Monday, December 18, 2006

Ahmadinejad 'Thwarted' in Iranian Elections?


Well, so says the State Department. Let's take it at face value. I don't think the hairy little freak is all that popular, even if the amateurs at Time think he's the bomb.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad looks to have been thwarted from keeping his ultra-conservative allies in control of key offices despite efforts to "cook the books" in weekend elections, the State Department said.

The elections for municipal councils and a powerful religious assembly saw Ahmadinejad loyalists suffer setbacks at the hands of more moderate candidates in a number of key races, including for seats on the Tehran city council.

"It would seem that they are not the results that President Ahmadinejad would have hoped for," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said when asked to comment on the vote.

"I think, despite the regime's efforts to cook the books in terms of an outcome, they seem to have been thwarted in that regard," he said.

Meanwhile, yet another Bush critic says his views on Iran are being silenced.
A former top White House Middle East policymaker accused ex-colleagues of censoring an article he wrote for the New York Times to silence his criticism of the tough US line on Iran.

Flynt Leverett, who stepped down as the national security council's senior director for the Middle East affairs over policy differences in 2003, said senior officials falsely claimed his article spilled intelligence secrets.

"The White House intervened in the CIA publication review process and has threatened me with legal proceedings if I publish this op-ed because the White House claims it contains classified information," said Leverett.

"That claim is false, I would say that claim is fraudulent. The people making that claim know it is not true," Leverett said at the New America Foundation think-tank where he is now a senior fellow.

The White House and the CIA rejected the charge, insisting the article, which Leverett says was based upon one already cleared by the agency, contained classified information.

Surely, the ugly left will howl over this while ignoring the plight of Iranian students who dare to heckle the swarthy midget.
Ahmadinejad told the audience at the time that they wouldn’t be harmed for speaking out. They might be expelled, though; a star-based rating system is used to purge the country’s universities of their most ideologically “threatening” students. Quote: “The star system has, however, become a badge of honour among those who have acquired them on their records. Students have likened it to the German Nazi-era practice of making Jews wear the Star of David…”

Oh, the maniacs are also persecuting Christians, but it's open season on them anyway. But nothing a little dialogue won't cure, right?

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