And then there's Iran...

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, here at a Sunday news conference, said elections were 'soundest of their kind.' (from CNN)


Here is video of protesters in Tehran on Saturday June 13, or Sunday June 14.
The protests are broken up by police on motorcycles. One of the police motorcycles goes down. We next see the motorcycle on fire, and the police person being led away - presumably by protesters who are trying to give him medical aid.




There was plenty of talk in 2000 and especially 2004 of fraudulent elections in the United States. If, in 2004, those of us who couldn't believe there wasn't fraud in that election had taken to the streets (on an equal scale as Iran, proportional to our population), it could have looked exactly like this video.

Go here to see pictures of protesters in Salem, Oregon from 2004. Not quite as many people.


Alleged fraud in America vs Alleged fraud in Iran. In 2004 we hoped we'd survive the next four years of Bush so we could get another chance to change the tone of the government.
Maybe we should have gone out in the streets.

Something to think about...in a country that values the 'rule of law' is it best to peacefully protest election fraud in the streets and risk violence (because you can't know how people will respond or be assured of the purity of everyone's motives). Or is it better to allow the fraud to stand and then work to make change for the next election?

In any event - I support the Iranian protesters and I think Ahmadinejad is a loser (both literally and metaphorically). His responses to the protests reveal a gap in what he says and the reality we can see. That's the most obvious symptom of a corrupt and illegitimate government.

Update: The video below is from CNN - a discussion of Iran on Fareed Zakaria's GPS. I've heard Reza Aslan discuss Iran before and like how he explains the politics and motivations of Iran. This is a good discussion that also includes Afshin Molavi and Nicholas Burns.