The phony talk of “green shoots” worked for a while as the administration and business establishment united in misleading the public about recovery prospects to induce it to spend. As they say you cannot fool all of the people all of the time. So, not surprisingly while people expressed a growing confidence, they acted cautiously.
Good news. If Washington Institute’s David Pollock report on the Middle Eastern/Muslim reaction to events in Iran is to be trusted, Iranian opposition forces can expect some serious help. It is Saudi financial support, rather than Obama’s Cairo speech, that was behind the recent electoral victory of the anti-Syrian, anti-Hezbollah forces. The Saudis, unlike the Americans, have money, are willing to spend it and need to answer to no one.
Much has been said, and justifiably so, about the role the poor Iranian economy plays in the current Iranian election crisis. Much less attention has been played to the role the global economic recession has already played in the rage sweeping the country and the role it is bound to play in its aftermath. Emad Gad, an Egyptian expert in international affairs, suggests that “Ahmadinejad will concentrate in the economic field to improve living conditions for his population after this crisis.”
President Barack Obama is about to hold a press conference in the Rose Garden and liberal blogger, Nico Pitney, is hopeful that finally, finally, Obama will condemn the bloody repression in Iran which Pitney has so passionately and tirelessly documented. He is not alone. Last night I saw David Gergen on CNN lose it. Yesterday, E.J. Dionne expounded on the Liberals’ Iran Dilemma. Liberals wish to avoid criticizing their “chosen one” but they can no longer bear his amorality and stubborn refusal to face an unwanted reality:
Netanyahu does what comes naturally. He stands by the demonstrators. He also does the diplomatic thing and keeps mum on Obama while giving a reluctant Gregory a lesson in democracy and immoral equivalency.
I also know that Iran’s women stand in the vanguard. For days now, I’ve seen them urging less courageous men on. I’ve seen them get beaten and return to the fray. “Why are you sitting there?” one shouted at a couple of men perched on the sidewalk on Saturday. “Get up! Get up!”Another green-eyed woman, Mahin, aged 52, staggered into an alley clutching her face and in tears. Then, against the urging of those around her, she limped back into the crowd moving west toward Freedom Square. Cries of “Death to the dictator!” and “We want liberty!” accompanied her.
Qatar’s English daily,The Peninsular,provides us with the information MSM does it’s best to hide for it does not support the claim that Obama’s caution has been reciprocated or prevented the US from becoming “the issue.” The chants were too complex not to have been carefully orchastrated:
I hope Barack Obama takes the time to read Ayatollah Khamenei’s speech. He would find it most educational. For the Supreme Leader, as Obama likes to call him, has not directed his rhetorical fire at his most forthright detractors, France and Germany. No, he directed them, as he always did and would have done if Obama had been more forthright in his response, at the United States. If president Obama hoped his “tepid” response would undermine Khamenei’s ability to posit America as the enemy (second, of course, to the Zionists), he was wrong. In other words, he betrayed American values in a manner that disgusted EVEN the editors of the Egyptian government daily Al Ahram and got “Death to America” chants in return.
For months as I listened to all the “conversation” about the “green shoots” and watched the stock market going up and up, I had a funny feeling that something is not on the up and up but I dared not write a word. On what basis? But last night I tuned in to the last minutes of the Charlie Rose show and heard Michael Lewis, the man Rose said was described to him “as best writer about economics today,” express similar sentiments:
Why are Iranians questioning the validity of the election results? Well, consider the case of Kerman, a city of half a million located in the southeast part of the country. According to the election map published this morning in the NYT, Ahmadinejad won over 70% of the votes in Kerman province.
In a superb article one of my favorite columnist, Brett Stephens, points out that Obama would much rather see “regime change” come to democratic Israel than to Theocratic Iran and, hence, can be expected to treat Netanyahu much more harshly than Ahmadinejad. Of course, nothing else can be expected from the man whose most beloved mentor is Jeremiah Wright. Unfortunately, Stephens goes on:
They are demonstrating in Boston, Toronto, London, Vienna, Berlin, Budapest and more importantly, in Dubai and Malaysia! Watch videos here http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/92055.html
Yesterday’s interview with Joe Biden has led me to believe that David Gregory may just emerge as a worthy successor to Tim Russert. Here is his exchange on Israel. Do remember Joe Biden went to Israel and personally vouched for Barack Obama’s commitment to the Jewish state. Obama personally followed him and 72% of the Jews believed them and voted for Obama. Since then Obama visited the Middle East twice carefully avoiding Israel. Gregory’s questions also explains the reasons Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, admits that Jews are concerned:
Consider: ”U.S. analysts find it “not credible” that challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi would have lost the balloting in his hometown or that a third candidate, Mehdi Karoubi, would have received less than 1 percent of the total vote, a senior U.S. officials told FOX News.” American “experts” on Iran are shocked, shocked, shocked Karim Sadjapour, analyst at carnegie endowment for international peace:
Roula Khalaf of the Financial Times reports: ”Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has often backed Mr Ahmadi-Nejad’s approach, has taken notice. Last week he responded to the criticism by insisting the “honour of the nation” was “reflected in the world”.“I do not accept the sayings of those who imagine that our nation has become belittled in the world be-cause of its commitment to its principles,” he said. “This path will continue until final victory.”
An article in the June issue of Le Monde Diplomatique detailing Iran’s economic woes leads me to question whether the excitement surrounding the upcoming Iranian elections is not a rouse. Will the Mullahs follow in Mao’s footsteps and use this “let a thousand flowers bloom” as way to identify their enemies and, eventually, destroy them? A continued rise in the price of oil brought about at least in part by the collapse of the dollar would certainly enable them to do so.
There are times I wish for creative ambiguity. Watching Hillary Clinton dial back not only her own campaign assertion but also her own envoy’s recommendation that the US would make clear to Iran that it would retaliate militarily against an Iranian nuclear attack, I wished George Stephanopoulos had not stiven so hard for clarity.
In March 1951 the Shah appointed General Haj-Ali Razmara as prime minister. Four days later he was assassinated by Khalil Tahmasebi, a member of an Islamist terrorist group Fadayan-e Islam:
