National Review Online posted an editorial today on the Iranian elections. Before we get too upset at rigged voting numbers, lets look at how we got the candidates. According to the article:
"Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, evidently believed that the electoral maneuver could be carried out as usual, according to his sole and uncontested will. He may even believe that he is popular and respected. So an election with the superficial air of a contest was arranged. A field of 475 possible candidates (no women, naturally) was whittled down to Ahmadinejad and three elderly members of the Islamic establishment. Khamenei and Ahmadinejad prepared to coast to victory."
Iran is ruled by the Mullahs--not by the President. They choose the candidates and run the election. Mir-Hossein Mousavi may have seemed like the moderate candidate, but a true moderate would not have gotten throught the election process and been allowed to run.
It has been thirty years since the shah was overthrown and the Islamic Republic installed. That is the last time the kind of unrest we are seeing now was present.
The article concludes:
"How far repression will go is unforeseeable, but the regime's misguided manipulation and recourse to violence is a lasting stain. The supreme leader and his president have little choice except to pretend to strength. President Obama should call them on it, lending the opposition his rhetorical support. So far, he has given the impression that he wants the dictatorship to stabilize itself so he can get back to the work of appeasing it. The more Obama extends that hand of his, the likelier the regime is to try to crush its bones."
The young people in Iran are believed to be very pro-western. This will be a growing problem for the mullahs if they do not deal with it quickly and firmly. I do not expect the current riots and protests to lead to increased freedom in Iran, I expect we will see a crackdown on opposition to the government similar to what we saw in China in 1989.
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