Chaos and Violence In Iran: UPDATED

(9:00AM EST – promoted by Nightprowlkitty)

In the tense aftermath of Iran’s fiercely contested presidential election between the incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and reform candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi . . .

the Associated Press is reporting that . . .

according to Iran’s Interior Ministry, the final count from Iran’s presidential election gave 62.6 percent of the vote to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and 33.75 to Mir Hossein Mousavi, “a former prime minister who has become the hero of a youth-driven movement seeking greater liberties.”

Ahmadinejad only got 62 percent of the vote?  Those slackers who “counted the votes” for him obviously didn’t count them with enough enthusiasm.  Government hacks counting the votes for Saddam Hussein always gave him at least 95 percent of the vote.  Government hacks counting the votes for Ferdinand Marcos always gave him at least 98 percent of the vote.  Government hacks counting the votes for Idi Amin always gave him at least 150 percent of the votes.      

Ahmadinejad only got a feeble 62 percent of the vote, but that was plenty good enough for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei . . .

who is urging Iranians to unite behind Ahmadinejad.  He told the nation that  Ahmadinejad’s “landslide win” over reformer Mousavi in Iran’s presidential election was a “divine assessment” and a “real feast”.

Despite this claim of Supreme Leader Khamenei, Allah’s Decider Guy, Guardian of the Pillars of Islam, Defender of the Faith and Head Rooster in the Henhouse etc, etc, etc, Ahmadinejad’s “landslide win” wasn’t due to a divine assessment, the fix was in and the final vote totals were decided upon long ago.    

Bill Keller of the New York Times . . .

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.”

It remains to be seen whether Iran’s Supreme Council, which is comprised of Muslim versions of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, can shove this “divine assessment” and “real feast” down the throats of the Iranian people.  

Mousavi rejected the result as rigged, urged his supporters to resist a government of “lies and dictatorship”, and warned that he “won’t surrender to this manipulation.”

Ali Akbar Dareini and Anna Johnson . . .

The powerful Revolutionary Guard cautioned that it would crush any revolution against the Islamic regime by Mousavi’s green movement.  The Revolutionary Guard is directly under the control of the ruling clerics and has vast influence in every corner of the country through a network of volunteer militias.

NBC News is reporting “violent clashes between rock-throwing protesters and police in the center of Tehran . . . ”  

“Black-clad police also gathered around key government buildings and mobile phone text messaging was blocked in an apparent attempt to stifle one of the main communication tools by Mousavi’s movement.”

Daniel Tencer. . .

Iran is in turmoil and the country’s political scene is undergoing moment-by-moment changes following Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s landslide victory in yesterday’s presidential elections, with evidence growing of a brutal government crackdown on supporters of reformist opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi. Reports from several news sources indicate that Mousavi himself has been placed under arrest.

UPDATES

Nico Pitney . . .

Grand Ayatollah Sanei in Iran has declared Ahmadinejad’s presidency illegitimate. There are strong rumors that his house and office are surrounded by the police and his website is filtered. He had previously issued a fatwa, against rigging of the elections in any form or shape, calling it a mortal sin.

Dozens of reformist politicians were said to have been arrested at their homes overnight.  There were also reports of politicians and clerics being placed under house arrest.  When asked at the news conference about the whereabouts of his opponents, Mr. Ahmadinejad never answered directly but made vague references to those committing crimes deserving to be arrested.

Steve Clemons writes about a discussion he had in London with “a well-connected Iranian who knows many of the power figures in the Tehran political order.”

The scariest point he made to me that I had not heard anywhere else is that this “coup by the right wing” has created pressures that cannot be solved or patted down by the normal institutional arrangements Iran has constructed. The Guardian Council and other power nodes of government can’t deal with the current crisis and can’t deal with the fact that a civil war has now broken out among Iran’s revolutionaries.

My contact predicted serious violence at the highest levels. He said that Ahmadinejad is now genuinely scared of Iranian society and of Mousavi and Rafsanjani. The level of tension between them has gone beyond civil limits — and my contact said that Ahmadinejad will try to have them imprisoned and killed.

Likewise, he said, Rafsanjani, Khatami, and Mousavi know this — and thus are using all of the instruments at their control within Iran’s government apparatus to fight back — but given Khamenei’s embrace of Ahmadinejad’s actions in the election and victory, there is no recourse but to try and remove Khamenei. Some suggest that Rafsanjani will count votes to see if there is a way to formally dislodge Khamenei — but this source I met said that all of these political giants have resources at their disposal to “do away with” those that get in the way.

Millions of fake Iranians and Zionist agents who voted for Mousavi are angry, but real Iranians are celebrating Ahmadinejad’s divine triumph.  “I am happy that Ahmadinejad has won, he helps the poor and he catches the thieves,” sandwich seller Kamra Mohammadi, 22, told the AFP news agency.

Most leaders flip a coin.  If it’s heads, they help the poor.  If it’s tails, they catch the thieves.  But not Ahmadinejad, he does BOTH.  Some days, he helps the poor in the morning and catches the thieves in the afternoon, and other days, he catches the thieves in the morning and helps the poor in the afternoon.  It depends.  If thieves are all over the place when he walks outside in the morning, he catches them first, and if poor people are all over the place when he walks outside in the morning, he helps them first.  

Now that we’ve got that clarified, it’s time to wrap this essay up.

Shitheads like Kamra Mohammadi will always support the Ahmadinejad’s of the world.   Shitheads in America will always support the Nixons and Cheneys and Palins.   Shitheads in Russia will always support the Stalins and Putins.  Pick a country.  Any country.  it’s the same everywhere.  

But there are also intelligent people everywhere.  In every country.  There are leaders like Mir Hossein Mousavi and Aung San Suu Kyi and Dennis Kucinich in every country, who take a stand against tyranny in all of its ugly manifestations, and speak out against criminal governments and injustice.  

They need people like us to take a stand with them.

When we don’t, the shitheads win.