EPTOn June 15 2009 02:27 MarklarMarklar wrote:
so who did (would) you vote for xeris
so who did (would) you vote for xeris
I made my dad vote for Moussavi
Iranian protests - Page 6
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Xeris
Iran17695 Posts
I made my dad vote for Moussavi | ||
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Xeris
Iran17695 Posts
On June 15 2009 02:31 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: Well not all the links/sources are from Huffington post. Some are from Twitter, YouTube, BBC, Al Jazeera, and so forth. I think most of the unrest comes from the actual numbers and so forth, as well as the violent crackdown that started almost as soon as the polls closed. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/2009614135353845916.html Winning the popular vote etc. is one thing it's whole different story when Cell Phones, Power, and media outlets are cut off. And the foreign press is told they should be prepared to leave the country, as well as the mass arrest of opposition officials. These things are hard to determine truthfully. If you ask Moussavi supporters, they'll say there was fraud. Not likely because there was actually fraud, but that they're shocked at losing. Here's the thing. Do I think the election was 100% free and fair? Probably not. There are many elections in Iran that are rigged. HOWEVER, do I think possible election rigging were why Ahmadinejad won? No. If there was rigging (probably was some), it wasn't in any significant way. I would understand if the result was a dubious 51-49 win for Ahmadinejad. It's HARD to rig 12 million votes. Also, understand Iran's position. They're trying to maintain order. Pretty much all journalists are from Western nations, and I haven't read one good news about the election. Everything I've read is "Moussavi who was expected to win lost the election and his supporters are claiming election rigging." There's no news that says "Wow Iran had such an amazing voter turnout, they should be proud to be moving along a more democratic route". If I was Iran's government I'd want foreign reporters to leave too. This is only hurting Iran. | ||
Jibba
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MarklarMarklar
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Xeris
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He even told me that he would be very surprised if Ahmadinejad lost, simply because of such a huge incumbency factor. I even asked about election rigging and he said that the chances were fairly slim that there would be major election rigging. Really what happened in Iran is not a surprise if you actually know the politics. What happened is what has always historically happened since 1979. Incumbent runs, incumbent wins. The DIFFERENCE this time is that Moussavi is such a strong personality and through his campaign he was able to generate zealous support. There has never been such a wildly popular figure running against an incumbent before. This is why many people are "shocked" at the result. In the past, nobody has really campaigned against an incumbent (aka Rafsanjani, Khatami) because nobody thought there was a legit chance at victory. This time around, Moussavi campaigned really hard to have a chance. And now people seem to forget that really nothing out of the ordinary has happened. | ||
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Railz
United States1449 Posts
On June 15 2009 02:36 Xeris wrote: These things are hard to determine truthfully. If you ask Moussavi supporters, they'll say there was fraud. Not likely because there was actually fraud, but that they're shocked at losing. Here's the thing. Do I think the election was 100% free and fair? Probably not. There are many elections in Iran that are rigged. HOWEVER, do I think possible election rigging were why Ahmadinejad won? No. If there was rigging (probably was some), it wasn't in any significant way. I would understand if the result was a dubious 51-49 win for Ahmadinejad. It's HARD to rig 12 million votes. Also, understand Iran's position. They're trying to maintain order. Pretty much all journalists are from Western nations, and I haven't read one good news about the election. Everything I've read is "Moussavi who was expected to win lost the election and his supporters are claiming election rigging." There's no news that says "Wow Iran had such an amazing voter turnout, they should be proud to be moving along a more democratic route". If I was Iran's government I'd want foreign reporters to leave too. This is only hurting Iran. Who said they had to rig anything. It is possible to fake numbers. Xeris, check out Juan Cole's blog. Cole is liberal (and never shuts up about anything), but he's also generally regarded as one of the new Mid East scholars. http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/stealing-iranian-election.html | ||
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{CC}StealthBlue
United States41117 Posts
Students & people fighting back a large group of police & Basij right now at university of physics! I'm going to join them. #iranelectionabout 1 hour ago from TwitterFox is there any end to police's motorcycles?! how much more we should burn?! #iranelection https://twitter.com/Change_for_Iran | ||
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Jibba
United States22883 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/8052/6a00d83451c45669e201157.jpg) Hah, I wonder if that's actually true. EDIT: For those who don't get it, Ahmadinejad's lead supposedly grew proportionately with Mousavi's when 7 official announcements were made. Election results don't come in that smoothly, they're generally filled with lots of spikes as different regions and ethnicities are counted, but a shitty cover up job wouldn't account for this (and often times such smooth curves are found in cases of election fraud.) | ||
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Xeris
Iran17695 Posts
On June 15 2009 02:43 Railz wrote: Who said they had to rig anything. It is possible to fake numbers. http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/stealing-iranian-election.html That's true but I'm skeptical. I'm not one for conspiracy theories. I simply believe that the losing party just doesn't want to accept the loss. And Western journalists are fueling the fire. I don't even like or support Ahmadinejad either, but I think national unity is far more important than this petty protesting. PS. I read his blog. | ||
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Xeris
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Jibba
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/13/iranian-election | ||
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Railz
United States1449 Posts
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Xeris
Iran17695 Posts
Jibba United States. June 15 2009 02:55. Posts 6484 PM Profile Blog Quote Here's your counter argument, Xeris. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/13/iranian-election that's not a counter argument, that's exactly my argument O_O | ||
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Xeris
Iran17695 Posts
On June 15 2009 02:57 Railz wrote: People use it for easy sources of citing. If someone who is reading the blog doesn't know the subject at hand, Wikipedia is still the quickest way to learn a subject foreign to a person. ya but Wikipedia could easily be wrong. I could go and change those numbers right now and nobody would know O_O | ||
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Jibba
United States22883 Posts
On June 15 2009 02:59 Xeris wrote: that's not a counter argument, that's exactly my argument O_O "Here's an academic's representation of your counter argument" is what I was trying to say. So instead of just being forum goer vs. forum goer, there's some legitimate opinions being weighed here. | ||
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Jibba
United States22883 Posts
At 3:08 PM, Blogger gdamiani said... I fully understand that you are disappointed with the result as any would if he was following this election without any "esprit critique" through the prism of western media and academia. Indeed in the west there seemed to be throughout this campaign only one candidate in Iran and on type of supporter (the green-girls of Mousavi) – even media like Al-Jazeera managed this tour de force of having debates with invitees reflecting only one point of view. Furthermore from the onset we were getting softened up in case the results did not go well in favour of Mousavi by informing us of the "shutting down" of Facebook – as if that site has any statistical significance in that part of the world... As far as irregularities and outside pushes goes lets here are two of them – Al-Jazeera English managed to have an exclusive lengthy interview with Mousavi aired the day before the election when no campaigning is supposed to take place – It is Mousavi that did not wait the official results and proclaimed immediately – few hours after the end of voting – that he is the winner, in full breach of what you highlight in your article (The Electoral Commission is supposed to wait three days etc.) and this was suspiciously carried over by all western media including Al-Jazeera – except PressTV which tried to stick to the rule. I was indeed stunned as PressTV itself did not expect to have the results before the next day. Last but not least if I understand your thrust it is now a dogma that only pro or pseudo-pro western candidates can win fairly and squarely elections. I advise everybody to look at Lebanon were Hizb Allah accepted the electoral outcome despite its coalition got the majority popular vote and found itself in parliament in the opposition. I do not recall any media complaining of this outcome or cry foul. Back to Iran, To me it sounds more like a velvet type revolution that was nipped in the bud... by the people of Iran. | ||
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Railz
United States1449 Posts
On June 15 2009 02:59 Xeris wrote: ya but Wikipedia could easily be wrong. I could go and change those numbers right now and nobody would know O_O Citation sources are usually quick to moderate. I remember when someone changed France to say "Losers" and it was changed like 5 minutes later. | ||
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Jibba
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Xeris
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Think about it. Iran is a very fragile democracy (stable state but democratically not so). With each election Iran has seemingly embraced many democratic tenets more and more. This election was supposed to be the height of that. Voter turnout was INSANELY high, the campaigns were well fought, with debates, coalition building, etc. Now Moussavi and his people are threatening that. The Ayatollah's could just as well consolidate their power more and become more autocratic. They're trying to become more democratic because they see this is what the people want and realize their power hinges on the continued support of the people. But when you have people doing fucked up shit like not accepting election results when realistically there was little chance for victory anyways, it messes with the entire democratic process and makes it lose credibility. One of the signs of a stable democracy is power being transferred peacefully (in this case not transferred but retained). Despite Ahmadinejad being pretty dumb and overall not that great of a president, if he had lost I doubt he would have sent his followers into the streets to fight the new regime. Ahmadinejad above all wants to strengthen Iran, and despite all his shortcomings, that's at least the one thing that he has going for him. If Moussavi really is a supporter of IRAN he would tell his followers "I will run again in 4 years. For now though, let's do our best to support the government and try to fix our economy and support the democratic process" . | ||
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Jayve
155 Posts
Xeris wrote: Now again. I think that people are going too far talking about election rigging. It's hard to rig 12 million votes What exactly are you basing this on? Is there a graph that shows the difficulty on the Y-scale and "votes to rig" on the X-scale? You might have read books, written reports and what not and 90% of your family might live there. While that should make your opinion more valuable and less biased, it doesn't mean that you are "just right". My family's been in Iranian politics for more than 40 years. Xeris wrote: But really, what do people expect? Incumbent's have never lost in Iran. Despite what many believe, Ahmadinejad is wildly popular, not only in Iran but throughout the Middle East as well (among people). That's obvious. Anyone hating America can be successful in an area with people who have no reason to not hate America. Even I "dislike" America and the far majority of Americans (not all). The country/government for what it's done and its people for what they've let their government do. | ||
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