It's the official Iranian election thread!

[ToxicAdam]

From what I've read he has been completely out of politics since then. Not even commenting on or espousing other politicians since then.

[recursivelyenumerable]

The more I think about it, the more it doesn't really make sense to me that they'd fix the elections.  We all know that in a sense the whole Iranian political system is itself fixed, but that's implemented as a wrapper around the elections, the pre-/post- hooks being the vetting of candidates by the Guardian Council and the presidents' lack of ultimate power.  With those in place, I don't see why they'd need to fix the election itself, especially since Mousavi doesn't seem to be outside the range of presidents they've let in in the past, and rigging things seems to run more risk of instability than giving people a moderate establishment outlet for their discontent would.  What am I missing?

[Mandark]

TA:  He's definitely been in politics, but it's fair to say he's deliberately kept out of the public eye.  I think he's about as easy to get a read on as your next Iranian politican (that is to say very hard; I'm still not sure how much Ahmadinejad is a hawk and how much an opportunist).


tennin:  You're assuming a single, unitary Iranian elite which would choose whether or not to commit election fraud.

Iran's got a bunch of overlapping and competing institutions, factions, and power centers.  It's not hard to imagine a secretive effort to screw with some of the ballot-counting by, say, local political appointees who rely on the current spoils system or a cabal of Revolutionary Guard officers.

The dynamic you described, however, is a good reason not to think the Ayatollah got together with the Guardians Council and decided they would use the whole apparatus of state to fix the results.

[recursivelyenumerable]

good point, it's been a while since I spent any time thinking seriously about politics & society and it shows.

[Stoney Mason]

Officials: Ahmadinejad on way to landslide win
Violence flares after Iran authorities are accused of 'manipulating' results

NBC News and news services
updated 4 minutes ago

TEHRAN, Iran - Anti-riot police guarded the offices overseeing Iran's disputed elections Saturday with the count pointing to a landslide victory by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his opponent denouncing the results as "treason" and threatening a challenge.

Many people opened shops and carried out errands, but the backdrop was far from normal: black-clad police gathering around key government buildings and mobile phone text messaging blocked in an apparent attempt to stifle one of the main communication tools by the pro-reform movement of Mir Hossein Mousavi.

NBC News reported "violent clashes" between rock-throwing protesters and riot police in the center of Tehran.

Earlier, a statement from Mousavi posted on his Web site urged his supporters to resist a "governance of lie and dictatorship."

Outside the Interior Ministry, which directed Friday's voting, security forces set up a cordon. The results had flowed quickly after polls closed showing the hard-line president with a comfortable lead — defying expectations of a nail-biter showdown following a month of fierce campaigning and bringing immediate charges of vote rigging by Mousavi.

But an expected announcement on the full outcome was temporarily put on hold. A reason for the delay was not made public, but it suggested intervention by Iran's Islamic authorities seeking to put the brakes on a potentially volatile showdown.

'I won't surrender'
Ahmadinejad had the apparent backing of the ruling theocracy, which holds near-total power and would have the ability to put the election results into a temporary limbo.

Mousavi, who became the hero of a powerful youth-driven movement, had not made a public address or issued messages since declaring himself the true victor moments after polls closed and accusing authorities of "manipulating" the vote.

"I'm warning that I won't surrender to this manipulation," said the Mousavi statement on the Web on Saturday. "The outcome of what we've seen from the performance of officials ... is nothing but shaking the pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran sacred system and governance of lie and dictatorship."

He warned "people won't respect those who take power through fraud" and called the decision to announce Ahmadinejad winner of the election was a "treason to the votes of the people."

The headline on one of Mousavi's Web sites: "I wont give in to this dangerous manipulation." Mousavi and key aides could not be reached by phone.

Information clampdown?
It was even unclear how many Iranians were even aware of Mousavi's claims of fraud. Communications disruptions began in the later hours of voting Friday — suggesting an information clampdown. State television and radio only broadcast the Interior Ministry's vote count and not Mousavi's midnight press conference.

Nationwide, the text messaging system remained down Saturday and several pro-Mousavi Web sites were blocked or difficult to access. Text messaging is frequently used by many Iranians — especially young Mousavi supporters — to spread election news.

By Saturday morning, Iran's Interior Ministry said Ahmadinejad had 63.3 percent of the vote and Mousavi had 34.7 percent with about 85 percent of all votes counted. Based on ministry figures, around 75 percent of the country's 46.2 million eligible voters went to the polls, many of which were jammed packed Friday with people waiting several hours to cast their ballots.

At a press conference, Mousavi declared himself "definitely the winner" based on "all indications from all over Iran." He accused the government of "manipulating the people's vote" to keep Ahmadinejad in power and suggested the reformist camp would stand up to challenge the results.

"It is our duty to defend people's votes. There is no turning back," Mousavi said, alleging widespread irregularities.

Mousavi's backers were stunned at Interior Ministry's results after widespread predictions of a close race — or even a slight edge to Mousavi.

"Many Iranians went to the people because they wanted to bring change. Almost everybody I know voted for Mousavi but Ahmadinejad is being declared the winner. The government announcement is nothing but widespread fraud. It is very, very disappointing. I'll never ever again vote in Iran," said Mousavi supporter Nasser Amiri, a hospital clerk in Tehran.

Bringing any showdown into the streets would certainly face a swift backlash from security forces. The political chief of the powerful Revolutionary Guard cautioned Wednesday it would crush any "revolution" against the Islamic regime by Mousavi's "green movement" — the signature color of his campaign and the new banner for reformists seeking wider liberties at home and a gentler face for Iran abroad.

The Revolutionary Guard is the military wing directly under control of the ruling clerics and has vast influence in every corner of the country through a network of volunteer militias.

In Tehran, several Ahmadinejad supporters cruised the streets waving Iranian flags out of their car windows and shouting "Mousavi is dead!"

Mousavi appealed directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to intervene and stop what he said were violations of the law. Khamenei holds ultimate political authority in Iran. "I hope the leader's foresight will bring this to a good end," Mousavi said.

Mousavi said some polling stations were closed early with people still waiting to vote, that voters were prevented from casting ballots and that his observers were expelled from some counting sites.

Iran does not allow international election monitors. During the 2005 election, when Ahmadinejad won the presidency, there were some allegations of vote rigging from losers, but the claims were never investigated.

'Robust debate'
The outcome will not sharply alter Iran's main policies or sway major decisions, such as possible talks with Washington or nuclear policies. Those crucial issues rest with the ruling clerics headed by the unelected Khamenei.

But the election focused on what the office can influence: boosting Iran's sinking economy, pressing for greater media and political freedoms, and being Iran's main envoy to the world.

Before the vote count, President Barack Obama said the "robust debate" during the campaign suggests a possibility of change in Iran, which is under intense international pressure over its nuclear program. There has been no comment from Washington since the results indicated re-election for Ahmadinejad.

The race will go to a runoff on June 19 if no candidate receives more than 50 percent of the vote. Two other candidates — conservative former Revolutionary Guard commander Mohsen Rezaei and moderate former parliament speaker Mahdi Karroubi — only got small fractions of the votes, according to the ministry.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31238321/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa//

Iran govt declared Ahmadinejad winner with 62 pct

20 minutes ago

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran's government says incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the winner of the election with a landslide 62.63 percent of the vote. Top opposition contender Mir Hossein Mousavi takes only 33.75 percent of vote in a result disputed by his supporters.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Anti-riot police guarded the offices overseeing Iran's disputed elections Saturday with the count pointing to a landslide victory by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad while his opponent denounced the results as "treason" and threatened a challenge.

The standoff left Tehran in tense anticipation. Many people opened shops and carried out errands, but the backdrop was far from normal: black-clad police gathering around key government buildings and mobile phone text messaging blocked in an apparent attempt to stifle one of the main communication tools of the pro-reform movement of Mir Hossein Mousavi.

A statement from Mousavi posted on his Web site urged his supporters to resist a "governance of lie and dictatorship."

Outside the Interior Ministry, which directed Friday's voting, security forces set up a cordon. The results had flowed quickly after polls closed showing the hard-line president with a comfortable lead — defying expectations of a nail-biter showdown following a month of fierce campaigning and bringing immediate charges of vote rigging by Mousavi.

But an expected announcement on the full outcome was temporarily put on hold. A reason for the delay was not made public, but it suggested intervention by Iran's Islamic authorities seeking to put the brakes on a potentially volatile showdown.

Ahmadinejad had the apparent backing of the ruling theocracy, which holds near-total power and would have the ability to put the election results on the slow track.

There were no immediate reports of serious clashes or mass protests, and the next step by Mousavi's backers were unclear. Mousavi, who became the hero of a powerful youth-driven movement, had not made a public address or issued messages since declaring himself the true victor moments after polls closed and accusing authorities of "manipulating" the vote.

Along Tehran's Vali Asr St. — where Mousavi supporters joined in a massive campaign rally earlier this week — an Associated Press photographer saw police clubbing and chasing people. The reasons for the action was unclear. There were no signs of a demonstration or green-colored banners and clothing — the color of Mousavi's "green" campaign following.

"I'm warning that I won't surrender to this manipulation," said the Mousavi statement Saturday. "The outcome of what we've seen from the performance of officials ... is nothing but shaking the pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran sacred system and governance of lie and dictatorship."

He warned "people won't respect those who take power through fraud" and called the decision to announce Ahmadinejad winner of the election was a "treason to the votes of the people."

The headline on one of Mousavi's Web sites: "I wont give in to this dangerous manipulation." Mousavi and key aides could not be reached by phone.

It was even unclear how many Iranians were even aware of Mousavi's claims of fraud. Communications disruptions began in the later hours of voting Friday — suggesting an information clampdown. State television and radio only broadcast the Interior Ministry's vote count and not Mousavi's midnight press conference.

Nationwide, the text messaging system remained down Saturday and several pro-Mousavi Web sites were blocked or difficult to access. Text messaging is frequently used by many Iranians — especially young Mousavi supporters — to spread election news.

At Tehran University — the site of the last major anti-regime unrest in Tehran in 1999 — the academic year was winding down and there was no sign of pro-Mousavi crowds. But university exams, scheduled to begin Saturday, were postponed until next month around the country.

By Saturday afternoon, Iran's Interior Ministry said Ahmadinejad had about 63 percent of the vote and Mousavi had just under 35 percent with about 91 percent of all votes counted. The ministry also updated its voter turnout figures. Minister Sadeq Mahsouli said 85 percent of Iran's 46.2 million eligible voters went to the polls — setting a new record. On Friday, many polling stations were jammed packed with people waiting several hours to cast their ballots.

The state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported that Ahmadinejad plans a public address on Sunday in Tehran.

At a press conference, Mousavi declared himself "definitely the winner" based on "all indications from all over Iran." He accused the government of "manipulating the people's vote" to keep Ahmadinejad in power and suggested the reformist camp would stand up to challenge the results.

"It is our duty to defend people's votes. There is no turning back," Mousavi said, alleging widespread irregularities.

Mousavi's backers were stunned at Interior Ministry's results after widespread predictions of a close race — or even a slight edge to Mousavi.

"Many Iranians went to the people because they wanted to bring change. Almost everybody I know voted for Mousavi but Ahmadinejad is being declared the winner. The government announcement is nothing but widespread fraud. It is very, very disappointing. I'll never ever again vote in Iran," said Mousavi supporter Nasser Amiri, a hospital clerk in Tehran.

Bringing any showdown into the streets would certainly face a swift backlash from security forces. The political chief of the powerful Revolutionary Guard cautioned Wednesday it would crush any "revolution" against the Islamic regime by Mousavi's "green movement," which seeks wider liberties at home and a gentler face for Iran abroad.

The Revolutionary Guard is the military wing directly under control of the ruling clerics and has vast influence in every corner of the country through a network of volunteer militias.

In Tehran, several Ahmadinejad supporters cruised the streets waving Iranian flags out of car windows and shouting "Mousavi is dead!"

Mousavi appealed directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to intervene and stop what he said were violations of the law. Khamenei holds ultimate political authority in Iran. "I hope the leader's foresight will bring this to a good end," Mousavi said.

Iran does not allow international election monitors. During the 2005 election, when Ahmadinejad won the presidency, there were some allegations of vote rigging from losers, but the claims were never investigated.

The outcome will not sharply alter Iran's main policies or sway major decisions, such as possible talks with Washington or nuclear policies. Those crucial issues rest with the ruling clerics headed by the unelected Khamenei.

But the election focused on what the office can influence: boosting Iran's sinking economy, pressing for greater media and political freedoms, and being Iran's main envoy to the world.

Before the vote count, President Barack Obama said the "robust debate" during the campaign suggests a possibility of change in Iran, which is under intense international pressure over its nuclear program. There has been no comment from Washington since the results indicated re-election for Ahmadinejad.

The race will go to a runoff on June 19 if no candidate receives more than 50 percent of the vote. Two other candidates — conservative former Revolutionary Guard commander Mohsen Rezaei and moderate former parliament speaker Mahdi Karroubi — only got small fractions of the votes, according to the ministry.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jGSJEAPs_r2T2wxsL5G3t4z-jajQD98PP3OG1

[Cheebs]

The more I think about it, the more it doesn't really make sense to me that they'd fix the elections.  We all know that in a sense the whole Iranian political system is itself fixed, but that's implemented as a wrapper around the elections, the pre-/post- hooks being the vetting of candidates by the Guardian Council and the presidents' lack of ultimate power.  With those in place, I don't see why they'd need to fix the election itself, especially since Mousavi doesn't seem to be outside the range of presidents they've let in in the past, and rigging things seems to run more risk of instability than giving people a moderate establishment outlet for their discontent would.  What am I missing?

Well the Supreme Leader made it clear he wanted  Ameejddidiidijdjajdad to be re-elected there could be that motivation.

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

I'm not going to just automatically believe the votes were tampered with because some large groups of opposition appeared for rallies.

The fact that the margins were similar to 2005 makes me think that either the vote was rigged (but would be dumb to keep at the same percentages) or the same groups of people voted for the same types of candidates last time.

[Cheebs]

I'm not going to just automatically believe the votes were tampered with because some large groups of opposition appeared for rallies.

That's not the on;y thng that happened. Riot police started destroying their cars, the govt. shut off all their websites and closed down their cellphone accounts of the campaign so they can't contact anyone. That is fishy stuff.

[Stoney Mason]

To give the other side.

Wishful thinking from Tehran

Since the revolution, academics and pundits have predicted the collapse of the Iranian regime. This week, they did no better

I have been in Iran for exactly one week covering the 2009 Iranian election carnival. Since I arrived, few here doubted that the incumbent firebrand President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad would win. My airport cab driver reminded me that the president had visited every province twice in the last four years – "Iran isn't Tehran," he said. Even when I asked Mousavi supporters if their man could really carry more than capital, their responses were filled with an Obamasque provisional optimism – "Yes we can", "I hope so", "If you vote." So the question occupying the international media, "How did Mousavi lose?" seems to be less a problem of the Iranian election commission and more a matter of bad perception rooted in the stubborn refusal to understand the role of religion in Iran.

Of course, the rather real possibility of voter fraud exists and one must wait in the coming weeks to see how these allegations unfold. But one should recall that in three decades of presidential elections, the accusations of rigging have rarely been levied against the vote count. Elections here are typically controlled by banning candidates from the start or closing opposition newspapers in advance.

In this election moreover, there were two separate governmental election monitors in addition to observers from each camp to prevent mass voter fraud. The sentimental implausibility of Ahmedinejad's victory that Mousavi's supporters set forth as the evidence of state corruption must be met by the equal implausibility that such widespread corruption could take place under clear daylight. So, until hard evidence emerges that can substantiate the claims of the opposition camp we need to look to other reasons to explain why so many are stunned by the day's events.

As far as international media coverage is concerned, it seems that wishful thinking got the better of credible reporting. It is true that Mousavi supporters jammed Tehran traffic for hours every night over the last week, though it was rarely mentioned that they did so only in the northern well-to-do neighborhoods of the capital. Women did relax their head covers and young men did dance in the street.

On Monday night at least 100,000 of the former prime minister's supporters set up a human chain across Tehran. But, hours before I had attended a mass rally for the incumbent president that got little to no coverage in the western press because, on account of the crowds, he never made it inside the hall to give his speech. Minimal estimates from that gathering have been placed at 600,000 (enthusiasts say a million). From the roof I watched as the veiled women and bearded men of all ages poured like lava.

But the failure to properly gauge Iran's affairs is hardly a new phenomenon. When the 1979 revolution shattered the military dictatorship of America's strongest ally in the region few experts outside of the country suspected that the Islamic current would emerge as the leading party.

But in Iran, even the secular intellectual Jalal Al-e Ahmad, author of the infamous Occidentosis predicted the collapse of the regime at the hands of Islamic movement well over a decade before the fateful events of 1979. The maverick French philosopher, Michel Foucault, also made the right bet as he reported the events from the street – an insight that his many admirers still shy from. Since the revolution, academics, intellectuals and pundits have predicted the imminent collapse of the regime. As of today, they have done no better.

Such anomalies can only be explained by a longue duree. Iran is a deeply religious society. Of the Shah's mistakes nepotism, autocracy, and repression were fought by communists and liberals for decades with no success, but it was his attack on the religious establishment that led to his almost overnight demise.

Since then common Iranians have applied their ideals through the ballot box. In 1997 as the ashes of the Iran-Iraq war settled and the country saw a decade relative stability, voters came out in mass to support the former president-cleric Khatami against his rival, Natiq Nouri, a senior member of the establishment. Western reporters saw this in terms of a grand generational divide: young freedom loving liberals against elder conservative clerics. But it was really a vote for the ideal of honesty and piety against allegations of entrenched corruption. Many of those same Khatami supporters voted for Ahmedinejad yesterday, despite the fact that Khatami's face was on every one of Mousavi's campaign posters.

For over a week the same social impulses of anti-corruption, populism, and religious piety that led to the revolution have been on the streets available to anyone who wanted to report on them. Ahmedinejad, for most in the country, embodies those ideals. Since he came into office he has refused to wear a suit, refused to move out of the home he inherited from his father, and has refused to tone down the rhetoric he uses against those he accuses of betraying the nation. When he openly accused his towering rival, Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanji, a lion of the revolution himself, of parasitical corruption and compared his betrayal to the alleged deception against the Prophet Muhammad that led to the Sunni-Shia split 1,400 years ago, he unleashed a popular impulse that has held the imagination of the masses here for generations. That Rafsanji defended himself through Mousavi's newspaper meant the end for the reformists.

In the last week Ahmedinejad turned the election into a referendum on the very project of Iran's Islamic revolution. Their street chants yelled "Death to all those against the Supreme Leader" followed by traditional Shia rituals and elegies. It was no match for the high-spirited fun-loving youth of northern Tehran who sang "Ahmedi-bye-bye, Ahmedi-bye-bye" or "ye hafte-do hafte, Mahmud hamum na-rafte" (One week, two weeks, Mahmoud hasn't taken a shower).

Perhaps from the start Mousavi was destined to fail as he hoped to combine the articulate energies of the liberal upper class with the business interests of the bazaar merchants. The Facebook campaigns and text-messaging were perfectly irrelevant for the rural and working classes who struggle to make a day's ends meet, much less have the time to review the week's blogs in an internet cafe. Although Mousavi tried to appeal to such classes by addressing the problems of inflation and poverty, they voted otherwise.

In the future, observers would do us a favour by taking a deeper look into Iranian society, giving us a more accurate picture of the very organic religious structures of the country, and dispensing with the narrative of liberal inevitability. It is the religious aspects of enigmatic Persia that helped put an 80-year-old exiled ascetic at the head of state 30 years ago, then the charismatic cleric Khatami in office 12 years ago, the honest son of a blacksmith – Ahmedinejad – four years ago, and the same yesterday.

• Abbas Barzegar is a PhD candidate in religious studies at Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/13/iranian-election

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

eh, fuck it

[Cheebs]

American officials are on the media describing this as coup like and not a real democratic election. Things are getting a bit crazy. Sounds like America's official stance won't be to recognize the election results as legitimate.

[Stoney Mason]

American officials are on the media describing this as coup like and not a real democratic election. Things are getting a bit crazy. Sounds like America's official stance won't be to recognize the election results as legitimate.

Like I said I'm not very big on Iran when it comes to elections and fairness. It's a rigged system from the start and its not especially open so that doesn't give me very much confidence in the end results. If you cheat at the actual process I'm willing to entertain the idea that you're willing to cheat on the end results.

That being said, it's also hard for me to dismiss as an outsider the idea that perhaps Ahmadinejad symbolizes and represents what the mass of Iranian people want at this moment. Similar to the way as I keep bringing it up that George Bush represented what the American people wanted in 2004, however misguided or ignornant what we wanted at that time was.

[Phoenix Dark]

My airport cab driver reminded me that the president had visited every province twice in the last four years – "Iran isn't Tehran," he said.

Interesting. The articles posted a couple days ago said the rural areas featured more folks than the cities. Seems like the reports were correct about many people wanting change, they just didn't acknowledge than even more didn't want change.

We won't know whether there was vote tampering or not for a few days right, although the communications shutdown seems fishy as hell. I wonder if Mousavi knows whether this was a set up or not. Declaring the results to be false is just gonna throw things into turmoil.

[Cheebs]

Well the Iranian Electoral Commission is saying the entire election was a fraud and a set-up and says a re-vote needs to be taken place.

[Cheebs]

Oh and Mousavi has been arrested

[Mandark]

I'm not going to just automatically believe the votes were tampered with because some large groups of opposition appeared for rallies.

Yep.  Losing coalitions in big countries can still put together big demonstrations, and visible enthusiasm doesn't always translate to raw numbers.  Ron Paul, anyone?

To give the other side.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/13/iranian-election

Good article, and a reminder that we tend to oversimplify foreign politics and shoehorn them into familiar narratives.*  For all the talk of Mousavi's base being in the cities, every member of Tehran's city council belongs to Ahmadinejad's political party.

So there's a dimension that more closely resembles old-style urban machine politics, or third-world patrimony, than it does a reformers vs. reactionaries fight.

Well the Iranian Electoral Commission is saying the entire election was a fraud and a set-up and says a re-vote needs to be taken place.

Where you reading that?





*Yes I'm the guy who posted two "Ahmadinejad is Bush" stories.  I still think the TNR one is good and the similarities are pretty instructive.  Anyways, I contain multitudes.

[FlameOfCallandor]

Did someone say Ron Paul? 

spoiler (click to show/hide)

I kid I kid

[close]

[Stoney Mason]

This is gonna be nasty.

.

[Stoney Mason]

Some links.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/13/iran-demonstrations-viole_n_215189.html
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/dreyfuss/443348
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2009/06/vote-iran
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/06/13/official-obama-administration-skeptical-irans-election-results/
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE55C1Z220090613?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124486223846612095.html#mod=rss_whats_news_us
http://niacblog.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/election-liveblogging-saturday/

[Mandark]

Juan Cole argues that the election was probably stolen.

Cole carries a lot of weight with me but I'm not totally convinced.  I'd like to see the results broken down in detail along with the last couple elections to see if there are any wild disparities.

Of course Iran probably doesn't release anything like that (results by city are being reported but it seems really piecemeal) and I've just been spoiled by Nate Silver's spreadsheet porn.

[Stoney Mason]

Juan Cole argues that the election was probably stolen.

Cole carries a lot of weight with me but I'm not totally convinced.  I'd like to see the results broken down in detail along with the last couple elections to see if there are any wild disparities.

Of course Iran probably doesn't release anything like that (results by city are being reported but it seems really piecemeal) and I've just been spoiled by Nate Silver's spreadsheet porn.

That's ultimately the problem. That in a "vote" like this in society like that, its very hard to trust results because the governing powers cloak so much in mystery.

[brawndolicious]

Well the Iranian Electoral Commission is saying the entire election was a fraud and a set-up and says a re-vote needs to be taken place.

Where you reading that?

yeah, is this even directly from the Electoral Commission or what?

[Mandark]

Okay, here is my current Official Stance on the issue.

It's totally plausible that Ahmadinejad would win as many votes as has been reported in the official totals.

It's totally plausible that fraud would be committed to benefit Ahmadinejad and the official totals are bogus.

There is nothing right now that is dispositive either way and there probably never will be.

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

I don't know a whole lot about Iranian politics and whether Mousavi's urban base was as large as people were suggesting it was.  Same goes for underplaying Ahmadinejad in the cities as well.

I just know that, as I said before with the previous election, that Iranian reform seems to get overplayed.  Maybe it is because the west really hopes that Iran will reform so as a result, some of the coverage tends to exaggerate a bit that Iran is headed down that path.  Also, Ahmadinejad's economic decisions may not necessary cause votes for the opposition.  A lot of working and lower class families voted for Reagan in 1984 and Bush in 2004, despite arguments that can be made that their economic decisions made their lives harder in their first terms.

I'm just not convinced that Ahmadinejad stole the election.  It is unlikely though that we would ever get to the bottom of this, given how illiberal Iran tends to be.

[Phoenix Dark]

There can be no question that the June 12, 2009 Iranian presidential election was stolen. Dissident employees of the Interior Ministry, which is under the control of President Ahmadinejad and is responsible for the mechanics of the polling and counting of votes, have reportedly issued an open letter saying as much. Government polls (one conducted by the Revolutionary Guards, the other by the state broadcasting company) that were leaked to the campaigns allegedly showed ten- to twenty-point leads for Mousavi a week before the election; earlier polls had them neck and neck, with Mousavi leading by one per cent, and Karroubi just behind.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2009/06/laura-secor-irans-stolen-election.html

edit: also from TPM

Moreover, in a protest against election results Iran's Hashemi Rafsanjani resigned from his posts as the chairman of the Assembly of Experts and as head of the Expediency Discernment Council, the two most influential institutions in the country.

edit again

Iran expert Gary Sick has a new post up taking stock of what's happened over the last 48 hours and what decisions confront the key players in the drama. I won't try to summarize it. But in his reconstruction of events he does say (what I'd heard earlier but not in a way that seemed reliable) that the Mousavi campaign was apparently notified by election officials that they had won only to see Interior Ministry officials announce an Ahmadinejad victory just a short time later.

[Mandark]

If the current figures are to be believed, urban Iranians who voted for the reformist ex-president Mohammad Khatami in 1997 and 2001 have defected to Ahmadinejad in droves.

This is exactly what I was talking about.  She's trying to illustrate how improbable this shift would be when Khatami voters already defected to Ahmadinejad in 2005.

She's whittling away at the complexities of another countries politics until they fit into an easy, familiar shape.

Sick's piece is a bit better but I don't think he's actually gotten any new information about Mousavi's campaign being told they won.  Looks like he's just repeating what we already heard, and some people attach more credibility to it because of his expertise.






edit:  It's getting to the point where the fraud itself will be a moot point.  Iran's been so heavy-handed in trying to squash any unrest that it's going to create the impression of fraud and things will go from there.

[recursivelyenumerable]

The more I think about it, the more it doesn't really make sense to me that they'd fix the elections.  We all know that in a sense the whole Iranian political system is itself fixed, but that's implemented as a wrapper around the elections, the pre-/post- hooks being the vetting of candidates by the Guardian Council and the presidents' lack of ultimate power.  With those in place, I don't see why they'd need to fix the election itself, especially since Mousavi doesn't seem to be outside the range of presidents they've let in in the past, and rigging things seems to run more risk of instability than giving people a moderate establishment outlet for their discontent would.  What am I missing?

I have to say this argument has been pretty much refuted by events -- Mousavi's call for resistance (compare to, say, Gore), Mousavi's and Karoubi's house arrest, and Rafsanjani's resignation clearly indicate a serious rift within the Iranian elite.  I guess a substantial section of the elite came to the conclusion that the hard-line faction represented by Ahmadinejad was harmful to their interests and had to go (sort of like how business leaders, the press, etc. decided Bush had to go in 2006-8).  Ahmadenijad's faction may have decided to pre-empt them with a virtual coup.

(I know the US analogies are facile but uh mumble mumble mumble.  disclaimers about my not really knowing anything, etc. should be implicit by now)

[Flannel Boy]

Did someone say Ron Paul? 

His name is like the bat(shit insane) signal: it makes you appear every time.

[Mandark]

Ahmadinejad ran as an outsider in 2005 and his faction is generally composed of younger politicians who aren't clerics.  So he was seen as a challenge to the old order of revolution-era ayatollahs.

Khamenei almost certainly support Rafsanjani in 2005, and he criticized Ahmadinejad's firing of Ari Larijani as chief nuclear negotiator.  So the two are far from completely sympatico.

But Juan Cole says Khamenei and Mousavi have a going back to the 80's, and it's possible that the tenor of the campaign changed so much in the final weeks that people who chose not to block Mousavi's candidacy earlier changed their minds.

The communications shutdown, use of the IRGC and the proclamation from Khamenei show that there's a co-ordinated effort to establish control coming from the national level.  I wonder how much the IRGC leadership is involved, since I think they have a monopoly on providing cell phone service in Iran (their version of the Army Corps of Engineers is big into business and patronage).

Everything is so opaque and Iran's system is so peculiar.  This has to be what Kremlinology was like.

[ToxicAdam]

Mousavi had the "hot chick" vote all wrapped up.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/06/irans_presidential_election.html

[Fresh Prince]

Hmm Persian women do seem on average quite good looking.

[Cheebs]

I was watching Biden on Meet The Press. He clearly seems to think the election was a fraud but is trying to keep his mouth shut  for obvious reasons is just calling the results as "unlikely" and that he has doubts that it was a valid election.

[Stoney Mason]

Well there is this at least. You have to of course be skeptical that this will simply be an attempt to whitewash any wrong doings and confirm the results rather than turn up actual fraud but I guess its better than nothing.

In about-face, Khamenei backs vote fraud probe
After initially welcoming results, Iran’s supreme leader orders investigation

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's state television said Monday that the supreme leader ordered an investigation into claims of fraud in last week's presidential election.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered the powerful Guardian Council to examine the allegations by pro-reform candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who has claimed widespread vote rigging in Friday's election. The government declared President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the winner in a landslide victory.

It was a stunning turnaround for Iran's most powerful figure, who previously welcomed the results.

The outcome of the election has disconcerted Western powers trying to induce the world's fifth-biggest oil exporter to curb its nuclear program. President Barack Obama had urged Iran's leadership "to unclench its fist" for a new start in ties.

Mousavi wrote an appeal Sunday to the Guardian Council, a powerful 12-member body that is a pillar of Iran's theocracy. Mousavi also met Sunday with Khamenei.

Vice President Joe Biden said Sunday that Obama's effort to engage Tehran after a nearly three-decade estrangement would continue, regardless of the election's result. Obama, shifting course from his predecessor, has said he wants to talk to the theocratic regime in Tehran, with the central goal of stopping it from producing a nuclear weapon. He has set a year-end deadline for a positive response to his overture.

Biden told NBC's "Meet the Press" that the administration was still examining whether Friday's vote in Iran accurately reflected a response to Obama's desire for engagement.

"That's the question," Biden said. "Is this the result of the Iranian people's wishes? The hope is that the Iranian people, all their votes have been counted, they've been counted fairly. But look, we just don't know enough."

He said the United States had no choice right now but to accept the outcome as announced, but, Biden said, "I have doubts" about its fairness.

Mousavi's backers have waged three days of street protests in Tehran.

Protest rally postponed in Tehran
The defeated candidate's supporters called off a planned protest rally in Tehran on Monday after the Interior Ministry declared it would be illegal and treated as sedition.

A Mousavi Web site said the gathering had been delayed after the Interior Ministry refused to authorize it.

The European Union urged Iran not to use violence against those protesting against the disputed election and urged the authorities to look into complaints of irregularities.

"I have thorough respect for all the Iranian citizens who have shown their discontent and have demonstrated peacefully," EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner told reporters in Luxembourg. "I do hope that the security forces will refrain from showing violence."

The Guardian Council, whose chairman, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, endorsed Ahmadinejad before the vote, said it would rule within 10 days on two official complaints it had received from Mousavi and another losing candidate, Mohsen Rezaie.

"Mousavi and Rezaie appealed yesterday. After the official announcement (of the appeal) the Guardian Council has seven to 10 days to see if it was a healthy election or not," ISNA news agency quoted council spokesman Abbasali Kadkhodai as saying. 

Guardian council's role
The council vets election candidates and must formally approve results for the outcome to stand. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei earlier told Iranians to support Ahmadinejad.

On Sunday, Mousavi's supporters handed out leaflets calling for a rally in downtown Tehran on Monday afternoon. The protests over the last two days are the sharpest show of discontent against the Islamic Republic's leadership for years.

"The Interior Ministry issued a statement and said no permission had been issued for a rally ... The holding of such a gathering would be illegal," state radio said.

"Some seditious elements had planned to hold a rally and by fabrication said they had permission from the Interior Ministry. Any disrupter of public security would be dealt with according to the law," it said.

Mousavi urged Iranians on Sunday to keep up nationwide protests "in a peaceful and legal way."

Last week a senior Revolutionary Guard official vowed to foil what he called an attempt by Mousavi and his supporters in the streets to stage a "velvet revolution" — the name given to Czechoslovakia's non-violent 1989 revolution against communism.

Protests, clashes
Pro-Mousavi demonstrators threw stones at police at Tehran University on Sunday and clashed with Ahmadinejad supporters on a main avenue that was littered with broken glass and fires.

In the north of the capital, a stronghold of Mousavi backers, riot police patrolled after midnight. Garbage burned in the street, some cars had their windows broken, and police blocked access to roads.

After dusk, some Mousavi supporters took to rooftops across Tehran calling out "Allahu Akbar" (God is greatest), an echo of tactics by protesters in the 1979 Islamic revolution.

U.S. leaders have shown caution in their comments on the election so far, in the hope of keeping alive Obama's strategy of engagement with Iran, with tougher talk coming from Europe.

Germany, one of Iran's biggest trading partners and a negotiator in the West's nuclear talks with Tehran, said it had summoned the Iranian ambassador on Sunday.

"We are looking toward Tehran with great concern at the moment. There are a lot of reports about electoral fraud," Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told German ZDF TV.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31365097/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/

[Cheebs]

He is probably just saying it to shut people up and end the chaos, I doubt anything will come of it.

[brawndolicious]

Well they obviously need the 10 days to forger the votes but ultimately, they may throw Ahmadinejad under the bus and do a revote.

[Beardo]

A lot of people have been claiming that the American media hasn't been covering the elections. I just want to point out that Drudge.com has been showcasing the election extensively.

[Stoney Mason]

A lot of people have been claiming that the American media hasn't been covering the elections. I just want to point out that Drudge.com has been showcasing the election extensively.

Actually he was quite slow to cover it in comparison to some other sites and only shifted relatively recently. He's covered minor stories in the past a lot more than this and more quickly.

I've been checking the onlines sites quite a bit and initially noticed how relatively little coverage he gave the story in headlines form.

[Phoenix Dark]

Drudge's initial motive was to cover it as an embarrassment/failure to Obama, but now he's shifted attention because there's a bigger issue at hand there. Even now he's up to his old tricks, like the current "MOUSAVI SEEKS FATWA..." headline.

[etiolate]

cnn has had the most coverage from what i've seen
fox has been all over healthcare and palin
and the rest is pretty much E! network level stuff

the attention whoring of websites has kept me from botherin with them

[Mr. Gundam]

BBC World News and News Hour with Jim Lehrer have been pretty damn incredible.

[Mandark]

Fraud or not, it's nice to see the protesters showing a bit of spine.  I hope the elites feel enough pressure that they decide to accommodate the reform movement rather than crack down on it.

[Guybrush Threepwood]

awesome pic

[CurseoftheGods]

awesome pic

http://6.media.tumblr.com/WS7ReC9ySorh66exlus4RBEPo1_500.jpg

[Guybrush Threepwood]

What do you mean ?

Look at that smile. Despite all the shit she has to face simply because she's a woman, she still has the balls to go out there and fight for what she believes in.

That pic will be famous one day.

 

[CurseoftheGods]

Sorry, I feel bad seeing women with black eyes. Didn't know feeling that way was so wrong and unnatural.

[Guybrush Threepwood]

*sigh* whatever

[Flannel Boy]

Hmm Persian women do seem on average quite good looking.

Average?

I'm going to make several assumptions: Most photographers in Iran are male, and they are likely to take pictures of any photogenic women they can find among the crowds of voters. Then male publishers sift through these photos and publish pictures of the most beautiful Iranian women they can find. (Why else do so many Iranian-Canadian chicks look like amnintenho?)

Average nothing!

[etiolate]

I dunno

My persian-american female friends are normally hawt.

[Flannel Boy]

I dunno

My persian-american female friends are normally hawt.

1. that can't possibly be a very large sample
2. post pics or shut up.

[brawndolicious]

Malek is correct.  His name is arabic so he has some actual credibility on this.

[Flannel Boy]

Malek is correct.  His name is arabic so he has some actual credibility on this.

But I'm not Arabic and neither are Iranians!

[etiolate]

Yeah.... posting pics would be creepy.  And one of them is less a friend and more a chick I flirted with that turned out a bit crazy and might hunt me down if I posted pics.

[Phoenix Dark]

too bad Malek can't use his analytical knowledge to actually get a woman. 

[brawndolicious]

Fraud or not, it's nice to see the protesters showing a bit of spine.  I hope the elites feel enough pressure that they decide to accommodate the reform movement rather than crack down on it.

what do you mean by accommodate?

Malek is correct.  His name is arabic so he has some actual credibility on this.

But I'm not Arabic and neither are Iranians!

Well they don't know that.

[Mandark]

am nintenho:  To treat the reformist movement as a group that needs to be co-opted or appeased, rather than something that can be stamped out.

[etiolate]

The question is what would appease them? If they don't trust the results, would they trust an investigation?

[Mandark]

I'm not talking about just the reaction to these specific events.

If the Iranian elites see the reform movement as tenuous enough that they can end it with more oppression, that's what they'll do.

If they see it as an intractable fact, they will have to tolerate some level of activity of liberal political parties and other aspects of a civil society.  Long term, that's the only way Iran moves towards freedom.

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

I don't expect much from this.  Still, the fact that they are even addressing that there might be voter fraud I think goes a long way.

awesome pic

http://6.media.tumblr.com/WS7ReC9ySorh66exlus4RBEPo1_500.jpg

Maybe she fell down a flight of stairs.

[Tauntaun]

awesome pic

(Image removed from quote.)

Guess she's already been told once. 

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

[brawndolicious]

am nintenho:  To treat the reformist movement as a group that needs to be co-opted or appeased, rather than something that can be stamped out.

The problem is that nobody can actually prove that there was ANY election fraud.  Who knows how accurate the "official" leaked numbers of Mousavi are?  In the future, people will question if the election was valid but Ahmadinejad will still be the president for another term.

Also, the idea that this will bring on any real secularization doesn't make any sense.  Both candidates firmly believe in the idea of an Islamic state.