through every post here, i have to offer my strongest agreement to anyone here who acknowledges that--whether the election was rigged or not--ahmadinejad is a proto- or semi- or quasi-fascist fuck. "deformed worker" is quite deformed indeed if he insists on liking a politician who said, in response to a question about the oppression of gays, "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country (the usa). In Iran we do not have this phenomenon, I don't know who has told you that we have it".
What this has to do with "Ultra-Leftism" or any other stupid reifications I don´t know, and don´t care. A fundamentalist, holocaust-denying thug doesn´t earn my political sympathy, under any circumstances. (this of course has nothing to do with the question of iran´s right to nuclear technology etc. etc.)
Bhaskar, my comment was not intended to be an analysis of the composition and motivation of the protesters, or of Ahmadinejad's response. In fact I could not render an opinion on those matters, as the reports that I've heard were, for the most part, no more informative than a comic strip. My limited criticism was of US reporting on the aftermath of the election, nothing more.
Yoshie, according to this article:
http://theactivist.org/blog/the-...-or-
alternative
Liberal socialism is in fact, socialism from below.
fair enough. i'm glad I wasn't dealing with another deformed worker. i had enough of that discussion 12 hours ago.
No, I am not a Ahmadinejad supporter, if that's what you mean. He is a demagogue. My deeper point is that I view US reporting on the election as part and parcel of the 'regime change' agenda directed at Iran.
I don't know if this is accurate or not, but a Twitter comment reports the following:
Ahmadynezad now calls himself "seyed" (bloodline of prophet mohammad) & wearing a green shawl on state TV! unbelievable! #IranElection
from this:
http://twitter.com/Change_for_Iran
via this:
http://www.philipweiss.org/mondo...-farsi-
and.html
"More working class people voted for Bush than Kerry - would you consider that a class vote? The BNP's main support comes from working class people but that wouldn't be a class vote either."
Right populism is different from Left populism Andrea, as i'm sure you understand perfectly well.
"without wading through every post here, i have to offer my strongest agreement to anyone here who acknowledges that--whether the election was rigged or not--ahmadinejad is a proto- or semi- or quasi-fascist fuck. "deformed worker" is quite deformed indeed if he insists on liking a politician who said, in response to a question about the oppression of gays, "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country (the usa). In Iran we do not have this phenomenon, I don't know who has told you that we have it".
What this has to do with "Ultra-Leftism" or any other stupid reifications I don´t know, and don´t care. A fundamentalist, holocaust-denying thug doesn´t earn my political sympathy, under any circumstances. (this of course has nothing to do with the question of iran´s right to nuclear technologyetc. etc.)
Your gross and wilful misrepresentation of Ahmadinejad and his politics could come straight from the NewLabour/BBC book of political chicanery. I bet you can't wait for your big Western boys to go and liberate every last gay in Iran by bombing them all to bits.
"The only socialist who is (apparently) unconditionally enthusiastic about Ahmadinejad -- and emphatically pubic about it -- that I know is Hugo Chávez: "The Iranian leader recognized the importance of the struggle that this electoral conjuncture represented, which the Venezuelan leader said is 'a very big and important victory' for the peoples who are fighting for a better world" ("President Chávez Congratulates Ahmadinejad on His Reelection," VTV, 13 June 2009)."
This is because Chavez actually understands Marxism.
Good article from Information Clearing House. Might be interesting reading for those who reflexively assume that everything the West says must therefore be true, and that everything the West's designated enemies say must therefore be false:
http://
informationclearinghouse....rticle22827.htm
Interesting that, as soon as figures are published suggesting the vote hasn't been rigged (or, at least, if it has been rigged, it's been rigged in a sophisticated way), no one discusses the figures any more.
Those who compare Ahmadinejad to Bush would be on stronger ground if the last three years of Bush's first term had seen an increase in equality in the USA.
Maybe Ahmadinejad should be analysed according to the empirical facts rather than spurious similes.
Troll deleted
Andrea - real leftists also reject aligning themselves with Mousavi, who is a neo-liberal. The point lenin and myself both made above still holds here: it is unclear what is happening in Iran at the moment and it would be foolish to jump on any bandwagon at the moment. Ahmadinejad is a social conservative with a terrible record on civil rights, union rights, etc. Mousavi is from the neo-liberal wing of the clerical elite. He offers, like Khatami before him, some timid reforms to try to maintain a support base amongst certain strata of the population. But the reformist movement in Iran hasn't moved beyond aligning themselves with this neo-liberal wing of the Iranian ruling class. And the working class and rural poor appear, in the face of no independent working class party, to have sided with the old statist wing of the Iranian bourgeoisie.
Not so very different to the United States to be honest. But certain people's over-the-top attacks on Ahmadinejad; their willingness to accept the spin coming from the western media; speaks to an internalized acceptance of the Islamophobic categories generated by western imperialism.
As to the movement against the election. If there were more people on the pro-Ahmadinejad protest, would that make them right? If the people protesting for Mousavi are pro-privatization or if they are demographically middle class, would that make them wrong? If Ahmadinejad actually won the vote on an anti-neoliberal, anti-elite corruption basis, should the left support that as an opening to push bigger questions?
You see, it's complicated and not at all clear at this point as to who represents the future.
Neither protests nor allegations of frauds are unprecedented in Iran, nor are they in other countries for that matter. Such are fixtures of normal politics when social and political forces are polarized and perceived stakes are high.
Whether the protests will become politically significant depends on two factors: whether Mousavi will eventually concede (like Gore and Kerry) or whether he will seek to make use of protests to build a bigger social base for himself (like AMLO); and whether Mousavi-supporting protesters can recruit working-class Iranians to join their protests.
Oh WTF. Andrea, it is simply untrue that "more working class people voted for Bush than Kerry", unless you somehow exclude members of ethnic minorities. Kerry won all income strata in the lower half of the distribution, Bush all those in the upper half. You are either very misinformed or disingenuous.
And I have no idea who deformed worker is talking to when he mentions people who think whatever Western media say must therefore be true. Of course it isn't. Neither is it false, simply because it's reported in Western media. It is, in fact, possible to hold a different opinion from deformed worker without being an imperialist stooge. Amazing, I know.
Look, the information clearinghouse article doesn't matter: So what if Ahminjad has no real power? Having the Ayatollah be in charge is even more irritating. And yes, it strikes me that you all have been in fact dismissive of Iran's civil rights issues, rejecting them in favor of focus on foreign policy. Hell, just becuse RESPECT included the bit about homosexuals, doesn't mean they've acutally done anything. I'm done here.
Troll deleted
"You're obviously unfamiliar with parties like the BNP and previously the Nazi party and their economic policies."
No, Andrea. YOU'RE the one who's obviously unfamiliar with them. Contrary to what the endless documentaries on UKTV Yesterday or the History Channel might try and steer you towards believing, the fact that "Nazi" was short for "National Socialist" did not make them in the slightest bit socialist, national or otherwise. They used some quasi-socialist ideas to appeal to sections of the working class in the early days, but they certainly let it be known in elite circles that they were never actually serious about this sort of stuff, which is kind of why they became the favoured candidate of the German bourgeoisie when the collapse of trust in "parliamentary democracy" threatened an increase in support for the KPD.
Similarly with the BNP, i understand they are currently trying to cloak their disgusting policies in quasi-socialist "anti-globalisation" rhetoric and the like. But my guess - based on their history of shallow and fickle populist appeals to whatever theme is flavour of the month at the moment (see Lenin's article above) - is that they, just like the Nazis, would disgard this unnecessary baggage at the drop of a hat if and when the time comes to play up to vested interests for support.
You see, Ahmadinejad and left-populists in general are distinct from the right-populism you mention in two very distinct ways:
1. Left-populists (Chavez, Ahmadinejad, Morales) back up their Left rhetoric with Left policies that benefit the working classes and the poor.
2. Left-populists have NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with racism, national chauvinism, and the like. It's to do with the fact they are left-wing, you see.
"deeply religious, ignorant and therefore fall prey to the government's propaganda"
my last comment on this - its getting a bit old - but Yoshie - you see the above comment, there are a significant number of staunch Mousavi supporters who think the above --- I would guess they comprise maybe 10%of the Iranian population. That is where some of the liberals, who went to Iran, are getting their terminologies from, in how they describe supporters of Ahmadinejad.
There is no way that Mousavi can gain any ground, infact, from anectodal evidence from Iranians (working-middle class backgrounds) who did vote for Mousavi (because of differences with Ahmadinejad on issues of economics, style etc.) --- They now completely support Ahmadinejad, because unlike the US media, these Iranians in Iran are willing to accept the results.
There is a minority of Mousavi supporters who will not accept the results - this is his core base, and it will remain the same. And then there are some of Rafsenjani's supporters who will remain true to him... But, in all likelihood, Mousavi's support will continue shrinking fast. And IF IF elections were to be re-held, I would suggest that Ahmadinejad would win with an even bigger margin, because Mousavi/Rafsenjani have fully exposed themselves - those parts of the working class that might have voted for Mousavi - will switch to Ahmadinejad. Good night all - its been real, but do try and stay real ...
sorry typo error --- the name is Musawwir ... NOT "msuawwir"
"It is, in fact, possible to hold a different opinion from deformed worker without being an imperialist stooge. Amazing, I know."
It is possible, and indeed quite common, to be an +unwitting+ stooge.
I'm sure a lot of the mostly middle class mostly young people who are protesting about the defeat of their candidate are sincere in their belief that the election was rigged (after all, the candidate himself has given them licence to believe this by making the accusation himself), and are equally sincere in their desire for a relaxation of some of the more authoritarian features of Iranian society.
There are obvious comparisons with Eastern Europe 1989 here. I could also make comparisons with Hungary 1956 and with Czechoslovakia 1968, but i think Christian H will probably be sitting there with steam coming out of his ears! ;-)
Troll deleted
Those last two comments made by "Anonymous" were made by me.
The fact is Hitler nationalised the state
finally!
"sounds like an SWP version of history. The fact is Hitler nationalised the state and created millions of jobs for workers - these economic policies would be considered socialist, even if he didn't but into the rest of the ideology."
No, Andrea. The fact is that Nazi Germany was a corporate state. The big German monopolies kept their independence (all they were required to provide was loyalty to the Nazi State) and were given shitloads of free booty - both from the taxpaying public whom the Nazis had nicely disciplined in "Nazi unions", and from Germany's imperial conquests across Europe. Not to mention the huge militarisation that brought shitloads of public money into the coffers of armaments corporations like Krupp. The big monopolies in other Western countries - particulrly the US - were positively in love with this mode of state organisation, which is one reason why, for example, Henry Ford kept a photo of Hitler on his desk. In fact, this "state capitalism" is exactly the system that obtains in the United States today.
"Ahmadinejad feels Hitler was unfairly demonised for many of his policies and talks at great length about this."
I have NEVER EVER seen a credible source where he actually says this, or indeed anything like this. And no, i don't count "The BBC Guide to Distorting and Embellishing Translations from Farsi" as a credible source.
"it's crazy to welcome a candidate that will make an Israeli attack far more likely next year. That is common sense"
So Ahmedinejad & those who support him are responsible for the (potential) actions of the Israeli government & military? That makes no sense.
Also, it's been claimed above that the BNP's support is mostly working class. What evidence is available would indicate the opposite.
Troll deleted
"What is Iran if it's not state capitalism?"
Yes but Iranian state capitalism doesn't militarily occupy 100 countries worldwide for the purpose of facilitating maximum profit accumulation. In fact, Iranian state capitalism doesn't occupy anywhere except, er Iran, and wants, under Ahmadinejad, nothing more than the right to independent development.
Moreover, Ahmadinejad has put in place concrete policies to ameliorate the accumulation process in Iran, so that some of the profits of Iranian state capitalism accrue to the worse off in that society. That would appear to be precisely why - in the absence of a credible truly socialist alternative - the working class have apparently backed Ahmadinejed. It's rather similar to the way the working class in Britain used to vote in droves for Old Labour. Except that - oops! - the British State under Old Labour did actually militarily occupy overseas territories for the purpose of facilitating the extraction of wealth from them.
malangbaba: "Seems no one is providing coverage of the victory rally. Any estimates on numbers?"
Here are some photos and videos of victory rallies and opposition protests:
mrzine.monthlyreview.org/iran140609.html.
The first set of photos comes from Mehr News. Its visual news section has a lot of photos of mass rallies for Ahmadinejad, before and after election day.
"Clearly a moderate would be more likely to do some sort of deal"
So Israel is more likely to attack Iran if Ahmedinejad is president rather than Mousavi? It doesn't occur to you that the problem in that scenario would be Israel?
Should all elections be decided on the basis of violent coercion by other countries?
"In the north it is mainly working class voters that elected the BNP"
How do you know? They don't have secret ballot "in the north?" This sounds like the familiar bullshit assertions about the supposed racism of "the white working class." That's not to say they don't have any support amongst the working class, but there's no evidence that workers are more likely to vote for them than anyone else. Certainly their membership is not predominantly working class.
"Does that mean it was a "class vote?"
Well, no. It's a race vote.
Troll deleted
AndreaH: "Ahmadinejad's vote was a religious right vote, not a class vote."
You haven't talked with any Ahmadinejad voters and asked them what they actually believe. In short, you have no evidence about the content of their cultural views.
AndreaH: "Clearly a moderate would be more likely to do some sort of deal. Everybody knows this, which is another reason why the internional media were very curious about this election."
The Mousavi supporters are said to be more desirous of closer relations with the West than the Ahmadinejad supporters are. But it is the Mousavi supporters' refusal to accept the election results and initiate a violent protest that is now likely to complicate the prospects of normalization of Iran's relations with the West. It would have advanced the cause of rapprochement if they had accepted the results this time and tried to win four years later (when Ahmadinejad's term limit, by the way, comes) instead. It looks like their narrow domestic class interests trumped their vision of national politics and international relations.
Jesus Harold Christ Andrea is talking a lot of shit, alter the nuclear programme? Way to repeat Imperialist propaganda there Andrea! Iran has no reason whatsoever to alter its programme, It has done nothing wrong. Funny you dont mention the recent election of a completely non-moderate government in israel, thats telling!
Your ignorance on Nazism and socialism is also quite shocking. You need to crack open some books. Id start with William Shirer's Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. He's no SWP member but he lays out quite well how un-socialist the Nazi government was.
Also you ignoramus, moderate is always a code word for pro-West. People like Suharto were considered moderates. If we were to chronicle the crimes of all the 'moderate' leaders the West has played chummy with we'd be here a long, long time.
RE: CLASS VOTE
EVERYBODY, from Western media/writers (whether of right or left persuasion) to Iranian factions (Reformist, Conservative, Revolutionary) fully acknowledge that Ahmedinejad made efforts to redistribute wealth. Many of them have in fact derided him for this very fact and tried to pin it as "bribery," or call him the "potato government," but his efforts on spreading healthcare, education, and housing, etc. to those that never had access to it before are accepted by ALL parties.
RE: ETHNIC VOTE
There was an ethnic dimension to this vote. It had already been predicted that the outer/non-Farsi provinces would go to the reformists, and West Azerbaijan and Sistan-Balochistan did that, with closer calls in Ardebil and Kordestan. Even those predictions on outer/non-Farsi provinces going to reformers was based on past voting trends (which reflected the historical neglect of those provinces by the centre), but the prediction and trend has been undercut in this election due to Ahmedinejad's policies of going and visiting those provinces and promoting development projects there (education, housing, industry, etc). It would be more interesting to compare Ahmedinejad's % of votes in 2005 from Sistan-Balochistan, West Azerbaijan, Kordestan, and Ardebil, to his % from 2009 to see how he has made inroads into those ethnic communities.
RE: RELIGIOUS VOTE
This is pretty silly category in Iran. The Reformist, Conservatives, and Revolutionary/Principalists ALL significantly draw from the clergy and identify as RELIGIOUS. Khatami, Karroubi, etc are all (Reformist) clerics. Rafsanjani is also a cleric and in the Conservative camp (which by the way is socially MORE conservative than the others including Ahmedinejad). All this indicates the complex and diverse discourse taking place on what religion is and what its purpose should be within Iran (and beyond).
But Westerners (and wannabe -Westerners like ones running around Tehran) are too stupid or ignorant to notice these complexities and find it easier for their own respective agendas (of left- or right-wing) to try to fit them into simplistic categories such as secular vs religious, or reformist vs fundamentalist. It is an attempt to classify religion in the same positions that existed and continue to do so in Judeo-Christian Europe from the middle ages till now. If this isnt indicative of Euro-centrism, then I dont know what is.
Furthermore, since both Capitalist and Socialist/Left ideaologies developed out of the same historical moment, both of these establishment and left viewpoints end up being rooted in the same post-Enlightenment frameworks, which enshrine secularism, “modernity,” and the inevitable teleological narrative of social Darwinian “progress,” and THEN project these frameworks as universal and inscrutable unto the rest of the world as they have done so for at least the past 200 years.
Who here has read any of the writings of the scholars that laid the foundations for the Revolution? Mutahhari? Shariati? Khomeini? Sadr? Taleqani?
But it is the Mousavi supporters' refusal to accept the election results and initiate a violent protest that is now likely to complicate the prospects of normalization of Iran's relations with the West.
I think that's an unnecessary hostage to fortune. The protesters could hardly have matched the cops for violence, weapon-for-weapon, pound-for-pound. In all likelihood, whatever violence took place was initiated by the state, as it usually is in these circumstances. The neoliberal faction around Mousavi might well be using the grievances of a (fairly sizeable) layer of Iranians to enhance their position in the state, but these kids are hardly responsible for that.
Lenin: "I think that's an unnecessary hostage to fortune. The protesters could hardly have matched the cops for violence, weapon-for-weapon, pound-for-pound. In all likelihood, whatever violence took place was initiated by the state, as it usually is in these circumstances. The neoliberal faction around Mousavi might well be using the grievances of a (fairly sizeable) layer of Iranians to enhance their position in the state, but these kids are hardly responsible for that."
Protesters in Iran, as well as anywhere else, are perfectly capable of rioting without provocation of cops. E.g., burning down gas stations in response to fuel rationing in Iran in 2007.
I'm not talking about advisability of violent protest per se (which may be called for depending on what people want) -- I'm talking about its advisability in relation to the Mousavi camp's platform.
The first pictures that came out seemd to show Iranian police just holding lines calmly, and the Mousavi protectors exulting in the streets and subsequently starting to rampage. See the progression here:
http://omid57.blogspot.com/2009/...og-
post_13.html
http://news.gooya.com/didaniha/a...9/06/
089095.php
Also given the history of brutality of Iranian police, it would seem that at least for the last two days they have been taking it much more easier than they are quite capable of, including taking a decent amount of beatings themselves.
I'm always uncomfortable about talk of "violent" protest. The violence always comes about because the state represses people - whether its overt (cops batons) or not.
Calls for "peaceful" protest (in this context) is just another way of saying that you (the people) are a stage prop to be removed as soon as a new "leader" topples an old one
There are causes and circumstances in relation to which riots, for instance, are more productive than peaceful protests. However, pushing Iran and the West closer to each other at this point in history, as the Mousavi camp says it wants, isn't one of them.
Why not? If Iran becomes a more ordinary liberal democracy there may be far more space for the left. The clerics out of the classroom, independent trade union organization possible, etc etc.
Why be a reactionary and not fully support the politicization of part of the population of a depoliticized society. It's a struggle that has the change the yield change.
Bhaskar,
how is that working out for the Left in the liberal democracies? Any notable accomplishments of the Left in Europe or the US recently?
Again, the left needs to question its this Marxist fundamentalist presumption of an inevitable teleological narrative of social Darwinian “progress.”
"Why be a reactionary and not fully support the politicization of part of the population of a depoliticized society." - You mean the depoliticized society that just turned out a 85% vote? That shows up in million to rallies and counter-rallies?
How many people come to your Left rallies again?
Your basically making a case against the overthrow of reaction and for the Iranian-brand of fascism, because the "left" isn't strong enough for your taste in Western countries.
That is a despicable stance and no one has ever said, ever said, that progress through struggle is "inevitable", but the gains of past victories of progressive forces are still seared into the soul of liberal democracy. If you refuse to acknowledge that you need a therapist in addition to a history lesson.
the Iranian-brand of fascism
This is far too hysterical. As repressive as the Iranian state is, it is not fascist. And, incidentally, the success of neoliberalism does not necessarily yield greater political liberalisation. I'd have thought the adventure of Chile would have scotched that rumour at birth.
From my point of view, the (liberal democratic) West today looks no closer to communism than the Islamic Republic of Iran today.
As for depoliticization under liberal democracy, the recent European Parliament elections are a good example: the turnout has dipped to 43%; the center-left vote collapsed; the far left failed to advance; the far right got ahead by appealing to anti-immigrant and anti-Islamic xenophobia.
As a matter of fact, if any far-left party anywhere in Europe ever gets 34% of the vote in a major election -- the same percentage that the IRI officials say Mousavi received -- that party will be holding a press conference declaring what a great milestone, what a historic advance, etc. it is, instead of protesting. :->
Two points to Malangbaba:
"EVERYBODY, from Western media/writers (whether of right or left persuasion) to Iranian factions (Reformist, Conservative, Revolutionary) fully acknowledge that Ahmedinejad made efforts to redistribute wealth. Many of them have in fact derided him for this very fact and tried to pin it as "bribery," or call him the "potato government," but his efforts on spreading healthcare, education, and housing, etc. to those that never had access to it before are accepted by ALL parties."
Let's be clear about this. Ahmedinejad has not attempted to redistribute *wealth*. He has redistributed *income*. There is a difference, and it's important. If he was redistributing wealth, then we would be talking about him as a socialist. He has. however, left the capitalist nature of Iranian society untouched. He is a populist.
What Malangbaba means by "Capitalist and Socialist/Left ideaologies", I have no idea. Capitalism is not an ideology. It's a mode of production. It's a set of relationships that comes out of how people produce the necessities of life. The Iranian Revolution (of 1979) came out of the material circumstances of people's lives, not the writings of intellectuals (whatever effects these may have had on how people saw the options in front of them).
To describe capitalism as an ideology is strange, as though, if you believed in something else, something other than capitalism, then you wouldn't be exploited. I always find this sort of comment strange, since it implies, in the end, that there is no material reality on which ideas rest. Since, almost invariably, this is not what the writers mean, then I'm left puzzled and confused.
Yes but look, once people take to the streets they carry the possibility to be more than "Mossavi's camp". I'd like to know what other grievances they are raising for instance
"incidentally, the success of neoliberalism does not necessarily yield greater political liberalisation."
Why does a liberal political society have to yield neoliberalism, or at least interminably. Look at Venezuela and Bolivia. When Bolivia was under authoritarian rule would you argue against a bourgeois democratic movement? Aren't the masses of these countries organized and relatively conscious. Who would have expected this of Venezuela of all places in the late 1980s.
I know this isn't your position lenin, I'm asking this to the others who have shown more antipathy towards the protesters.
Yoshie saids:
"The (liberal democratic) West today looks no closer to communism than the Islamic Republic of Iran today."
Your position is invariably anti-Marxist. Marx entered politics as the editor of a liberal democratic newspaper in the Rhineland and originally was the voice of political democracy in Germany. Throughout his life he lambasted censorship, the death penalty, etc.
He came to socialism THROUGH liberal democracy, through his search for a deeper more comprehensive democracy.
I'll quote Draper:
"The heart of the theory is this proposition: that there is a social majority which has the interest and motivation to change the system, and that the aim of socialism can be the education and mobilization of this mass-majority. This is the exploited class, the working class, from which comes the eventual motive-force of revolution. Hence a socialism-from-below is possible, on the basis of a theory which sees the revolutionary potentialities in the broad masses, even if they seem backward at a given time and place."
I just got back from trading my labor-for-cash in a night-shift, so I think I deserve around 6 hours of sleep. Good night comrades.
A couple of things said here boggle the mind:
1. according to malangbaba we`re supposed to become familiar with the "revolutionary" writings of "scholars" like Khomeini, or we´re ethnocentric teleological Western pigs. (OK, then I´m all for teleology.) this has nothing whatsoever to do with leftism.
2. ahmadinejad as "leftist" (deformed worker, again). and I'm supposed to have "distorted" the Great Leftist Theocrat by .... quoting him! deformed worker really does babble in the tradition of "leftists" who saw in Mao the new incarnation of Lenin, or thought the Shining Path were the innocent victims of an imperialist smear campaign. Just because A. is a populist who´s somewhat slowed down privatizations, or even spent money on some useful social programs, doesn´t make him a hero of the working class. And just because Uncle Sam hates him doesn´t mean I shouldn´t too.
good article:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/200.../pers-
j15.shtml
@Bhaskar
Marx was not a liberal, but a democrat. In the Germany of the 1840s these were two very different things. In the meantime, Engels attacked the liberals in _The Condition of the English working Class_.
Liberals are not the only ones who are opposed to the death penalty, censorship, etc. Socialists have a long tradition of opposition to these, as indeed do the anarchists (soem of whome would also call themselves liberal).
But I don't honestly understand how this gets us one step nearer to understanding what is going on in Iran. People seem to be arguing about ahistorical yardsticks with which to judge history. These do not exist. Let's abandon this seacrh and start arguing on the besis of whatever empirical facts we can gather.
Oh, and sleep well, Bhaskar.
I don't believe in a theory of necessary stages of history which has us think that liberal democracy is a necessary stage through which we must all pass to get to socialism and then communism. That theory of history is not essential to historical materialism.
No, Im questioning your underlying premises that make you see Iran as a reactionary and fascist state, based on which you cannot explain the advances in male, female, and rural literacy, women's access to contraceptives and family planning, expansion of public housing, expansion of health services, expansion of primary, secondary and technical schools, women making up a majority of students in higher education, community health clinics, reductions in infant mortality rates, redistribution of land to peasants, unprecedented availability of commodities to rural poor, availability of work for women, etc.
These very same indicators that the Left uses to demonstrate the success of countries like Cuba, are completely ignored by the Left when it comes to Iran because they essentially they have beards, wear hijab, and base these developments on the Quran and Hadith rather than Marx or other white men.
And it is not just Iran, but similar models are used by Islamic movements of Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood within their communities. But here, a convergence of the left and the imperialists, sees these groups equally as fundamentalist reactionaries in the same category as Al-Qaeda, Taliban, Rightwing Christians in the US, etc.
"That is a despicable stance and no one has ever said, ever said, that progress through struggle is 'inevitable'"
I didnt say that progress in inevitable through struggle. I questioned your presumption, based in a particular historical context, which presumes that one much first evolve to a liberal democracy before proceeding into a left/socialist state.
Fundamentalism comes in two forms:
1. Literalism - What was said/written in holy books (Quran, Bible, Kapital, etc) is forever true without regard to context
2. Vanguardism - I/We are the only ones capable of interpreting and guiding to the Truth, and thus must dictate to the people
The Left exhibits both of these trends. As someone who grew up in (religiously) fundamentalist families, the Leftist fundamentalists appears no different than the religious fundamentalists.
These in very much part of the reason that the Left is in such a dismal place today. It is also why those at the forefront of struggle are those with dynamic ideas growing from their own indigenous heritage (Christian liberation theology and Left ideas in Venezuela, Indigenous theology and resistance in Bolivia, and Revolutionary Islamic theology in Iran, Hezb, Hamas) are powerful movements with real and actual mass bases and support. While the western secular Left sits in universities, websites, and miniscule meetings accomplishing nothing.
Bhaskar: "progress through struggle is 'inevitable', but the gains of past victories of progressive forces are still seared into the soul of liberal democracy."
There's nothing inevitable about progress. There is no telos to which social history is destined, just as there is no telos to which natural history is destined.
Moreover, the level of the living standard and the scope of freedom in liberal democracy in the West today can only be partly chalked up to the gains of past struggles in the West itself. The rest is due to the gains of imperialism, of which we are also beneficiaries. Iran may or may not become liberal democratic one day, but if it does, it won't become like a liberal democracy in the West but a liberal democracy in the South, like India, Brazil, and South Africa.
Stageism is the hallmark of men shaviks and maoists.
Why does a liberal political society have to yield neoliberalism
The Mousavi wing promotes, first and foremost, neoliberal solutions to Iran's problems of accumulation and development. The main criticism from the reformist camp has been Ahmadinejad's insufficient enthusiasm for privatization - not that he isn't privatizing, but that he isn't doing it fast enough or enthusiastically enough. Both Mousavi and Rafsanjani agree on this point. Mousavi wants to reform Article 44 to allow for more of the 'mother industries' to be open to expropriation, and has proposed a ministry for this purpose. So, it's not a question of whether liberalisation entails neoliberalism. It is a question of whether neoliberalism necessarily promises any political changes that will be of assistance to the left and the labour movement. All the Mousavi campaign did was offer to 'review' certain legislation that was unfair to women, for example. It excited some progressive constituencies, and got their backing for a campaign whose main goal is changing the property structure to the benefit of the ruling class. (And Mousavi is no outsider when it comes to the Iranian ruling class.) The likelihood is that if he had won, the economic liberalisation programmes and IMF agenda would have been taken up more aggressively, while any efforts at political liberalisation would have been stalled, diverted, and probably defeated because it wasn't based on a mass campaign but misguided hopes in an elite project. Just as happened under Khatami, and just as would have been the case had Rafsanjani won.
I'll address points in depth around noon when I wake up, but I said "no one has ever said, ever said, that progress through struggle is 'inevitable'". I don't know how you the missed the first part yoshie :)
I think the WSWS did a good analysis of the Iranian election and western media response to it in their latest update.
oh and Yoshie I am more orthodox in my reading of Capital (stagist) and I'm not a strong believer in the dependency theory, which means of course we have fundamental underlying disagreements
Bhaskar: "I don't know how you the missed the first part yoshie :)"
Oops, my bad. Glad to realize we're in perfect agreement on that part.
lenin:
it's not about Moussavi anymore, I'm well aware of his economic poicy, but now its about the protesters and the desirably of a democratic movement in Iran, something I see as progressive, but malangbaba sees as literally "counterrevolutionary".
ultimately what we think on these matters is irrelevant, but I found some of the views expression by deformed worker and others disconcerting.
Bhaskar: "I am more orthodox in my reading of Capital (stagist) and I'm not a strong believer in the dependency theory, which means of course we have fundamental underlying disagreements."
It's also good to see differences clarified in comradely fashion, too. Thank you.
I think that, when we debate questions like what's happening in Iran, inevitably these different underlying premises we hold affect how we think. Here in this thread we are getting them out in the open, which I think is a better way of going about it than leaving them unstated and un-thought-out.
Bhaskar: "it's not about Moussavi anymore, I'm well aware of his economic poicy, but now its about the protesters and the desirably of a democratic movement in Iran, something I see as progressive, but malangbaba sees as literally 'counterrevolutionary'. ultimately what we think on these matters is irrelevant, but I found some of the views expression by deformed worker and others disconcerting."
Maybe we can all agree on saying that the protesters have the right to protest while reserving our right to express reservations about the protest movement's ideology, strategy, tactics, etc.?
"I think the WSWS did a good analysis of the Iranian election and western media response to it in their latest update."
Agreed. It's excellent.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/200.../pers-
j15.shtml
The WSWS article that Matt linked here pleasantly surprised me, in its flat refusal to give any credence to the fraud story.
Even the Washington Post carries this extremely sceptical article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
wp...1401757_pf.html
malangbaba´s catalogue of progressive reforms in iran under the mulluhs reminds me of boilerplate cp apologetics for stalin many decades ago. Leaving aside the fact that homosexuality in iran is both illegal and PUNISHABLE BY DEATH, including minors, human rights watch reports that
"During President Ahmadinejad’s administration, Iran’s human rights record has
reached new lows. The security and intelligence services, controlled by his
administration, have led an ever-expanding crackdown against peaceful activists
and dissidents. Hard-line elements within the judiciary, emboldened by
Ahmadinejad’s lack of concern for human rights violations, have sent the number of
executions skyrocketing, including those of juvenile offenders. In addition to
prosecution and imprisonment of peaceful activists, Ahmadinejad’s presidency has
also created an intense atmosphere of fear and intimidation across most sectors of
the country’s once-vibrant and growing civil society."
http://www.hrw.org/middle-eastn-...stn-africa/
iran
(sorry for the bad formatting)
why do i already know that malangbaba will reply that HRW is just a willing tool of humanitarian interventionist warmongering or something of the kind...? please prove me wrong.
On a related story, Dennis Ross seems to have been ousted as envoy to Iran after raising the possibility of a war in a book. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spa...es/
1093058.html
In the Wash Post article lenin links it says : "Iranians view their support for a more democratic system, with normal relations with the United States, as consonant with their support for Ahmadinejad. They do not want him to continue his hard-line policies. Rather, Iranians apparently see Ahmadinejad as their toughest negotiator, the person best positioned to bring home a favorable deal -- rather like a Persian Nixon going to China."
Given ahmadinejad´s apparent popularity among teenage voters, maybe here´s a better analogy:
he´s an iranian avigdor lieberman.
It's so good to know that the stalwart anti-imperialist Achmedinejad has descisively beaten the neocon tools again.
These so-called human rights activists are merely a tool of the West and have no right to tell Iranians or anyone else what to do. Anyway, even British people are sick of the constant whining about the "human rights" of criminals!
Hopefully in the future the anti-imperialist bloc - North Korea, Iran, and Venezuela will define human rights as the real right of self-determination from neocon imperialists like Bliar.
Matt, to what extent can a president in the Iranian system of politics be held responsible for the behavior of the forces of repression? Looking at the Khatami presidency and comparing it with the Ahmadinejad presidency, it doesn't seem to me that the president has the power to shape the level of repression unilaterally.
See Martin Rowson's cartoon in the Guardian today.
Only two words come to mind to describe this 'win': David Duke. (Friend of the regime.)
The Leninist left's capacity to fall for despots never fails.
"Iranians Call for Post-vote Calm."
Compared to Nixon and Lieberman, a host of David Duke, and a friend of Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro. Mr. Ahmadinejad is a veritable Rorschach test.
Since the Left as never claimed Nixon or Lieberman as its heroes, you wonder why it should make an exception over this racist thug.
My thoughts consolidated: http://malangbaba.blogspot.com/2...es-
peoples.html
malangaba, the latest I heard is that Khamenei said that the Guardian Council look into Mousavi's letter of complaints and that the Mousavi camp canceled today's protests due to the Interior Ministry's refusal to give a permit to them. Some of the protesters may still come out into the streets today, but it's likely that the number will be fewer. Hopefully, there will be no more violence by any side on this issue.
Thats good. Any link to Khamenei's agreement to look into complaints?
It is also silly of Ahmedinejad to have been so belligerent. He should have openly invited them to look into the results.
They cancelled todays protest because they were told the interior ministry was given permission to use live ammunition
The BBC's Jon Leyne, in Tehran, says he understands plain-clothed militias have been authorised to use live ammunition for the first time.
In the legal world, that is called hearsay, which apparently is acceptable in journalism if you are reporting on a "rogue" state.
apollo: "Since the Left as never claimed Nixon or Lieberman as its heroes, you wonder why it should make an exception over this racist thug."
I don't know about Lieberman, but I've heard some leftists say, as an ironic comment on the disaster of the neoliberal age, that Nixon was the last liberal president (in the US sense of "liberal" = "New Deal/Great Society").
So, if, as you claim, Ahmadinejad gets off easier than he should, both among his own people and among Western leftists, that's probably less a comment on his actual quality than on the general state of politics today, which makes any deviation from neoliberalism rather unusual among the political class.
In any case, vanguardism is antithetical to democracy. Respect for democracy has to mean respect for the people's right to make "a wrong choice."
malangbaba, no, I haven't seen any written agreement yet -- I just saw it reported in a Reuters dispatch. I'll now go look into the Persian media and see if more solid info is available.
Sure, they have the right to make a wrong choice, but we don't have to praise the wrong choice because they made it. Thatcher, Bush, Netanyahu - all voted for by the people. Does that mean we can't criticise those choices?
Frankly, I think that the left's moribund status is in part due to its failure to express a clear moral line that ordinary people can relate to. The man in the street knows that Ahmadinijad is a thug and an embracer of Holocaust denial, and they have no patience with a left-wing defence on the basis of our enemy's enemy is our friend. They see right through it. They're not thick. But the vanguard left has a long legacy of this - see J. Stalin.
"By [Ghorbanifar's] own account he was a refugee from the revolutionary government of Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini, which confiscated his businesses in Iran, yet he later became a trusted friend and kitchen adviser to Mir Hussein Mousavi, Prime Minister in the Khomeini government. Some U.S. officials who have dealt with Ghorbanifar praise him highly. Says Michael Ledeen, adviser to the Pentagon on counterterrorism: "[Ghorbanifar] is one of the most honest, educated, honorable men I have ever known." Others call him a liar who, as one puts it, could not tell the truth about the clothes he is wearing,"
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=54948
The bold reactions and content of criticism surrounding the candidates from within Iran’s youthful population is striking considering previous protests and the consequences that followed. Although far too numerous to mention all of them, a sampling of activity for which photos and video are available can be presented. Most of these events take place in risky atmospheres in cycles that are quick to occur and immediately dismantled by state security and secret services.
As seen on video leaked out of Iran on May 4, during a lecture at the University of Babolsar, students pressed candidate Mirhossein Moussavi (a “reformist” backed by former president Mohammad Khatami) about his role and actions as a former prime minster (1981-1989). In particular, they criticized Moussavi’s role in the execution of thousands of political prisoners in the infamous 1988 massacres in Iranian jails. This historical mass execution has been documented and recognized by Amnesty International (AI) in a public statement as well as an in house report. Although Moussavi made his best attempt to avoid the question, students by way of shouting slogans and holding up signs and pictures of those killed in 1988 pushed for answers when they said “At the time, you were the prime minister…what do you have to say now about your silence back then when all this was taking place? How may people did you kill yourself?” These types of remarks are no doubt extremely risky in a government that has a past reputation of eliminating opposition, especially public criticism, by way of blood curdling tortures and swift executions.
http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2...6/12/
75720.html
apollo: "Sure, they have the right to make a wrong choice, but we don't have to praise the wrong choice because they made it. Thatcher, Bush, Netanyahu - all voted for by the people. Does that mean we can't criticise those choices?"
Yes, we do. But if we first listen to people who voted for them, and understand where they're coming from, our criticism would be sharper and our capacity to propose an alternative greater. Bush, for instance, is an enemy; but not all former Bush voters are. At the very least some of them can change their minds, or so I would think. We can't just preach to the converted.
And we can't just criticize either. We have to be willing to have our own faults pointed out by working people. If Americans prefer Obama to American leftists, to take another example, maybe some of the reasons are leftists' own faults, rather than Obama's or Obama voters's. Maybe there are some things Obama is doing well and we are not.
'We have to be willing to have our own faults pointed out by working people'
Indeed, and and one of those faults is turning a blind eye to despots and racists.
By the way, does listening to where people are coming from apply to Israeli Zionists, as well?
Marc, the first quote comes from an article by a leftist I know. I don't agree with him always, but he is a man of principles. But the second article's author appears to be a MEK associate looking to have MEK legalized. I'd look for at least a second opinion on the matter or try to find the video in question -- first of all to see if it actually exists.
"In the legal world, that is called hearsay, which apparently is acceptable in journalism if you are reporting on a "rogue" state"
Mousavi himself first called off the rally to prevent loss of life in his quoted words. It now seems that the powers that be are trying to calm things down with the Guardian Council investigating the claims, and Mousavi attending the rally to urge calm
"By the way, does listening to where people are coming from apply to Israeli Zionists, as well?"
Of course. Especially if you are an advocate of a one-state solution.
How does that fit in with BDS?
Another victory for managed democracy, eh comrades?!
Let's just hope the actual Iranians don't spoil it all by toppling their own democratically elected government and having a revolution, eh?
Victory to the riot police!
While I support the right of people (Israeli leftists and Palestinians) to fight for BDS, my own personal opinion now is that it would probably be better if we focused -- instead of BDS -- on (1) ending the siege on Gaza, getting the West and Israel to recognize the democratic choice of the Palestinian people and (2) making the West treat Israel like any other state, not a special ally requiring special protection (which means ending military and financial aids and diplomatic support).
Well, I agree with you on that one. But of course it does require getting anti-Zionists to recognise some uncomfortable democratic truths about Israelis. Like the fact that they seem to want a Jewish state for reasons unconnected with the BNP etc. Sauce for the goose, etc.
apollo: "Well, I agree with you on that one. But of course it does require getting anti-Zionists to recognise some uncomfortable democratic truths about Israelis. Like the fact that they seem to want a Jewish state for reasons unconnected with the BNP etc. Sauce for the goose, etc."
I think that we would do better if we begin with a different question than ones like "Do you support or oppose Zionism?" "Do you support or oppose the Islamic Republic?" If we begin with abstract ideological questions like that, a lot of people on their respective sides say, "Of course, we want a Jewish state." "Of course, we want Islam to be the source of our law." End of conversation.
Maybe we need a different beginning.
Good stuff, thanks.
Like the fact that they seem to want a Jewish state for reasons unconnected with the BNP
Well, they're not allowed to have one. Daddy should take it away and explain to them that it's very mean to murder and oppress people.
um apollo substantial sections of the left were criticizing Stalin years before it became mainstream to do so. Please restrain from your ill informed generalizations
It is indeed mean. Mean too for leaders to invite Nazis to join their Holocaust denial fest.
Shameless to post screeds about BNP Nazis and then cheer when a Nazi apologist wins a possibly rigged election.
Substantial sections were, substantial sections were also not. The CP for example, which was considerably larger than the Trot groupiscules.
Mean too for leaders to invite Nazis to join their Holocaust denial fest.
Sure. Pretty fucking trivial in comparison, though. And it's a shame to make such a comparison, given that it's effect is precisely to trivialise that issue.
Shameless to post screeds about BNP Nazis and then cheer when a Nazi apologist wins a possibly rigged election.
Who cheered, though? I didn't. I'm not in favour of any of the factions of the Iranian ruling class, any more than I'm about to hop into bed with the American empire on this question.
Thanks for the background on the sources, Yoshie. I had only a vague memory of Mousavi's history. The Uruknet article provides a link to an apparent copy of part of the Walsh Report, while the MEK source provides no such link to the video (not that I would understand it anyway if it exists). In the end, I am actually more interested in clarifying Mousavi's role in the mass execution of political prisoners in 1988 (which presumably included many from the Left).
A recent Harvard Human Rights Review article on the 1988 massacre suggests that Mousavi was far less important than Rafsanjani, who represented the main power faction in Iran, had been centrally involved in the Iran-Contra affair, and was very close to Khomeini. It was likely he who requested the execution order and it was he who visited television studios abroad to reassure people that there was no big massacre taking place.
Lenin: "A recent Harvard Human Rights Review article on the 1988 massacre suggests that Mousavi was far less important than Rafsanjani, who represented the main power faction in Iran, had been centrally involved in the Iran-Contra affair, and was very close to Khomeini. It was likely he who requested the execution order and it was he who visited television studios abroad to reassure people that there was no big massacre taking place."
Sounds like a must read.
I'll forward it to you.
Thanks. A must read indeed.
T seems that tens of thousands are defying the ban on the Mousavi rally. Mousavi himsef also there, as is the other liberal candidate, Karroubi. Whatever we may think of the protestst, they are not fizzling out.
It does dig up some interesting material. Eg, this quote from Rafsanjani:
"In the world, there are always people who can’t be dealt with in
any way but through repression. We must repress those people.
This atmosphere of terror must exist for such traitors and deceitful
people."
A quick passage from the report:
"When considered in the context of Iran in the late 1980s, it seems plausible that the executions may simply have been part of the regime’s inner power struggles. With Khomeini’s death expected, various factions contended bitterly for control of the future of the Islamic Republic. The main faction seeking power was affiliated with then-Parliament Speaker Hashemi
Rafsanjani, and its success depended, in large part, on forcing rivals such as Ayatollah Montazeri out of power. Mehdi Hashemi, an ally and relative of Montazeri, had already been tortured and executed in 1987 for revealing Rafsanjani’s role in the Iran-Contra scandal.104 The execution of political prisoners, whose rights Montazeri and his supporters had attempted to defend for a number of years, may have been yet another maneuver in this ongoing struggle against Montazeri’s faction.105 If decreasing Montazeri’s power within the government was the goal of the prison massacre, then the strategy proved immensely successful. As a result of Ayatollah Montazeri’s conscientious objection to the killings, Khomeini effectively sidelined him and thus allowed Rafsanjani’s faction to emerge victorious."
I think this is it for anyone else interested.
http://www.law.harvard.edu/stude...20/
shahrooz.pdf
Yes, that's the one. I only have it in Word.
A condensed version of the author's analysis if the 36-page review article can't be gotten to.
http://www.payvand.com/news/08/a...8/aug/
1068.html
Mousavi letter to Iran's supreme leader (BBC)
Holocaust denial, trivial. Mmm.
Yes, by comparison with ethnic cleansing, of course it is. And if you have a problem with Holocaust denial being trivialised by such ridiculous comparisons, you need to direct your 'mmm' at the person who made the comparison in the first place.
So basically apollo you respond by confirming that you were generalizing. By the way Trots may seem insignificant now but back in the time Stalin was alive they were a significant force. Significant enough to have Stalin worried, significant enough that the US government felt compelled to move against them. Your groupsicle comment revealed only your understanding, limited at that, of present day trotskyism.
Neo-Nazi BNP denies Holocaust - huge screed by Lenin's Tomb
Neo-Nazi David Duke denies Holocaust. Deemed trivial by Lenin's Tomb.
"The man in the street knows that Ahmadinijad is a thug and an embracer of Holocaust denial"
1. Please, for the love of God, give us some credible evidence that Ahmadinejad is an "embracer of Holocaust denial"; i'm yet to see any, despite hearing this "fact" repeatedly asserted by left-liberals.
2. Yes, the "man in the street" does - by and large - have the idea drilled into his head that Ahmadinejad is an unspeakably evil character. But can the man in the street name the President of Egypt? Or the Emir of Kuwait? Or the King of Jordan? Has the man in the street even heard of General Suharto or General Mobutu? Ask yourself why.
By joining in with the West's attacks on Ahmadinejad (which have nothing whatsoever, by the way, to do with any human rights violations he has made; and everything to do with the fact that he thinks the Iranian working class rather than Western big business should benefit from Iran's wealth), you have already let the West win, since you have let them dictate the terms of political debate. The most natural and obvious Left response to the West's accusations of electoral fraud against Iran should be to ask how the the West - with all their extensive history of electoral subterfuge - dare to think they have a right to make these accusations.
Post-Stalin takes in the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. When Trots were certainly groupiscules.
Neo-Nazi BNP denies Holocaust - huge screed by Lenin's Tomb
Neo-Nazi David Duke denies Holocaust. Deemed trivial by Lenin's Tomb.
1) Actually, what I wrote a 'huge screed' about was Nazism and the attempt to cover it up. A much broader topic.
2) What I said was that it was trivial by comparison with ethnic cleansing.
The person who made that comparison trivialised the issue of Holocaust denial (not to mention the Nakba), not me. That person, you poor fool, is you.
"holocaust denier Ahmadinejad"
Evidence please?
Oh what's that Mike?....You haven't any either?....What's that Mike?....Because you're a stupid little twat?
"You are the most insane and stupid person here. Please do not talk to me."
Well i can think of one person who's certainly more insane and stupid.
"deformed worker, he held a conference for the most notorious holocaust deniers in the world, you fruit cake."
I assume you are referring to the "A World Without Zionism" conference. Now that's not the same as Holocaust Denial is it, you silly sausage?! Once again, are you able to furnish me with one - just ONE, Mike! - example of Ahmadinejad ACTUALLY DENYING THAT THE HOLOCAUST TOOK PLACE (i.e. what sane people would regard as being meant by the term "Holocaust Denial")?
No, it was the Holocaust denial conference attended by David Duke, David Irving was unable to attend because he was in prison at the time.
This is the one
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Int...f_the_Holocaust
Meanwhile the Guardian is reporting that the demonstrators are being fired on.
it's irrelevant what he thinks about the holocaust.. it doesn't matter.
it doesn't matter that the vote was rigged, which it clearly was.
the people have a right to protest, no one should dispute that, i personally and i guess most people here support them despite ideological differences, but it won't matter if we did or not.
this conversation reached its natural conclusion a long time ago.
The BBC's Persian service says that four protesters have now been shot dead.
Bhaskar, I don't agree. If the vote was rigged in such a way as to ensure that a loser became a winner, clearly it's a coup. That's what people who take this view are saying. Now, we have a situation where, reportedly, shots are being fired at protesters from government compounds. So, if you're right in your assumption that the vote was rigged, then this is becoming a violent coup. I haven't seen persuasive evidence of a fix yet, but we can't act as if the question doesn't matter.
On the stuff about Holocaust-denial, I tend to agree a bit more: does anyone really doubt that inviting scumbags like Duke and Irving to deny the Nazi holocaust was not only a politically retrograde step that dealt with the issue of Zionism in the worst possible way causing maximum harm to anti-Zionism, but also diplomatically stupid? Is there anything else to say about it? Need we labour over it, as if there weren't bigger fish to fry here?
rooieravotr: "T seems that tens of thousands are defying the ban on the Mousavi rally. Mousavi himsef also there, as is the other liberal candidate, Karroubi. Whatever we may think of the protestst, they are not fizzling out."
Yes, I saw photos and videos. Today's protest is a bigger challenge for the regime, since it is composed of both younger and older people.
Hopefully, the opposition and the government can come to an agreement on a solution that would expand democracy, rather than return young people to riots.
I mentioned Chavez's congratulation message. I hope that Chavez will also convey to the Iranian government how Venezuela has handled its own electoral struggle. He, too, has faced similar allegations of frauds, opposition rallies and riots, a recall referendum, and so on. Perhaps he has a tip or two as to how to handle a situation like this as peacefully and constructively as possible.
"On the stuff about Holocaust-denial, I tend to agree a bit more: does anyone really doubt that inviting scumbags like Duke and Irving to deny the Nazi holocaust was not only a politically retrograde step that dealt with the issue of Zionism in the worst possible way causing maximum harm to anti-Zionism, but also diplomatically stupid? Is there anything else to say about it? Need we labour over it, as if there weren't bigger fish to fry here?
lenin | Homepage | 15 Jun, 18:24 | # "
Have you ever considered that it's people like you and your mates who are the reason that the Jews need to have their own country?
Holocaust denial is not a stupid mistake. It's indicative of a far right ideological system. It's inherent in why this thing should receive no support from the left. And what's more, some of your readers are denying his holocaust denial, because I assume, they haven't even heard of it. Hardly over laboured?
Now this racist's regime is gunning down protesters in the streets. What does that resemble? To me, fascism.
Holocaust denial is not a stupid mistake.
Don't finger-wag as if I don't know that. At best Holocaust-denial is politically retrograde and antisemitic, and at worst it is malicious, with an intent to muddy the waters for the purposes of rehabilitating Nazism. But I don't agree that Ahmadinejad hosting this event means he's a Nazi, or on the 'far right'.
Have you ever considered that it's people like you and your mates who are the reason that the Jews need to have their own country?
Have you ever considered that it's people like you and your mates that are actually apologists for violent racism and the ethnic cleansing of over 700,000 people? Has it ever occurred to you how sick it is, truly sick, to mobilise the sickening realities of the Nazi holocaust in defence of such slaughter?
Well he certainly doesn't mind inviting Nazis as honoured guests to his country. Which doesn't exactly make him Anne Frank.
So it is your position that Ahmadinejad is not a jewish girl murdered by the Nazis in Auschwitz? Do you have any evidence to back up this assertion?
It makes him someone who's cool with nazis, you'll agree.
It's always controversy here at the Tomb.
marc b., indeed. Jeez. They don't even bother with straw men anymore, now it's just heaps of straw with no apparent shape.
Apollo, I don't want to take any of the fun away from Lenin, but I don't think that Ahmadinejad gives a rat's ass what David Duke or any other goose steppers think of him. I also see no evidence that 'Holocaust Denial' plays a part in his platform or programs beyond its use as a means of whipping up anti-Ahmadinejad talk in the West and Israel, which probably plays well with some of his constituency. Anyway, that is my superficial impression.
So he's an unprincipled thug? Who'd have thunk it.
Well, yes, but lack of principles and thugishness are hardly distinguishing characteristics for a career politician.
Just a bit of objectivity would be nice Christian.
Realist thinktank Stratfor weighs in in favor of Ahmadinejad: http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/
2...iranian_reality
The Guardian links to this photo of the protester shot today in Tehran.
http://img1.tinypic.info/files/
r...0jqhqkr9mwy.jpg
Here are a couple of videos from today's protest in Tehran: mrzine.monthlyreview.org/iran150609.html.
What makes this different from previous protests, even large ones, is the fact that this involves regime insiders taking leadership. So, one of the conditions for the growth of the protests has been fulfilled. Mousavi has put himself on the line, and so have his allied politicians.
Since Khamenei first blessed the election results and asked others to respect them and then backtracked to look into Mousavi's letter, the issue can theoretically get more significant than Ahmadinejad vs. Mousavi, Rafsanjani, Khatami, etc., though protesters seem to still mean Ahmadinejad, not Khamenei, when they (or rather some of them) chant Death to the Dictator and the like.
Juan Cole points out that the death of a protester further adds to the potential for growth of this protest, especially given the significance of martyrdom in Shi'ism and Iranian culture.
Theres blood in Tehran. Pray for Peace and calm.
Juan Cole is citing VOA to say it was 100,000 protesters for Mousavi's rally. It seemed larger than that to me, though I havent seen any good aerial shots.
This rally again received a lot more coverage than Ahmedinejad's victory rally.
Wonder what the size comparisions are between the two.
Troll deleted (don't encourage the little bastard)
Mike, that is not impossible, but so far the crowds' chants mostly center on Where's My Vote? And they are waving Mousavi colors and posters. That shouldn't be so threatening to Khamenei. Worst come to worst, make Ahmadinejad a fall guy.* Khamenei can emerge "shocked, shocked" to find a fraud of which he had been previously unaware, whether or not there was any fraud to begin with.
* In my opinion, the president's job (and the prime minister's job when this office still existed) under the Islamic Republic has always been to be a fall guy when necessary, to be blamed for the faults of the regime so the regime itself can reemerge with its legitimacy intact.
malangbaba, I'll look for areal shots, so you can compare.
I suppose another route that the regime can take is to get Ahmadinejad to lead another rally to match the Mousavist rally (as has been done in Venezuela on occasions like this), instead of taking two possible alternatives I suggested above.
The problem with the alternative rally is that it will again focus on Tehran, which is not fully representative of the rest of the country. We'll see.
This video by Al Jazeera (Arabic) www.youtube.com/watch?v=O70TRhcwZg4 has a brief aerial shot at the beginning.
Just as a data point, a France 24 video aired by CCTV about today's protests by both sides: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zF1ejawjTY. The video's presentation is far less partisan than BBC's has been.
BBC actually gave a decent visual coverage of the victory rally, but its voice-over commentary explicitly prompts the viewer to disregard what is being shown, by saying that the regime can turn on and off mass rallies of this size any time, just like that, by using its vast resources: "Crowds Join Ahmadinejad Victory Rally".
deletion not fair, len, i'm no troll. just sick of the tippy-toeing here today.
I caught a BBC report earlier this evening which stated that the Mousavi supporters in Tehran were middle class, but that the journo didn't know about the rest of the country. This seems to be a bit of a shift (although the same report did describe Ahmadinejad as being supported by conservatives, so maybe not very many marks for consistency).
I think the Mousavi rally might have been over a million: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e...h?v=ey9Kgf-
cB40
That Rowson cartoon is a crock of shit, and vaguely offensive in that he equates a minority vote with a popular victory (implying Iranians only voted for him out of anti-semitism).
As a lover of cartoons, I've always thought he was one of the worst - political attitudes aside - newspaper cartoonists in the country (note how he always has to have large balloons of babbling text to flesh out his lack of visual meaning). How he can share a newspaper with the great Steve Bell and not retire in shame is beyond me.
Question - do any readers of this blog know who Mike actually is? Is he a composite of trolls? He seems to be awake 24 hours a day.
I'm afraid Martin Rowson is ever-so-slightly a twat for contributing to the New Humanist. He also produced their 'top trump' cards about religions which, of course, hailed Islam as the great oppressor:
http://newhumanist.org.uk/images...s/Muslim1%
2Epng
I personally despise Martin Rowson for this, and refuse to giggle even on the very rare occasions when his cartoons are funny.
Btw, 'Mike' is a single obsessive person who has been trolling the blog since approx. 2004. He has no life, and so he can sleep in the day and write most of his posts in the night. He's like a vampire fuckwit.
As much as I can identify with his sad situation, I wish he'd fuck off!
The quality of Juan Cole's analysis has gone down since Obama's election, like many liberals.
As for Rowson, I've also noticed he reverts to the worst Victorian imagery when he's 'making a statement' about African leaders too. Am I mistaken in thinking he has a famous/influential father? It can't be talent in a country awash with far better cartoonists who'd never get a look-in on a national paper.
No idea as to his provenance, but I wouldn't be at all surprised by satirists on the British liberal-left repeating ancient racist stereotypes.
No, Rowson doesn't have a famous/influential father. He was adopted and wrote a memoir about it, which I read. Neither blood not adoptive parents were famous. The one with the famous/influential father is Seamas Milne (Sir Alastair Milne, former DG of the BBC)
And of course Milne Jnr is an Old Etonian.
Thanks for correcting me - Rowson's still crap though.
"On the stuff about Holocaust-denial, I tend to agree a bit more: does anyone really doubt that inviting scumbags like Duke and Irving to deny the Nazi holocaust was not only a politically retrograde step that dealt with the issue of Zionism in the worst possible way causing maximum harm to anti-Zionism, but also diplomatically stupid?"
Agreed, wholeheartedly. Nothing about that conference - the International Conference to Review the Global Vision of the Holocaust - says that Ahmadinejad is a Holocaust-denier though, which he isn't and never has been.
What Ahmadinejad HAS said, on many occasions, is that the way Western imperialism envisions the Holocaust - as a de facto excuse for the State of Israel to carry out whatever aggression it likes - is wrong. He has criticised - rightly - the creation of a veritable "Holocaust industry" in the West, as have Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelstein, and others.
Other invitees to that conference, by the way, were the Orthdox Jewish Anti-Zionist organisation Naturei Karta. Of course the mainstream media don't tell you that they were attendees, for the obvious reason that it might interfere with the desired message conveyed by telling you that David Duke et al attended. (Quite what the organisers thought that inviting the likes of Duke could possibly achieve for the Anti-Zionist cause though, i'll never know).
Post Stalin Stalin was no longer popular. Did you forget Kruschevs denunciations? Although I will admit that the stalinist parties of today seem to let in a little Stalin love every now and then, when they think noones looking.
More crazy shit from badnewswade. I wonder if he'll ever master the art of debate without wild, really over the top completely slanderous attacks on his opponents?
Bullshit. You love my ass.
Bullshit. You love my ass.
And how many hours did you spend crafting that stinging retort?
Naura Kartei, a tiny sect of the much larger Satmar movement of non-Zionist Orthodox Jews. When NK appeared in Tehran next to David Duke, the Satmar excommunicated them for being a Jewish figleaf to neo-Nazis.
Other invitees included Robert Faurisson, who denies the existence of the gas chambers.
Give it up, deformed worker. Every crackpot racist was invited to this conference. Who invited them and why?
@Apollo, what is your point? Are you arguing that this election was about anti-semites versus philo-semites?
This discussion has now completely lost direction. So much heat, so little light.
"As to antisemitism ‘in the anti-Zionist movement’, we are in danger of being bogged down in semantics, so let me put it like this: my point is that to the extent that people foolishly embrace racist arguments about Jews and think that’s anti-Zionism, they have to be challenged and put right." (Seymour)
What about people who foolishly embrace racist arguments about Zionists?
For example, the idea that Zionists control the media, that every Zionist is a foreigner if he lives in Israel, etc. The type of arguments traditionally put against Jews?
Are they racist too?
Or somehow magically, those same anti-Jewish stereotypes are rendered kosher when applied to Zionist Jews?
What about people who foolishly embrace racist arguments about Zionists?
Those already are racist arguments about Jews, thinly veiled. If you say 'Zionists control the media', or even less euphemistically 'Jewish power controls the media', you are embracing a racist argument about Jews. Why is this so difficult to understand?
Or for example the racist argument that is you are a Zionist, you want "all resistance to Israeli domination crushed".
I think it is a racist argument. I want the Palestinians to have their state, but I don't want to lose mine in the process. What am I "crushing"? Somebody's hopes of killing me and my family?
that every Zionist is a foreigner if he lives in Israel
Nice try. A Zionist living in Israel is occupying Palestine, and moreover believes in his or her inherent right to do so. Such a person is a racist, of course.
"Those already are racist arguments about Jews, thinly veiled. If you say 'Zionists control the media', or even less euphemistically 'Jewish power controls the media', you are embracing a racist argument about Jews. Why is this so difficult to understand?"
I agree, Seymour.
"Nice try. A Zionist living in Israel is occupying Palestine, and moreover believes in his or her inherent right to do so. Such a person is a racist, of course."
So where can live a Zionist and not be a racist, Seymour?
Or for example the racist argument that is you are a Zionist, you want "all resistance to Israeli domination crushed".
This is not an argument that has been made, but equally it is not remotely a racist argument. It may be mistaken. It may be fundamentally unsound. In truth, many Zionists only want to see resistance to Israeli domination of the pre-1967 territories crushed. Many only want to see resistance to the existing settlements crushed. But to be mistaken about this is to have a misunderstanding about Zionism as a political movement. By conflating Jews with Zionism, you are actually encouraging an antisemitic stereotype.
I want the Palestinians to have their state, but I don't want to lose mine in the process.
You don't want to lose the little apartheid state, I understand. And because of your racist conceptions of the Palestinians, you can't envisage a situation in which you might actually share a democratic multi-cultural polity with them. I understand this too. What I don't understand is how you have the balls to say that anyone who opposes this monstrous world-view is a racist.
Lenin, don't forget to answer my question:
"So where can live a Zionist and not be a racist, Seymour?"
"And because of your racist conceptions of the Palestinians, you can't envisage a situation in which you might actually share a democratic multi-cultural polity with them."
Interesting. So generalizing your argument, Argentinians are racists because they don't want to merge with Brazilians in one country is what you mean?
So where can live a Zionist and not be a racist, Seymour?
You have to stop being a Zionist, because Zionism is an inherently racist ideology - not just in practise, not just in this particular case, but in the very idea that Jews constitute a distinct race of people who must live separately from other races. I suggest maybe setting up an association called Zionism Anonymous. "Hi, I'm Barry, and I think we have the right to colonise most of historic Palestine and blow the shit out of whoever tries to stop us." "Hi, Barry!"
o generalizing your argument, Argentinians are racists because they don't want to merge with Brazilians in one country is what you mean?
I suggest you try to control the drivel by some means. Hold a napkin over your mouth or something. Argentina is not a colonial state that has occupied most of historic Brazil and kept its former residents in a state of perpetual terror and impoverishment. Argentina is not a state found on racist ideology and practise. Argentina does not impose apartheid on Brazilians. This much is just uncontroversial, you see.
You're a racist because you think you're entitled to the fruits of ethnic cleansing and oppression. You think that if this massive injustice were reversed, the Palestinians would just take the opportunity to kill you and your family. That is because of your racist preconceptions about Palestinians. I recognise that Israelis have steeped in this racist ideology so thoroughly that they don't even notice it. But this is why it is so urgent that you seek help. This pig-ignorant, racist purview is damaging you. It is locking you into support for a garrison state that has no future. It is keeping you under a constant blackmail. Maybe one day you'll see this and join the grown-ups.
But Seymour, if being Zionist is already being racist, then what is wrong with accusing Zionists of controlling the media? Everything you can throw against the Zionists is for a good cause.
"but in the very idea that Jews constitute a distinct race of people who must live separately from other races."
No Zionist thinker ever argued that Jews are a race (in the sense of being different from other human beings). On the contrary, every Zionist thinker always argued that Jews are just like other human beings. And just like other human beings, they can self-organize as a people, and have a state and culture and stuff.
I think that you are wilfully mudding the waters.
"Argentina is not a colonial state that has occupied most of historic Brazil and kept its former residents in a state of perpetual terror and impoverishment. Argentina is not a state found on racist ideology and practise. Argentina does not impose apartheid on Brazilians. This much is just uncontroversial, you see."
Argentina is not a colonial state? hahahahahaha! You are such an ignorant, Seymour!
Not 500 years ago. Not 100 years ago. Not yesterday, but today, Argentinians are ocuppying the land of several indian tribes, among whom, for example, the Tobas.
Did you think that the Tobas spoke Spanish before the Spanish colonized the land? Do you think that all the Tobas are dead? Or that they are Argentinians?
They are Argentinians to the extent that Arabs are Israelis.
Watch this video in which you will see Tobas dying TODAY of malnutrition, and then tell me that Argentina (the country that I know closely since I was born there) is not a colonial state.
And where is your outrage?
Find me just one Palestinian who weighs 24 kilos like the Toba woman in the video, o that looks like the Toba child in the video, who looks like he is in Auschwitz right now, and I will agree with you that Israel is a racist country.
And please, can you speak of what you know, instead of just babbling and letting everybody know you are an ignorant?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l...h?
v=l3IxEYRCNdM
And btw, Argentina and Brazil don't have a real history of hatred between them like we can agree there is between the Israelis and the Palestinians. More the reason why it is unexplicable that they don't merge in just one country.
Please pay especial attention to the video from minute 3 to 5.
Thus are native americans treated by the Argentinians, who occupied their land, commited genocide and are doing it even today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l...h?
v=l3IxEYRCNdM
Let me quote again Seymour: "Argentina is not a colonial state"
The biography of this guy you will probably find interesting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Chr...topher_Columbus
then what is wrong with accusing Zionists of controlling the media?
They don't control the media. It is a lie. It is also a racist lie because 'Zionist' is a euphemism for 'Jew'. How isn't this obvious? How is that I need to explain to you, presumably a Jewish person, how antisemitism works?
No Zionist thinker ever argued that Jews are a race
You're ignorant too, I see. (I expect this sort of drivel is repeated in pro-Zionist sites). Le'ts put it like this: a number of Zionists rejected biological race theory, but it is absolutely not the case that no Zionist ever argued that the Jews were a separate race. Herzl was not convinced by the race theories of some such as Auerbach, Ruppin and Zangwill, for example, although he was certainly of a Volkish persuasion and certainly racist toward the Arabs. But the idea that the Jewish people constitute a coherent, separate entity that must be nationalised and militarised, that cannot live among others, is one that derives from European racism and colonialism.
On the contrary, every Zionist thinker always argued that Jews are just like other human beings. And just like other human beings, they can self-organize as a people, and have a state and culture and stuff.
You mean, just like those European states that colonised much of the world? Yes, it's true, Jewish people can participate in such a shameful venture - though most had nothing to do with it. I mean, it's not as if Israel expresses some peculiar Jewish Volksgeist. It's just another colonial state, robbing and murdering
Not yesterday, but today, Argentinians are ocuppying the land of several indian tribes, among whom, for example, the Tobas.
I know, dear - aboriginal peoples are oppressed minorities in several former colonial states. It is a terrible situation. But since you actually support colonialism, you are not in a position to criticise it or use the situation in a sophistical attempt to sidestep criticism of Zionism.
Now, if I may remind you of what you actually, absurdly, suggested - it was that Israel's relationship to the Palestinians is in some sense equivalent to Argentina's relationship to Brazil. It isn't. You're making a fool of yourself by persisting with such an idea.
Nonetheless, you blithely continue:
And btw, Argentina and Brazil don't have a real history of hatred between them like we can agree there is between the Israelis and the Palestinians. More the reason why it is unexplicable that they don't merge in just one country.
The fact that Argentina hasn't done to Brazil what Zionists did to the Palestinians is not a reason why the two situations are comparable. Now, there are two possibilities. One is that you fully understand that your comparison is nonsensical, and that every further elaboration on your part only makes it more conspicuously absurd. In which case, you are bluffing and dissembling, desperate to avoid the topic. The second is that you really are such a fool as to take all this seriously. In which case, I can only recommend that you go and talk to some adults about it. Okay?
"Argentina is not a colonial state? hahahahahaha! You are such an ignorant, Seymour!
Not 500 years ago. Not 100 years ago. Not yesterday, but today, Argentinians are ocuppying the land of several indian tribes, among whom, for example, the Tobas.
Did you think that the Tobas spoke Spanish before the Spanish colonized the land? Do you think that all the Tobas are dead? Or that they are Argentinians?
They are Argentinians to the extent that Arabs are Israelis.
Watch this video in which you will see Tobas dying TODAY of malnutrition, and then tell me that Argentina (the country that I know closely since I was born there) is not a colonial state.
And where is your outrage?
Find me just one Palestinian who weighs 24 kilos like the Toba woman in the video, o that looks like the Toba child in the video, who looks like he is in Auschwitz right now, and I will agree with you that Israel is a racist country."
And another Zionist turns up and basically go's "Never mind what we're doing - look over there!" It's like someone who's shot someone pointing across the road at the dozen dead in a car crash that's simultaneously happened, so as to distract attention.
rocobley: "distract attention"
On the contrary. I want you to focus attention. Where real genocides are taking place.
"I mean, it's not as if Israel expresses some peculiar Jewish Volksgeist. It's just another colonial state, robbing and murdering"
As if you knew anything, Seymour. It only took me to go fetch my daughter from kindergarten once to see how amiut yehudit (we prefer that term to German words, please) characterizes Israel. My daughter and the rest of the children were painting pictures of trees and eating dry fruits. It was Tu Bishvat, you see. And they were living Jewish culture in the kindergarten itself.
"You mean, just like those European states that colonised much of the world?"
No, I mean like any country in the world. I would say also like an Arab country expresses the Arabness of its own population, except that these expressions are filtered by the represive dictatorship systems in which they sadly live.
"It is a terrible situation. But since you actually support colonialism"
I am a native in my own land, Seymour. My people was there before the Arabs. I don't support colonialism. Nor Jewish nor Arab colonialism.
"Now, if I may remind you of what you actually, absurdly, suggested - it was that Israel's relationship to the Palestinians is in some sense equivalent to Argentina's relationship to Brazil. It isn't. You're making a fool of yourself by persisting with such an idea."
The only difference is that Palestinians don't have a state yet. When they had, the situation will be equivalent as any situation between two states.
What you haven't explained is why you want to mix together two people who hate eachother instead of separating them and let the tempers cool, like the case between Brasil and Argentina. I must tell you, because you have shown yourself to know nothing about Argentina, that there was a war between Arg and Brasil in 1815. Since then, each people developed its own culture within their own state, and there is no hatred anymore.
What Argentina and Brasil do to their own native populations is, as I showed you, something else entirely.
Fabian, you are gibbering. Yes, I know you feel terribly romantic about Israeli culture and the pretty things that the kiddies paint. (I bet you're one of those who likes the bit in Cabaret where all the party sings 'Tomorrow belongs to me'). Yes, I know you have an intimate sense of belonging to the apartheid state. No, I don't care one bit. No, your constant string of non-sequiturs isn't persuasive. No, you aren't impressing anyone.
As to this detritus:
I am a native in my own land, Seymour. My people was there before the Arabs.
Some people believe in ghosts and fairies and the grinch who stole Xmas. Some people believe in the chakras. Some believe in the transmigration of souls. You believe in some mystical connection with an ancient group of people who were entirely unlike you in their lives, their concerns, their dilemmas, their culture, etc. You believe this comparatively banal superstitious horseshit validates your support for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and the creation of a colonial state. What you don't appear to realise is that such mysticism is common among colonialists. You only have to look at the role of Aryanism in the British empire to see that.
Anyway, I think we can consider this conversation - if such it can be called - concluded. You may return to your Volkish daydreams.
"You believe in some mystical connection with an ancient group of people who were entirely unlike you in their lives, their concerns, their dilemmas, their culture, etc."
Well, it is in me and my own people to see how we relate to our own past, don't you think Seymour? You are not very much like Shakespeare in any sense, either. However, you thread on his footsteps.
"Well, it is in me and my own people to see how we relate to our own past, don't you think Seymour?"
No it isn't if your "relation to the past" causes you to set up an state based upon ethnic identity in a land that already has an entrenched population of another ethnic group.
"I am a native in my own land, Seymour. My people was there before the Arabs."
What the hell does that mean. You weren't alive. This is narrowminded ethnocentrism and nationalism of the worst order. It's ignorant and reactionary.
If the Zionist movement was to guarantee Jewish rights in Palestine in a stable democracy, there wouldn't be a leftist supported anti-Zionist movement. Too bad Zionism is an apartheid movement.
"Too bad Zionism is an apartheid movement."
And can you explain exactly how it is you work that out? It just sounds to me like you're throwing around nasty hot-button words in order to get people emotional so that they'll agree with you.
Was Black Power also an aparthied movement?
n terms of law, describing Israel as an apartheid state does not revolve around levels of difference and similarity with the policies and practices of the South African apartheid regime, and where Israel is an apartheid state only insofar as similarities outweigh differences. In 1973, the UN General Assembly adopted the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (General Assembly resolution 3068 entered into force on 18 July 1976 -- the year of the Soweto uprising in South Africa and the Land Day uprising in Palestine). The resolution set forth that the definition of the crime of apartheid was not limited to the borders of South Africa. The fact that apartheid is defined as a crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which entered into force in 2002 -- long after the apartheid regime was defeated in South Africa -- attests to the universality of the crime.
While the wording of the definition of the crime of apartheid varies between legal instruments, the substance is the same: a regime commits apartheid when it institutionalizes discrimination to create and maintain the domination of one "racial" group over another. Karine Mac Allister, among others, has provided a cogent legal analysis of the applicability of the crime of apartheid to the Israeli regime (see "Applicability of the Crime of Apartheid to Israel," al-Majdal #38, Summer 2008). The main point is that like genocide and slavery, apartheid is a crime that any state can commit, and institutions, organizations and/or individuals acting on behalf of the state that commit it or support its commission are to face trial in any state that is a signatory to the Convention, or in the International Criminal Court. It is therefore a fallacy to ground the Israeli apartheid label on comparisons of the policies of the South African apartheid regime, with the resulting descriptions of Israel as being "apartheid-like" and characterizations of an apartheid analysis of Israel as an "apartheid analogy."
Recognition by the international community of such universal crimes is often the result of a particular case, so heinous that it forces the rusty wheels of international decision-making into motion. The Transatlantic Slave Trade is an example where the mass enslavement of peoples from the African continent to work as the privately owned property of European settlers formed an important part of the framework in which the drafters of the 1956 UN Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery thought and acted. An even clearer example is the Genocide Convention (adopted in 1948, entered into force in 1951) in the wake of the Nazi Holocaust in which millions of Jews, communists, Roma and disabled were systematically murdered with the intention to end their existence. We do not describe modern day enslavement as "slavery-like," nor do we examine the mass killing of hundreds of thousands of mainly Tutsi Rwandans through a Rwandan "genocide analogy."
Two points made by Mac Allister in her legal analysis of Israeli apartheid deserve to be reiterated because they are often confused or misconstrued even by advocates of Palestinian human rights. First, Israel's crimes and violations are not limited to the crime of apartheid. Rather, Israel's regime over the Palestinian people combines apartheid, military occupation and colonization in a unique manner. It deserves notice that the relationship between these three components requires further research and investigation. Also noteworthy is the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Campaign National Committee's "United Against Apartheid, Colonialism and Occupation: Dignity & Justice for the Palestinian People" position paper, which outlines and, to some extent, details the various aspects of Israel's commission of the crime of apartheid, and begins to trace the interaction between Israeli apartheid, colonialism and occupation from the perspective of Palestinian civil society. [1]
The second point worth reiterating is that Israel's regime of apartheid is not limited to the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In fact, the core of Israel's apartheid regime is guided by discriminatory legislation in the fields of nationality, citizenship and land ownership. This discriminatory legislation was primarily employed to oppress and dispossess those Palestinians (refugees and internally displaced) who were forced from their land and property during the 1948 Nakba, or catastrophe, as well as the minority who managed to remain within the 1949 armistice line (referred to as the "green line"), who later became Israeli citizens. Israel's apartheid regime was extended into the West Bank and Gaza Strip following the 1967 occupation of those territories for the purpose of colonization and military control over the Palestinians who came under occupation. Using again the example of South Africa, the crime of apartheid was not limited to the Bantustans -- the whole regime was implicated and not one or another of its racist manifestations.
The analysis of Israel as an apartheid state has proven to be very important in several respects. First, it correctly highlights racial discrimination as a root cause of Israel's oppression of Palestinians. Second, one of the main effects of Israeli apartheid is that it has separated Palestinians -- conceptually, legally and physically -- into different groupings (refugees, West Bank, Gaza, within the "green line" and a host of other divisions within each), resulting in the fragmentation of the Palestinian liberation movement, including the solidarity movement. The apartheid analysis enables us to provide a legal and conceptual framework under which we can understand, convey and take action in support of the Palestinian people and their struggle as a unified whole. Third, and of particular significance to the solidarity movement, this legal and conceptual framework takes on the prescriptive role underpinning the growing global movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel until it complies with international law.
http://electronicintifada.net/
v2...icle10440.shtml
link cut off.
but it's pretty much commonly accepted even by mainstream commentators that Israel is an apartheid state. Everything I said in my original post is not disputable, and you didn't even try
Commenting by HaloScan
