Some evidence is coming in showing elements of the Revolutionary Guard of Iran standing down, or even vowing to defend the protesters.
Here.
If this is true, then Iran may have gone from mass protests to full blown revolution.
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Saturday, June 20, 2009
Video of Iranian Thugs Opening Fire on Crowd, and Crowd Not Backing Down
Here. Apparently from earlier today.
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Obama: Not Concerned About Right and Wrong, but About "Tenor and Tone"
When you live in a world where words and words alone are the beginning, middle and end of all matters, then it is perhaps understandable that one's principal concern for a dictatorship brutally repressing a populace crying out for freedom, is the 'tenor and tone' of the dictators.
The problem, of course, is that the real world goes beyond mere words and sophistry, and into concrete actions. Out in the world beyond the academic, the literary, the poetic prose, the nuance and the tortured moral equivalence, we face concrete things such as:
- killing of the lowest order: not in the name of preserving the life and liberty of one's neighbors, as soldiers must sometimes do, but in order deny our neighbors these god given rights,
- state repression: not mere crimes committed by society's outcasts, but sanctioned wrongs which cannot elicit punishment, and
- control of thought, speech and information: not a purposeful, debated and balanced weighing of competing societal interests, but a bald control of information as a tool to retain power.
I draw on these examples because those who live in a world of nuanced moral equivalences, those who pointed to the monitoring of suspected terrorist calls, or a handful of rogue soldiers in Abu Garib, as examples of the worst kind of state repression (often for purely partisan reasons), are now befuddled and muted when confronted with the stark differences in that which they have claimed were the same.
The reason there are millions of citizens crying out in Iran, as opposed to a handful of special interest groups with a cackle of special interest media following them around, is that there is a difference between grievances we experience in the West and the horrors those from countries like Iran must endure. It is quantifiable, calculable, and morally certain. Our handful of "repressors" at Abu Garib were investigated and punished in accordance with the law. Their repressors ARE the law. There is no comparison between state repression of freedoms, and the imperfections and grievances that will always arise in a modern democracy.
An epic battle is being waged at a time and place that will no doubt shape the history of our World. In this battle there is no mushy middle. There are no nuanced qualifications or limitations. It is not about tone or tenor.
It is simply about right and wrong.
/
The problem, of course, is that the real world goes beyond mere words and sophistry, and into concrete actions. Out in the world beyond the academic, the literary, the poetic prose, the nuance and the tortured moral equivalence, we face concrete things such as:
- killing of the lowest order: not in the name of preserving the life and liberty of one's neighbors, as soldiers must sometimes do, but in order deny our neighbors these god given rights,
- state repression: not mere crimes committed by society's outcasts, but sanctioned wrongs which cannot elicit punishment, and
- control of thought, speech and information: not a purposeful, debated and balanced weighing of competing societal interests, but a bald control of information as a tool to retain power.
I draw on these examples because those who live in a world of nuanced moral equivalences, those who pointed to the monitoring of suspected terrorist calls, or a handful of rogue soldiers in Abu Garib, as examples of the worst kind of state repression (often for purely partisan reasons), are now befuddled and muted when confronted with the stark differences in that which they have claimed were the same.
The reason there are millions of citizens crying out in Iran, as opposed to a handful of special interest groups with a cackle of special interest media following them around, is that there is a difference between grievances we experience in the West and the horrors those from countries like Iran must endure. It is quantifiable, calculable, and morally certain. Our handful of "repressors" at Abu Garib were investigated and punished in accordance with the law. Their repressors ARE the law. There is no comparison between state repression of freedoms, and the imperfections and grievances that will always arise in a modern democracy.
An epic battle is being waged at a time and place that will no doubt shape the history of our World. In this battle there is no mushy middle. There are no nuanced qualifications or limitations. It is not about tone or tenor.
It is simply about right and wrong.
/
Friday, June 19, 2009
No "Hope and Change" for Iranians
Krauthammer. Read it all.
During the presidential election those who actually sought to scrutinize, rather than fawn over Obama (much of the media being in the latter category) noted his 130 "present" votes in the Illinois legislature and wondered if he would also take a pass on hard decisions as president.
As Krathammer rightly notes, what's going on in Iran may be the beginning of the end of brutal theocratic rule and a tectonic shift towards democracy in that region. Millions cry out for democracy against rulers who are avowed enemies of the U.S. and whose main export in the region is terrorism and proxy warriors.
And Obama votes "present".
Shameful.
/
During the presidential election those who actually sought to scrutinize, rather than fawn over Obama (much of the media being in the latter category) noted his 130 "present" votes in the Illinois legislature and wondered if he would also take a pass on hard decisions as president.
As Krathammer rightly notes, what's going on in Iran may be the beginning of the end of brutal theocratic rule and a tectonic shift towards democracy in that region. Millions cry out for democracy against rulers who are avowed enemies of the U.S. and whose main export in the region is terrorism and proxy warriors.
And Obama votes "present".
Shameful.
/
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Media Bias By the Numbers
ABC News, which is hosting what is essentially an Obama infomercial on his health care plan, has its donations numbers released.
By way of background, the general public voted roughly 53% to 47 %, for Obama.
So did ABC employees donate close to 50:50? Nope.
55: 45? Keep trying.
60:40? Uh uh.
75:25? Not even close.
Try 33:1.
At that level, imagine the group think, the complete one-sidedness, the base assumptions that not only go unchecked, but where the alternative viewpoint is not even comprehended. By the way, these numbers are no aberration but are consistent with other similar studies.
There's a reason why the implicit message in every media story is "why isn't the government doing something", why conservatives' ads are viewed as abhorrent even if they're true whereas Liberal dishonest ads ("we're not making this up") are just normal politics, why the media has long since forgotten the greatest political scandal of our time which tore at the very underpinnings of government accountability - bypassing it to flog a conservative PM from two decades ago, why Harper giving a speech to Americans is viewed as the under current of U.S. manifest destiny whereas pointing out Iggy actually declared himself to be American is somehow off base, etc, etc, etc.
The media is on their team. It's as simple as that.
/
By way of background, the general public voted roughly 53% to 47 %, for Obama.
So did ABC employees donate close to 50:50? Nope.
55: 45? Keep trying.
60:40? Uh uh.
75:25? Not even close.
Try 33:1.
At that level, imagine the group think, the complete one-sidedness, the base assumptions that not only go unchecked, but where the alternative viewpoint is not even comprehended. By the way, these numbers are no aberration but are consistent with other similar studies.
There's a reason why the implicit message in every media story is "why isn't the government doing something", why conservatives' ads are viewed as abhorrent even if they're true whereas Liberal dishonest ads ("we're not making this up") are just normal politics, why the media has long since forgotten the greatest political scandal of our time which tore at the very underpinnings of government accountability - bypassing it to flog a conservative PM from two decades ago, why Harper giving a speech to Americans is viewed as the under current of U.S. manifest destiny whereas pointing out Iggy actually declared himself to be American is somehow off base, etc, etc, etc.
The media is on their team. It's as simple as that.
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Did I Hear That Correctly? Iggy's Back to Blustering About Taking Down the Conservatives?
"Let me at him, just let me at him" Iggy yells to an empty school yard, an hour after he ran away from his after-school fight with the biggest kid in class he had bragged about beating to a pulp all week long.
(Translation for the french link: "Iggy's telling his troops to prepare for a November election")
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(Translation for the french link: "Iggy's telling his troops to prepare for a November election")
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Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Iggy: Credibility Gone
Two opposing parties agree to have a look at an issue a few months down the road - seems reasonable to me.
The problem for Iggy, is that for weeks he was promising his supporters the rumble in the jungle, the battle royal, doing the "if you don't give me what I want, I'll bring you down...just try me" bluster, when all he was ever prepared to do was have a nice little fireside chat. The NDP will be merciless at Iggy's failure to obtain anything concrete.
But the results of this fizzled melodrama are far less important than what it says about the man who wants to one day lead this great country. If his supporters can't trust him to do what he says why should the rest of us? After going so far out on a limb to show he means business, only to crater when the chips were down, how can he ever be taken seriously?
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The problem for Iggy, is that for weeks he was promising his supporters the rumble in the jungle, the battle royal, doing the "if you don't give me what I want, I'll bring you down...just try me" bluster, when all he was ever prepared to do was have a nice little fireside chat. The NDP will be merciless at Iggy's failure to obtain anything concrete.
But the results of this fizzled melodrama are far less important than what it says about the man who wants to one day lead this great country. If his supporters can't trust him to do what he says why should the rest of us? After going so far out on a limb to show he means business, only to crater when the chips were down, how can he ever be taken seriously?
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