NEWS BLOGS
NEWS BLOGS
category: news
24 Jun 2009
related tags: Iran |

Roger Cohen of NY Times, then my two cents:

I said the Islamic Republic has been weakened. Why? I see five principal factors.

1) The first is that the supreme leader’s post — the apex of the structure conceived by the revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini — has been undermined. The keystone of the arch is now loose.

Khamenei, far from an arbiter with a Prophet-like authority, has looked more like a ruthless infighter. His word has been defied. At night, from rooftops, I’ve even heard people call for his death. The unthinkable has occurred.

2) The second is that the hypocritical but effective contract that bound society has been broken. The regime never had active support from more than 20 percent of the population. But acquiescence was secured by using only highly targeted repression (leaving the majority free to go about its business), and by giving people a vote for the president every four years.

That’s over. Repression will be broad and ferocious in the coming months. The acquiescent have already become the angry. You can’t turn Iran into Burma: The resistance of a society this varied and savvy will be fierce.

3) The third is that a faction loyal to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, fiercely nationalistic and mystically religious, has made a power grab so bold that fissures in the establishment have become canyons.

Members of this faction include Hassan Taeb, the leader of the Basiji militia; Saeed Jalili, the head of the National Security Council and chief nuclear negotiator; and Mojtaba Khamenei, the reclusive but influential son of the supreme leader.

They have their way for now, but the cost to Iran has been immense, and the rearguard action led by Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a father of the revolution, and Mir Hussein Moussavi, the opposition leader, will be intense.

4) The fourth is that Iran’s international rhetoric, effective in Ahmadinejad’s first term, will be far less so now. Every time he talks of justice and ethics, his two favorite words, video will roll of Neda Agha Soltan’s murder and the regime’s truncheon-wielding goons at work. The president may prove too much of a liability to preserve.

5) The fifth is that, at the very peak of its post-revolution population boom, the regime has lost a whole new generation — and particularly the women of that generation — by failing to adapt.

Thirty years from the revolution, the core question of this election was: Must Iran stand apart from the forces of economic and political globalization in order to preserve its Islamic theocracy?

Or is it confident enough of its Islamic identity, and its now firmly established independence from America, to trash the nest-of-spies vitriol and an ultimately self-defeating isolation?

The answer has been devastating.

Read more.  I think Cohen is being shy.  I’ll add to his 5 reasons/signs:

1 - No Street Cred: Unlike Khomenei, Khamenei lacks real authority.  The man who helped him become the Supreme Leader has turned against it, what does that say about all of the clerics who were never really all that “into him?” So to take Cohen’s argument one step further, it’s not so much that Khamenei has lost authority, I daresay he never had it.

2 - Regression to the Mean: the 1979 Revolution was a just movement to ridden Iran of the US’ puppet.  But, the religious movement hijacked the Revolution due to a lack of options.  This movement is all about evening that extreme movement.

3 - It’s the Demographics, Stupid: 70% of Iranians are below 30 years old, meaning they are connected via technology to the rest of the world.  To them, the concept of not having democracy or freedom is absurd.  This is a matter of when, not if.

4 - The Religious / Military Matrix: This was a coup d’etat not so much by the Religious Crazies, but by those who seek both a further Militarization and more Religion in society.  That’s pushing it.  It’s possible that Ahmedinejad would have won 50%+1, but the Regime got greedy by saying it won 60%+.  In Iran, some might want religion, others might want a strong military, but few really want both.

5 - Bearded Men Make Way for Courageous Women: Cohen does hit the nail on that one, but he fails to recognize the true extent of Iran’s women who will seal the deal.   The Revolution in 1979 was about bearded men who grew tired of the Shah’s subservience to the US and his corruption.  The soon-to-be-dubbed Revolution of 2009 will be driven by women who will provide a shield and beacon for the rest of the nation to follow.