I'm Not Sure This Is Going to Help

If this is the best Rafsanjani can come up with in a week, I'm here to tell you right now, the people who are yelling "Allah u Ahkbar" from their rooftops every night don't give a shit about preserving the Revolution.

Unless he's planning on a broader push for the restructuring of governance in Iran - placing more power in the hands of (honestly) elected officials - I'm sorry to say this isn't going to end well.

Or soon...

[That is, unless the NeoCons have their way again.]

A Warning to the NeoCons

Seriously, the people of Iran not only should take control over their own fates (as they are doing), but they really don't want our "help" again.

Which really calls into question who is naive on the subject of foreign policy...

Actually, We Support Higher Taxes For Health Care

While patiently watching developments in Iran, interspersed with the usual reporting ranging from the serious to the stupid, I distinctly remember some commentators stating that while a recent CBS/NYT poll showed interviewees supported a public option (rather overwhelmingly) - there was a complementary lack of support for higher taxes to pay for it.

Perhaps we've discovered the reason our media sucks so badly: they can't read.

Americans overwhelmingly support substantial changes to the health care system and are strongly behind one of the most contentious proposals Congress is considering, a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

The poll found that most Americans would be willing to pay higher taxes so everyone could have health insurance and that they said the government could do a better job of holding down health-care costs than the private sector.

Seriously, that's the first two paragraphs. Not very hard to find, placed so as to be easily understood and grasped by most people.

Now, if we could just please stop with the "Obama's health care plans are dead" meme, and teach the morons in the Senate to read as well...

Green Shoots Meet Weed Killer

When the first reported drop in continuing unemployment claims came out last week, I wondered to myself, how many of those no longer receiving unemployment insurance were simply people who exhausted their 39 weeks?

I see I wasn't the only one.

1979 or 1997?

It feels like 1979, but it's now becoming just as likely that it's going to be a 1997 redux:

I think Moussavi is right to avoid extreme positions even as Khamenei has deliberately radicalized the conflict. He’s right because his moderation fans internal divisions that seem rampant. Any counterrevolutionary stance, at least at this point, would have the opposite effect.

The problem for Mousavi's moderation is rather plain to see on the streets of several major Iranian cities.

And I of course have several good reasons to believe the people really want mere reform. The Revolution that has ruled Iran for 30 years is an abject failure, and thanks to a blatantly stolen election, they can find no clearer resolution than the destruction of the system that arose out of it.

The problem for the people, however, is also rather plain to see on the streets - and is threatening to get worse. It's a delicate opening for wholesale change that may never appear depending on how the leading clerics handle their work.

Will they create a hole in the current regime large enough to destroy it, or just enough to placate the growing anger that continues to grow?

Something tells me that tomorrow (or Friday) could be our first sign about which side of the anti-Ahmadi/Khamenei resistance - reform or revolution - is going to take the larger and most concrete step.

Then Again

Maybe this is why Rafsanjani isn't particularly inclined towards validating the Ahmadi coup. [Original in Farsi here.]

As someone in Iran has recently said, all eyes are indeed on Rafsanjani... which in more ways than one is a pretty sad commentary on the Islamic Republic.

Only 50 Cities

Granted, with the caveat that they've only reviewed 10% of the votes.

Bastards...

Interesting Development

If true, and there's as even a chance it's not, this could prove to be an interesting development.

I've never seen a problem with an Islamic Republic where the clerics have a reduced or reformed role (perferably one that doesn't include a strong capacity for interference in civil law or foreign relations), rather that the way the system was set up Iran would of course lend itself to what the Iranian people have endured the last 30 years.

A discussion that is not likely going to come into play in Qom (assuming this report is even half correct), but one never knows when Rafsanjani is involved...

"From his mouth to Allah's ears"

I can find not one thing to disagree with here, except for the one unknowable variable.

How long can the people of Iran hold out?