John Kerry Admits 2004 Election Sellout

With many people convinced that John Kerry sold out the American people in 2004 by not challenging the clearly fraudulent and pivotal Bush vote in Ohio, Kerry's reported comments to Afghan president Karzai are troubling to say the least.

The Associated Press reports:

A senior American official briefed on the meetings by Sen. John Kerry gave The Associated Press details of the negotiations with Karzai... [Karzai] needed several more hours of convincing, including a long walk with Kerry on the Presidential Palace grounds.

During the extended stroll, the official said, Kerry opened up to Karzai, telling him about his own difficult decision not to challenge the vote count in Ohio on election night in 2004. There were allegations of voting irregularities in favor of incumbent President George W. Bush, and Kerry told Karzai that he knew he could have held up a final outcome for weeks by filing a challenge.

The official said Kerry told Karzai that he had decided then that a challenge was "not in the interests of an already divided and politically weary country." Link Link

Perhaps it would be better phrased that a challenge was: "not in the interests of the power elite in Washington". Comments by John Edwards the day after the election had given hope to Democratic activists that Kerry was standing firm against election fraud:

"John Kerry and I made a promise to the American people that in this election every vote would count and every vote would be counted. Tonight we are keeping our word and we will fight for every vote. You deserve no less."

But the Kerry campaign's subsequent actions seemed to me to be less than a full commitment to challenge the result. The policy looked like one of appeasing activists with weasel words, while not really delivering.

John Kerry has made a mockery of democratic politics and is hardly the person to advise Karzai about disputed elections. Or maybe it would be better to say that one of the 'John Kerry's is making a mockery of democracy. After all there seem to be at least two people wandering the world stage calling themselves John Kerry.

The first of the John Kerry's was involved in some duplicitous maneuvers in the controversial aftermath of the 2004 Presidential Election.

I wrote a story about this on Christmas eve 2004, even as lawsuits over the official outcome in Ohio were working their way through the courts. When Daniel Hoffheimer, the lawyer representing the Kerry campaign in Ohio made a statement which made it look like there was determination to mount a strong challenge, I pounced on the comment. My aim was to force the Kerry campaign off the fence of ambiguity and into the battleground of Ohio's fraud-ridden vote:

Kerry Preparing Grounds to Unconcede

BreakForNews.com, 24th Dec, 2004 23:00ET

by Fintan Dunne, Editor EXCLUSIVE

If you haven't been following John Kerry closely, get ready to hear of surprising developments. The vote-defrauded, potential president-in-waiting has just indicated through his lawyer that the validity of George Bush's reelection is no longer a given....

In early December, when the Kerry Campaign joined a suit by Green and Libertarian party candidates seeking a recount in Delaware County, Daniel Hoffheimer said Kerry wasn't disputing President Bush's victory in Ohio. The aim was to make sure any recount was "done accurately and completely," Hoffheimer said.

Now MSNBC 'Countdown' reports the same Hoffheimer, in comments on their imminent filing in the Ohio recount, concluding their call for a scrupulous recount with this caveat:

"...Only then can the integrity of the entire electoral process and the election of Bush/Cheney warrant the public trust."

That's the first time the Kerry Campaign has impugned the legitimacy of Bush's reelection......

http://www.breakfornews.com/articles/KerryPreparingGroundsToUnconcede.htm

My highlighting of the Kerry lawyer's comment ripped through the Democratic party activist community over the Christmas weekend. And by the following Monday 27th December, 2004 the Kerry campaign was forced off the fence --and onto the wrong side of the issue.

That was when everyone finally realized that Kerry and Edwards were not really challenging the Bush/Cheney alleged victory.

The letdown came via an official statement on Keith Olberman's Countdown show that night. Olberman made a veiled reference to my article, partly calling me a 'conspiracy theorist', but also partly acknowledging that I was actually right to hold the Kerry campaign to account for the statement made.

From Olberman's comments and the Kerry campaign response, it's clear that he had sent them my article, seeking a response:

Last Thursday night, his lead attorney on the ground in Ohio, Daniel J. Hoffheimer, issued a statement that constituted the third or fourth eyebrow-raiser from the Kerry camp in the post-election period.

In announcing that the Kerry-Edwards group would join the bid in Federal District Court in Ohio to preserve all "evidence" from the election and recount there, Mr. Hoffheimer said, on behalf of the senators, that such preservation was necessary because, "Only then can the integrity of the entire electoral process and the election of Bush-Cheney warrant the public trust."

This evening, after several Web columnists and bloggers joined me in questioning the bluntness of the phrase (one even wildly claiming this was a precursor to a Kerry "un-concession"), Hoffheimer changed his tone.

Mr. Hoffheimer advised us by e-mail:

"I would caution the media not to read more into what the Kerry-Edwards campaign has said, than what you hear in the plain meaning of our comments. There are many conspiracy theorists opining these days. There are many allegations of fraud. But this presidential election is over. The Bush-Cheney ticket has won. The Kerry-Edwards campaign has found no conspiracy and no fraud in Ohio, though there have been many irregularities that cry out to be fixed for future elections. Senator Kerry and we in Ohio intend to fix them. When all of the problems in Ohio are added together, however bad they are, they do not add up to a victory for Kerry-Edwards. Senator Kerry's fully-informed and extremely careful assessment the day after the election and before he conceded remains accurate today, notwithstanding all the details we have since learned."

The problem is, of course, that it was not some great, conspiracy-based, tin-foil-hat, piece of linguistic gymnastics, to infer from the conclusion to Mr. Hoffheimer's Thursday statement, that the Kerry-Edwards campaign did not believe that "the integrity of the entire electoral process and the election of Bush-Cheney" warranted the public trust. It is, in fact, to use Mr. Hoffheimer's phrase, "the plain meaning" of the first statement.

How do I know that? To borrow Chairman Sam Ervin's answer to that same question, as posed by John Ehrlichmann at the Senate Watergate hearings in 1973: "Because I can understand the English language. It's my mother's tongue."

The Kerry campaign spent much of 2004 being accused by its critics of trying to be all things to all people. It seems poised to continue to wear the bull's eye well into the New Year.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6667405

Apparently it's vital that the Afghan people have confidence in the validity of their democratic process, but it's perfectly alright for the American people to be denied their democratic mandate in 2004.

One John Kerry thinks that every vote should be counted. Another John Kerry reckoned in 2004 that Bush unquestionably won. A John Kerry half-challenged the result in Ohio. And finally, a person reputed to be John Kerry has now advised Karzai that the American people were too politically weary to bother them with issues like theft of elections.

Will the REAL John Kerry please stand up?

Probably not.

Iranian Regime's Economic Stew

In a recent article on Tehran Bureau, Muhammad Sahimi was too dismissive (by dint of his choice of adjectives), in describing of Ahmadinejad as: "isolated and delusional", and he erred in reducing the regime to the person of the president.

But he was correct to describe Ahmadinejad as "weak". Professor Sahimi accurately catalogs the ongoing obstruction of the hardliners and the very public political fractures. Furthermore he shows the regime is now tellingly reliant on a narrow base of IRGC appointees to fill government posts.

Ahmadinejad/IRGC's core 'hard' support is as low as 12%, with a 'softer' support extending to up to 20% of the population. Because of this, the disputed president's public pronouncements are reductionist and defensive --aimed at his own supporters and the ill-informed. By contrast, most other voices in Iranian politics are addressing the remaining 80%+ of the population.

Despite their hard-line rhetoric, Ahmadinejad/IRGC are unable to crush the reformers. It is going to be far harder to violently suppress any mass public protests in the weeks ahead. And there is a dire political problem looming for this one-legged regime: it's the economy, stupid!

Even a government of national unity would be hard-pressed to dig the Iranian economy out of the mire against the backdrop of deteriorating global finances. A lame duck Ahmadinejad government comprising an ineffectual clique will certainly fail to turn things around. One shudders to contemplate the unspoken financial state of Iran. Currency problems and capital flight are doubtless significant.

As the weeks pass, the economy will join the stolen election as the twin key political issues for the populace. Imagine an opposition rally protesting the economic straits of the people as well as the stolen election. Imagine the regime trying to suppress such a rally.

That the reformers are not already in prison is a victory in itself. Now, a death by a thousand cuts threatens the Iranian regime. That reality explains the government's determined effort to halt such a slow slide by means of show trials --which have backfired.

The reformists could compromise by accepting the current status quo, on condition of substantive electoral reform overseen by a parliamentary process. But from their perspective it might be best to simply allow this regime to stew in their own economic juice until well roasted.

Afgnanistan, Iran and Iraq: A Status Report

Professor Scott Lucas joins Fintan Dunne to discuss latest developments and prospects in Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq.

• In the aftermath of voting in the Afghan Presidential election, we chart the prospects for progress.

• We gauge the status and strength of political opposition to the Iranian regime.
• And we touch on the dire implications of the sophisticated multiple bombings and attacks in Baghdad, Iraq.

LISTEN: Mp3
Audio

Professor Scott Lucas

Scott Lucas is Professor of American Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Tehran, and on the Advisory Board of the Centre for American Studies and Research at American University Beirut. He writes for, and is a founder of, the weblog EnduringAmerica.com --where he currently blogs unmissable news analysis and reporting.

Afghan Election : Deals, Drugs and Democracy

In advance of the imminent Afghan Presidential election, we preview the leading candidates; details the deals; and chart the furure of the NATO campaign and the battle for civil society in Afghanistan.

LISTEN: Mp3
Audio

Professor Scott Lucas

Scott Lucas is Professor of American Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Tehran, and on the Advisory Board of the Centre for American Studies and Research at American University Beirut. He writes for, and is a founder of, the weblog EnduringAmerica.com --where he currently blogs unmissable news analysis and reporting.

Audio: Scott Lucas - July 9th : The Political Fallout

In the wake of the street protests across Iran on July 9th, Prof Scott Lucas joins Fintan Dunne to discuss the political fallout against the background of political developments which took place during the last week in Iran.

Interview Guest: Professor Scott Lucas

Scott Lucas is Professor of American Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK. He is also Adjunct Professor of the Institute for North American and European Studies at the University of Tehran, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Centre for American Studies and Research at American University Beirut. A specialist in US and British foreign policy, he has published extensively on Middle-East politics -especially on the Suez Crisis. Professor Lucas is a frequent contributor to American, British, and international media. He writes for, and is a founder of, the weblog EnduringAmerica.com --where he currently blogs unmissable news analysis and reporting.

LISTEN: Mp3 Audio

Protester estimate subsequent to the above audio

Based on analysis of considerable video evidence and news/tweet reports. From the reported totals at key locations - add those in these key location marches who did not make it to the center. Also from an analysis of videos depicting scenes at intersections; and reliable reports that the protests were widely scattered down to local level.

Methodology:

Key Locations at peak: 7,000

Surrounding these areas 5,000

Local intersections also 10,000 (50 by 200avg per intersection)

Local street gatherings : 3,000 (50 by 60avg per street)

Estimated Total: ~25,000 in Tehran

See: Videos, Photos and News in our Live 9th July Blog

Iran: A Regime Built on Sand

Respected investigative journalist and 'Devil's Game' author, Robert Dreyfuss was in Iran for the elections. His go-to, singular account in 'The Nation' of the country's election crisis, paints an unflattering picture of a government abandoning all but a propaganda pretence of democracy:

It was clear by nightfall on election day, June 12, that something was wrong. Across Tehran, troop transports rumbled out of the IRGC's fortified bases. Before the polls had even closed, Tehran took on the air of an occupied city. Later that night, ominously, my cellphone went dead, like everyone else's.

The atmospheric article outlines the breath across Iranian society of alienation from the coup regime:

Besides reformists, students, women and businessmen, Khamenei and Ahmadinejad are losing their core constituency: the clergy. And given that Iran is a state run by the priestly class, that might prove their undoing. I spoke to a dozen or so clerics, from low- to mid-ranking mullahs to a few who'd attained the rank of hojatolislam, just below ayatollah. There are hundreds of thousands of mullahs in Iran, perhaps a hundred or more who have attained the rank of ayatollah, and just two dozen or so who have developed sufficient reputation and following to be called grand ayatollah. And more and more of them, including many grand ayatollahs, have joined the opposition.....

Another cleric, who campaigned for Moussavi in dozens of Iranian towns and cities, said that the majority of mullahs had abandoned the president..... Some three-quarters of the grand ayatollahs in Iran support Moussavi, he told me.....

A very well-connected mullah I talked with said that he is a friend and follower of Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri..... "Khamenei does not deserve the position that he has," the mullah told me. "He has become a politician, and as a politician he has been corrupted." Describing Khamenei in these terms is extremely unusual, and indicates how much the Ahmadinejad-Khamenei axis has lost its legitimacy.......

To get a sense of what the business community thinks, during election week I attended a forum packed with executives at the offices of Etelaat, a liberal newspaper, where eight former ministers of oil, industry and mining slammed the government over its incompetence....

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090720/dreyfuss/

Iran: Step Forward Maj. General Steve Jobs

There is only one revolution tolerable to all men, all societies,

all political systems: revolution by design and invention....

--- R. Buckminster Fuller

The recent dramatic events in Iran have indefinitely sidelined the hard-line mullahs. I'm referring to the mullahs of the rabid US neocon cohort and their corresponding absolutists in Iran.

Mere weeks have consigned John McCain's infamous "Bomb, Bomb Iran" to history's lamentable anachronisms. The "collateral damage" of conquest now has a face: Neda's. Millions more Iranian faces join her in our mind. And we like them!

We like, not just: the westernized youths of Tehran. We also like the fearless black-clothed women who took the beatings; who answered back; who gathered the stones to be used against the firearmed Basij.

We even like some of the "towel-head" (see: prejudice, 9/11, Iraq) mullahs. Such as Mehdi Karroubi -striding with arms aloft in defiance; marching to Qoba mosque amidst a cheering, seething mass -yearning for a vote that counts.

We can now even discern the difference between a laudable reformist mullah and his neoconservative compatriots. Our former black and white vision is colored with nuance.

The Iran invasion is indefinitely postponed.

But the paradigm-shifting implications of Iran's uploaded uprising have yet to seep into our geopolitical thinking and strategies. In retrospect, we should have dropped cellphones and laptops on Iraq --then sat back and awaited the inevitable. It would have saved the lives of thousands of US troops and a hundredfold that number of civilian lives in "Saddam's" Iraq.

Admittedly, iPhones aren't cheap, but they come far less expensive than cruise missiles. And every dictatorship deserves to get free weapons of mass communication. Not merely to enable us see every repressive atrocity inflicted by a regime on its population, but to grant the society a communications mirror within which to see itself. And thus to change.

The ethos of Star Trek, series one, was to leave the alien cultures which the Enterprise visited, to resolve their issues of social evolution themselves. (Spock was surely a Democrat!) That ethos ebbed over decades of US foreign 'adventures', and vanished entirely in the wake of 9/11. The eUprising in Iran brings it firmly back into focus.

As the internet and communications revolutions take hold, the microchip is the pragmatists' new weapon of choice. Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and the military-industrial complex are suddenly strategically less relevant than Apple, Nokia and the civilian-electronic complex.

We no longer require a David Petraeus as much as a Steve Jobs.

We need special e-forces to drop anonymizing software such as Tor -deep behind enemy DSL lines.

Repressive regimes around the world are struggling to contain their populations behind electronic Berlin Walls. Battling the insatiable quest for unfettered internet systems. We've already had such a battle in the developed Western economies. The illegal music downloader's won it.

The Pentagon should be talking to the Pirate Bay founders.

'Command and Control' is yielding to 'persuade and network.'

The victims in Tiananmen Square remained largely faceless and the truth took months to be fully documented. In Iran, the victims are being webcast. One victim: Neda --turned from faceless to globally iconic in a matter of hours!

But Iran's events were less a revolution than a social evolution. The regime attempted the tried and trusted tactics of the past. But each bullet turned into a nail in its own coffin. Each blow was a blow to its own legitimacy. Each brutal digitally immortalized second will haunt it to an early grave.

Because the protesters, though seemingly unarmed, were after all very heavily armed -- with weapons the regime did not comprehend. The brave men and women in the streets clustered around their fallen --weapons in hand; recording every moment.

Weapons of mass communication.

Before we invented the mirror, we hardly knew our own faces. Iran has seen its own face, and the consequent evolution has defaced the regime into infamy. The Future beckons and whether the existing order falls in weeks, months or years -it is already tottering, zombified into the Past. As is every fragmented piece of its ethos.

Step forward Maj. General Steve Jobs. Your time has come.

It's is fitting, after all. In the early 1980's, upstart Apple Computer began a process which felled the behemoths of the minicomputer industry and crumpled the unassailable empire of mighty IBM.

Like the Iranian regime, IBM's leaders were incapable of realizing what they were dealing with. Before it was far too suddenly, far too late.

The rEvolution will not merely be televised. It will be digitized; emailed; streamed; tweeted; facebooked; uploaded; downloaded; remixed; scanned; and finally: printed on posters.

Around the world, within another year this change dynamic will pack more punch than a shrinking microchip. Yielding more and more rEvolutionary bang for young bucks.

The rEvolution will be instant!

Then: Over. Before it's begun.

Iran Sings Free My Land

Earlier today I found this beautiful new tribute song to the Iranian uprising on YouTube. Listen and watch, and if you think it captures the spirit of Iran's uprising, then do whatever you can to make this viral on the internet. Thank you.

And thanks to YouTube user "freemylandsong" for a moving and wonderful song. The Spirit of the People of Iran has inspired you.

YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_r0GgHiIzE

2nd @ 19:00GMT:

Tweet on http://twitter.com/fintandunne

Audio Interview: Prof. Scott Lucas

Blood or Politics: What Next for Iran?

Despite the official certification of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the victor in Irans presidential election, and despite the relative calm on the streets of Tehran, the country is still seething.

Rumours abound of moves by different factions, and the opposition is trying to consolidate a clerical and political platform to take a stand against the government.

The main opposition leader, Mir-Hossein Mousavi has now called on his Facebook page for a general strike. Protesters who took to the streets to shed blood for democratic principles are still afire with a zeal for reform.

So what next for Iran? Will political pragmatism win out over factionalism? Or will arrests, detentions and street clashes dominate the weeks ahead. Professor Scott Lucas of Birmingham University discusses the likely directions for Iran with Fintan Dunne.

Interview Guest: Professor Scott Lucas

Scott Lucas is Professor of American Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK. He is also Adjunct Professor of the Institute for North American and European Studies at the University of Tehran, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Centre for American Studies and Research at American University Beirut. A specialist in US and British foreign policy, he has published extensively on Middle-East politics -especially on the Suez Crisis.

Professor Lucas is a frequent contributor to American, British, and international media. He writes for, and is a founder of, the weblog EnduringAmerica.com --where he currently blogs unmissable news analysis and reporting.

LISTEN: Mp3 Audio

Hardliners Scuppered Deal With Mousavi

Ahmadinejad Victory Was Announced to Halt Compromise

The claimed victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the presidential election is built on sand and hides a deep split in the Iranian establishment.

That's the hidden tale behind a most curious mystery surrounding the official announcement by Irans electoral Guardian Council of a presidential election victory by Ahmadinejad.

Just hours earlier the very same electoral body had extended by five days the period for investigation of voting anomalies, and had welcomed proposals by Mir-Hossein Mousavi as "positive." That decision not only indicated a compromise deal on the election outcome, but it should have postponed any official confirmation of a victor.

So why the sudden turnaround? Does it hint at a spit in the government?


Now You See It, Now You Don't!

Early on Monday, 29th of January the New York Times reported the extension by Iranian authorities of the deadline for examining voting irregularities. The web URL of that NYT story was this one:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/30/world/middleeast/30iran.html?_r=1&hp

But if you go there now, you will not find that article. You will find only an article about the Guardian Council's confirmation of Ahmadinejad's 'victory'.

So how do you know the previous article even existed? Maybe I'm simply making this up and it never happened. Well, because we have a record of it's existence.

The exciting development was noticed by bloggers. In the Huffington Post, the National Editor, Nico Pitney was following Iran developments closely. Early on Monday 29th June he reported:

9:53 AM ET -- Iran extends deadline to investigate voter fraud again. Also, the Guardian Council says Mousavi has offered some "positive" proposals:

As officials began a limited recount of Iran's disputed presidential ballot on Monday, authorities in Tehran said they had extended by five days their deadline to investigate opposition claims of electoral fraud. The move could postpone the final certification of the ballot, which Iranian leaders insist was fair.....

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/29/iran-uprising-live-bloggi_n_222087.html

Another blogger had spotted that NY Times article too, and reprinted the key portion. It bears reading because it makes clear that just hours before Ahmadinejad was confirmed it looked like a deal with Mousavi had been achieved and was in full train:

NY Times: Iranian officials extend election probe deadline five days as opposition again clashes with authorities

As officials began a limited recount of Iran’s disputed presidential ballot on Monday, authorities in Tehran said they had extended by five days their deadline to investigate opposition claims of electoral fraud. The move could postpone the final certification of the ballot, which Iranian leaders insist was fair.....

The Guardian Council, a 12-member clerical panel charged with vetting and authenticating the June 12 vote, said on Monday that Mr. Moussavi had offered proposals to “rebuilt public trust” after more than two weeks of rallies and protests by the opposition that have drawn a broad and violent crackdown from government security forces.

Press TV, the English-language state satellite broadcaster, said the council had found Mr. Moussavi’s proposals to be “positive.” It did not say what they were. Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, the council spokesman, was quoted as saying the panel has “given another opportunity to Moussavi” to substantiate his grievances about the election.

http://inothernews.tumblr.com/post/132282111/ny-times-iranian-officials-extend-election-probe

I had also been following events closely, and had blogged about it:

The deadline to investigate opposition claims of electoral fraud has been extended by five days -postponing the final certification of the ballot. Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, the Guardian Council spokesman said it had “given another opportunity to Moussavi” to back up his claims of election rigging.

POSTED BY FINTANDUNNE AT 10:12 AM
http://fintandunne.blogspot.com/2009/06/advantage-rafsanjani-and-mousavi-as.html

After reading the NY Times article, I found the source of the story on the Iranian state website, PressTV.ir. I have a browser history record of the webpage which carried the story. This one:

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=99364&sectionid=351020101

But if you go there now, you will not find the article that prompted the NY Times and bloggers to cover the development. You will find only an article about the Guardian Council's confirmation of a Ahmadinejad win.

So, was there a deal in the making with Mousavi? The previous week, it seemed so. PressTV had reported:

'Rafsanjani, Mousavi vow support to end unrest'

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 02:06:13 GMT

Head of Iran's Expediency Council, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani will support efforts to end the post-election tension in the country, an Iranian lawmaker says.

Alaeddin Boroujerdi, Head of Iran's Parliamentary Committee on National Security and Foreign Policy told Fars news agency that the committee's governing board has held a meeting with Rafsanjani and Mir-Hossein Mousavi, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's main rival in the elections on Wednesday.

Boroujerdi termed the parliamentary delegation's talks with Rafsanjani as "constructive".

"The lawmakers asked Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani to help solve the problems and he vowed support and we hope that we would witness practical measures to be taken to end the current situation soon," he added.

Boroujerdi also noted that the lawmakers have discussed the post-election developments with Mousavi.

"During the meeting, the governing board of the committee explained their expectations from Mr. Mousavi and he voiced his interest to help in solving the issues."

Boroujerdi stated that the talks between Mousavi and Iranian lawmakers will continue.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=98986&sectionid=351020101

In their article on the certification of Ahmadinejad as victor, the NY Times noted:

The decision to certify the election seemed to reflect a growing split among the Iranian leadership about how to respond to a nation that has been left badly scarred after widespread protests, and a violent government crackdown that left at least 17 dead and hundreds more injured, hospitalized and jailed.

One group of officials under the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Mr. Ahmadinejad appeared to be trying to resolve the internal dispute by shifting some blame to foreign powers, particularly Britain, and by continuing reliance on the hammer-fisted policy of dispatching the police and militia members to beat protesters.

But there appear to be a growing number of officials and clerics who are deeply concerned about the unrest. On Monday, the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission of Parliament was scheduled to visit the holy city of Qum to meet with two grand ayatollahs. A day earlier it met with two former presidents, Mohammad Khatami and Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, in an effort to ease the strains that have developed since the June 12 election. The speaker of Parliament, Ali Larijani, a former nuclear negotiator, has emerged as a powerful opponent of Mr. Ahmadinejad.

It is not clear how far those seeking some kind of reconciliation will be able to push their drive, as the current hard-line leadership of Mr. Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Khamenei has continued to lash out at the opposition and insist that Iran’s troubles are a result of meddling by foreign powers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/30/world/middleeast/30iran.html?_r=1&hp

My interpetation of these events is that there was indeed a momentum for a deal with Mousavi. And that deal had reached the point where the electoral Guardian Council was making the announcement of an extension of the period for examination of irregularities. So the deal had reached the point where its progress was reported by official state media.

It was that development which spurred the cornered hardliners to quash the momentum in a hurry by announcing an Ahmadinejad victory.

The presidency of Ahmadinejad is clearly built on sand. And sands shift.

As I reported on Monday 29th June, after conversing with Iranian political analyst, Professor Muhammad Sahimi:

In a telephone interview this weekend, Prof. Sahimi said Rafsanjani and Iran's opposition leaders are biding their time to allow social pressures on Iran's government to intensify. Their aims are to split the government and to detach some commanders of the Revolutionary Guard from supporting the hardline government stance on the official election outcome.

http://fintandunne.blogspot.com/2009/06/advantage-rafsanjani-and-mousavi-as.html

The progressive forces in Iran, within and without the government, though sidelined by this latest preemptive move by the hardliners, are still working assiduously behind the scenes to achieve a proper resolution of the crisis.

Advantage Rafsanjani and Mousavi as Opposition Seeks Checkmate

by Fintan Dunne, 29th June, 2009

Influential Iranian former-president, Ayotalloh Rafsanjani has deferred for tactical reasons an emergency meeting of the Assembly of Experts -despite having now secured a majority in favor of convening the powerful clerical body, according to the Iranian political analyst Professor Muhammad Sahimi.

In a telephone interview this weekend, Prof. Sahimi said Rafsanjani and Iran's opposition leaders are biding their time to allow social pressures on Iran's government to intensify. Their aims are to split the government and to detach some commanders of the Revolutionary Guard from supporting the hardline government stance on the official election outcome.

"And if that happens," said Professor Sahimi, "then stronger actions such as an emegncy meeting of the Assembly of Experts to investigate the performance of the Supreme Leader can be done."

The government also now seems to be avoiding a definitive showdown. The deadline to investigate opposition claims of electoral fraud has been extended by five days -postponing the final certification of the ballot.

Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, the Guardian Council spokesman said it had “given another opportunity to Moussavi” to back up his claims of election rigging.

Recent seeming-concilliatory statements by Mousavi and Rafsanjani hint that the tide is in their favor and the battle is on to sway middle ground opinion and engineer a political chess advantage into a final checkmate.

Full interview with Professor Sahimi is below.

Interview Guest: Professor Muhammad Sahimi

Muhammad Sahimi, professor of chemical engineering and materials science, and the NIOC professor of petroleum engineering at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, has published extensively on Iran's political developments and its nuclear program. He is a member of TehranBureau.com a respected independent media group which publishes on Iranian political developments.

LISTEN: Mp3 Audio

Audio Interview: Prof. Hamid Dabashi

25th June, 2009

Green Shoots of an
Islamic Restoration

Guest: Prof. Hamid Dabashi
http://www.hamiddabashi.com/

Iranian-born, internationally renowned cultural critic and award-winning author, Hamid Dabashi is the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of the prestigious Chair of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in New York.

Author of scores of scholarly essays and books, Professor Dabashi has written extensively on the relationship between Islamic throcracy and democratic politics. Among his best-known books: Authority in Islam; Theology of Discontent; and Iran: A People Interrupted.

LISTEN: Mp3 Audio

Audio Interview: Dr. Michael Greger

2nd May, 2009

Swine Flu Goes Human to Human

GUEST: Dr. Michael Greger, M.D.
DIRECTOR, PUBLIC HEALTH & ANIMAL

AGRICULTURE - HUMANE SOCIETY OF USA

http://www.hsus.org

LISTEN: Mp3 Audio

Audio Interview: Percy Schmeiser

27th May, 2009

The Man Who Beat Monsanto

Guest: Percy Schmeiser

http://www.percyschmeiser.com/

LISTEN: Mp3 Audio

Audio Interview: Senator Stuart Syvret

Jersey's Campaigning Politician

10th April, 2009

Guest: Senator Stuart Syvret http://stuartsyvret.blogspot.com/

Jersey politician Stuart Syvret, who has been relentless in trying to force a proper invesigation of the Jersey child abuse issues has been arrested in a bid to try pressure him to back down.

Syvret has served as a Senator since 1990 and as Minister for Health and Social Services from 2005-2007. He was dismissed from his ministership in September 2007 after criticisms over his claims that officials in Jersey had been covering up child abuse cases.

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