Sunday, June 14, 2009

Iran, all hell breaks loose

So Iran held a presidential election on Friday and the election was very popular this year. Many came out to support their candidates and the internet and text messaging were very widely used. This morning the election results came in and the world was stunned. No one is buying the huge win for incumbant Ahmdinajad. The students who supported the reform candidate took to the streets in protest, so the police turned violent. Next thing you know the internet and cell phone service around the country goes down, and buses go up, in flames. 

Is this part two of the 79' Revolution? Part one being the overthrow of western infuence in the nation, part two being the instalation of complete democracy and the final ousting of a dictatorship? After the 79' Revolution removing the Shah the conservate and reform niche's of the nation battled it out on the streets to see who would lead the nation. The conservatives won. And everytime since, that the reform party has tried to make a dent in conservative power they have not been able to. Some say because they are unwilling to go violent and aggressive against the ruling powers. But maybe thats whats needed. and maybe now is the time. 

One election official working in the Ministry of the Interier the governmetn body that counts the election results says their was no fraud because no votes were counted. The election was handed to Ahmidinajad. Other rumers are saying voting boxes filled with votes were being burned all around the country.  Since the president, Ahmidinijad has limited power, many beleive the Supreme Leader, the real leader of Iran, has approved the election fraud. 

Yet others are saying maybe not. Maybe Ahmidinijad has staged his own coup without the consent of the Supreme leader. But the fact that a coup was staged is pretty much undebatable. Juan Cole explains why, a few of his examples are, 1. the history of Iranian elections shows different ethnic areas vote more favorably for their ethnically related candidate yet in this election that did not happen, all areas voted the same. 2. In the past region and town voting habits were broken down and released publically, this did not happen this year. 

Many on the street are saying Ahmidinajad's 63% of the vote is too much to be deemed believable. "if he got 51, 52% it might have seemed beleivable but not 63%."

Day one after the results were released was pretty insane, what will happen next is anybodys guess.

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