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freshwest
freshwest's Journal
freshwest's Journal
August 5, 2015
Many Iranians are social democrats repressed by the state religion. It seems the West profited by releasing Khomeini from a French prison when the young generation was determined to overthrow the Shah. I don't think a coincidence that the new generation got radicalized as it did.
(Anecdotally, I used to talk with the young Iranian emigrants as they were demonstrating in front of the ARAMCO building at that time. Many Iranians had fled the Shah to the USA and were doing well. But they were upset for their breathern left behind. Ironically, the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights was one of their inspirations. They were not religious zealots, but they stopped demonstrating when the Shah was gone. Later they were nearly as unhappy with that turn of events, but hoped for the best for Iran later.)
Iranians would likely prefer to go back a progressive government, in comparison to the rule of theocrats, as they had under Mosaddegh and their democratically elected government:
1953 Iranian coup d'état
Operation Ajax.
Mossadegh had sought to audit the books of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC), a British corporation (now BP) and to change the terms of the company's access to Iranian petroleum reserves. Upon the refusal of the AIOC to co-operate with the Iranian government, the parliament (Majlis) voted to nationalize the assets of the company and expel their representatives from the country.[7][8][9] Following the coup in 1953, a government under General Fazlollah Zahedi was formed which allowed Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran (Persian for an Iranian king),[9] to rule the country more firmly as monarch. He relied heavily on United States support to hold on to power until his own overthrow in February 1979.[7][8][9][10] In August 2013, 60 years after, the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) admitted that it was involved in both the planning and the execution of the coup, including the bribing of Iranian politicians, security and army high-ranking officials, as well as pro-coup propaganda.[11][12] The CIA is quoted acknowledging the coup was carried out "under CIA direction" and "as an act of U.S. foreign policy, conceived and approved at the highest levels of government."[13]
Iran's oil had been discovered and later controlled by the British-owned AIOC.[14] Popular discontent with the AIOC began in the late 1940s: a large segment of Iran's public and a number of politicians saw the company as exploitative and a central tool of continued British imperialism in Iran.[7][15] Despite Mosaddegh's popular support, the AIOC was unwilling to allow Iranian authorities to audit the company accounts or to renegotiate the terms of its access to Iranian petroleum. In 1951, Iran's petroleum industry was nationalized with near-unanimous support of the Majlis in a bill introduced by Mossadegh who led the Iranian nationalist party, the National Front. In response, Britain instigated a worldwide boycott of Iranian oil to pressure Iran economically.[16] Initially, Britain mobilized its military to seize control of the British-built Abadan oil refinery, then the world's largest, but Prime Minister Clement Attlee opted instead to tighten the economic boycott[17] while using Iranian agents to undermine Mosaddegh's government.[18] With a change to more conservative governments in both Britain and the United States, Winston Churchill and the Eisenhower administration decided to overthrow Iran's government, though the predecessor Truman administration had opposed a coup.[19] Classified documents show that British intelligence officials played a pivotal role in initiating and planning the coup, and that the AIOC contributed $25,000 towards the expense of bribing officials.[20]
Britain and the US selected General Zahedi to be the prime minister of a government that was to replace Mosaddegh's. Subsequently, a royal decree dismissing Mosaddegh and appointing Zahedi was drawn up by the coup plotters and signed by the Shah. The CIA had successfully pressured the weak monarch to participate in the coup, while bribing street thugs, clergy, politicians and Iranian army officers to take part in a propaganda campaign against Mosaddegh and his government.[21] At first the coup appeared to be a failure when, on the night of 15–16 August, Imperial Guard Colonel Nematollah Nassiri was arrested while attempting to arrest Mosaddegh. The Shah fled the country the next day. On 19 August, a pro-Shah mob paid by the CIA marched on Mosaddegh's residence.[22] According to the CIA's declassified documents and records, some of the most feared mobsters in Tehran were hired by the CIA to stage pro-Shah riots on 19 August. Other CIA-paid men were brought into Tehran in buses and trucks, and took over the streets of the city.[23] Between 300[1] and 800 people were killed because of the conflict.[2] Mosaddegh was arrested, tried and convicted of treason by the Shah's military court. On 21 December 1953, he was sentenced to three years in jail, then placed under house arrest for the remainder of his life.[24][25][26] Other Mosaddegh supporters were imprisoned, and several received the death penalty.[9]
After the coup, the Shah ruled as an monarch for the next 26 years[8][9] while modernizing the country using oil revenues, until he was overthrown in the Iranian Revolution in 1979.[8][9][27] The tangible benefits the United States reaped from overthrowing Iran's elected government included a share of Iran's oil wealth[28][clarification needed] and ensuring the Iranian nation remained under the control of an allied dictator. Washington continually supplied arms to the increasingly unpopular Shah and the CIA-trained SAVAK, his repressive secret police force;[9] however by the 1979 revolution, his increasingly independent policies resulted in his effective abandonment by his American allies, hastening his downfall.[29] The coup is widely believed to have significantly contributed to anti-American and anti-British sentiment in Iran and in the Middle East. The 1979 revolution deposed the Shah and replaced the pro-Western monarchy with a largely anti-Western authoritarian theocracy.[30][31]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat
The Middle East was not as extremist at that time and many people, including women and the various minorities, were given freedom to live as they choose. Our version of fascist theocrats, the GOP, is intent on subjecting us to a system as harsh and corrupt as the ayatollahs.
They're not kidding, it's not funny, and they are doing it piece by piece by getting the public to agree with their ideology as Rush and his Koch sponsors wanted. Fascism is a grass roots movement with payments made directly or indirectly to their followers. Change the thinking of the masses and it enables demagogues to get away with anything.
Note that Truman did not agree with the coup, but Eisenhower did. The only honorable thing to do in the face of nationalism of oil refineries, etc. in Iran would be to demand paying for the investment. Instead, this lousy thing was done. This is our legacy and why they say 'Death to America' as they have suffered terribly.
But it doesn't excuse our version of the ayatollahs, and ignoring history. The Iranians have not forgotten.
Obama is right to call the GOP out as they want to continue to carry out the wrong policies of the past. Obama has instead called for speaking with them since before 2008. We have a chance to turn things around there and we must turn things around here. Because it can happen here, yes it can.
The same, but Iranians are nationalists, GOP/Koch/Libertarians are Nihilists. And...
Iranians want to be united as a country, the American types are selling us out to every country, setting up their own fascist fiefdoms.Many Iranians are social democrats repressed by the state religion. It seems the West profited by releasing Khomeini from a French prison when the young generation was determined to overthrow the Shah. I don't think a coincidence that the new generation got radicalized as it did.
(Anecdotally, I used to talk with the young Iranian emigrants as they were demonstrating in front of the ARAMCO building at that time. Many Iranians had fled the Shah to the USA and were doing well. But they were upset for their breathern left behind. Ironically, the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights was one of their inspirations. They were not religious zealots, but they stopped demonstrating when the Shah was gone. Later they were nearly as unhappy with that turn of events, but hoped for the best for Iran later.)
Iranians would likely prefer to go back a progressive government, in comparison to the rule of theocrats, as they had under Mosaddegh and their democratically elected government:
1953 Iranian coup d'état
Operation Ajax.
Mossadegh had sought to audit the books of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC), a British corporation (now BP) and to change the terms of the company's access to Iranian petroleum reserves. Upon the refusal of the AIOC to co-operate with the Iranian government, the parliament (Majlis) voted to nationalize the assets of the company and expel their representatives from the country.[7][8][9] Following the coup in 1953, a government under General Fazlollah Zahedi was formed which allowed Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran (Persian for an Iranian king),[9] to rule the country more firmly as monarch. He relied heavily on United States support to hold on to power until his own overthrow in February 1979.[7][8][9][10] In August 2013, 60 years after, the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) admitted that it was involved in both the planning and the execution of the coup, including the bribing of Iranian politicians, security and army high-ranking officials, as well as pro-coup propaganda.[11][12] The CIA is quoted acknowledging the coup was carried out "under CIA direction" and "as an act of U.S. foreign policy, conceived and approved at the highest levels of government."[13]
Iran's oil had been discovered and later controlled by the British-owned AIOC.[14] Popular discontent with the AIOC began in the late 1940s: a large segment of Iran's public and a number of politicians saw the company as exploitative and a central tool of continued British imperialism in Iran.[7][15] Despite Mosaddegh's popular support, the AIOC was unwilling to allow Iranian authorities to audit the company accounts or to renegotiate the terms of its access to Iranian petroleum. In 1951, Iran's petroleum industry was nationalized with near-unanimous support of the Majlis in a bill introduced by Mossadegh who led the Iranian nationalist party, the National Front. In response, Britain instigated a worldwide boycott of Iranian oil to pressure Iran economically.[16] Initially, Britain mobilized its military to seize control of the British-built Abadan oil refinery, then the world's largest, but Prime Minister Clement Attlee opted instead to tighten the economic boycott[17] while using Iranian agents to undermine Mosaddegh's government.[18] With a change to more conservative governments in both Britain and the United States, Winston Churchill and the Eisenhower administration decided to overthrow Iran's government, though the predecessor Truman administration had opposed a coup.[19] Classified documents show that British intelligence officials played a pivotal role in initiating and planning the coup, and that the AIOC contributed $25,000 towards the expense of bribing officials.[20]
Britain and the US selected General Zahedi to be the prime minister of a government that was to replace Mosaddegh's. Subsequently, a royal decree dismissing Mosaddegh and appointing Zahedi was drawn up by the coup plotters and signed by the Shah. The CIA had successfully pressured the weak monarch to participate in the coup, while bribing street thugs, clergy, politicians and Iranian army officers to take part in a propaganda campaign against Mosaddegh and his government.[21] At first the coup appeared to be a failure when, on the night of 15–16 August, Imperial Guard Colonel Nematollah Nassiri was arrested while attempting to arrest Mosaddegh. The Shah fled the country the next day. On 19 August, a pro-Shah mob paid by the CIA marched on Mosaddegh's residence.[22] According to the CIA's declassified documents and records, some of the most feared mobsters in Tehran were hired by the CIA to stage pro-Shah riots on 19 August. Other CIA-paid men were brought into Tehran in buses and trucks, and took over the streets of the city.[23] Between 300[1] and 800 people were killed because of the conflict.[2] Mosaddegh was arrested, tried and convicted of treason by the Shah's military court. On 21 December 1953, he was sentenced to three years in jail, then placed under house arrest for the remainder of his life.[24][25][26] Other Mosaddegh supporters were imprisoned, and several received the death penalty.[9]
After the coup, the Shah ruled as an monarch for the next 26 years[8][9] while modernizing the country using oil revenues, until he was overthrown in the Iranian Revolution in 1979.[8][9][27] The tangible benefits the United States reaped from overthrowing Iran's elected government included a share of Iran's oil wealth[28][clarification needed] and ensuring the Iranian nation remained under the control of an allied dictator. Washington continually supplied arms to the increasingly unpopular Shah and the CIA-trained SAVAK, his repressive secret police force;[9] however by the 1979 revolution, his increasingly independent policies resulted in his effective abandonment by his American allies, hastening his downfall.[29] The coup is widely believed to have significantly contributed to anti-American and anti-British sentiment in Iran and in the Middle East. The 1979 revolution deposed the Shah and replaced the pro-Western monarchy with a largely anti-Western authoritarian theocracy.[30][31]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat
The Middle East was not as extremist at that time and many people, including women and the various minorities, were given freedom to live as they choose. Our version of fascist theocrats, the GOP, is intent on subjecting us to a system as harsh and corrupt as the ayatollahs.
They're not kidding, it's not funny, and they are doing it piece by piece by getting the public to agree with their ideology as Rush and his Koch sponsors wanted. Fascism is a grass roots movement with payments made directly or indirectly to their followers. Change the thinking of the masses and it enables demagogues to get away with anything.
Note that Truman did not agree with the coup, but Eisenhower did. The only honorable thing to do in the face of nationalism of oil refineries, etc. in Iran would be to demand paying for the investment. Instead, this lousy thing was done. This is our legacy and why they say 'Death to America' as they have suffered terribly.
But it doesn't excuse our version of the ayatollahs, and ignoring history. The Iranians have not forgotten.
Obama is right to call the GOP out as they want to continue to carry out the wrong policies of the past. Obama has instead called for speaking with them since before 2008. We have a chance to turn things around there and we must turn things around here. Because it can happen here, yes it can.
August 5, 2015
Just HAD to go there.
RIP, Jimi Hendrix.
I'll be posting less than I do now. I'm sadly disappointed.
As true as it was when it came out:
Just HAD to go there.
RIP, Jimi Hendrix.
I'll be posting less than I do now. I'm sadly disappointed.
August 5, 2015
Looks like the love of my life (but my guy was taller) for over a decade. Don't forget, the President of the Galaxy had an advantage. Because two heads are better than one. None of the candidates can match that hair except Frederik!
Thought it was this guy, at first:
Looks like the love of my life (but my guy was taller) for over a decade. Don't forget, the President of the Galaxy had an advantage. Because two heads are better than one. None of the candidates can match that hair except Frederik!
August 5, 2015
That's popular these days, is it not?
No problemo! There's a ready-made group who shares his vision, strangely enough. Or most of it:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/05/01/why-bernie-sanders-is-the-democratic-ron-paul-and-why-he-isnt/That's popular these days, is it not?
August 4, 2015
She's only addressing you if you fit in one of these categories:
Do you eschew 'backward right-wing politics?'
If not, the OP does not apply to you.
Do you 'hate the black guy in the White House and anything that he proposes?'
If not, the OP does not apply to you.
Do you possess or promote a 'fetishistic embrace of guns, hostility to women’s rights, Islamophobia, symbolic and overt racism?'
If not, the OP does not apply to you.
Going after rightwingers is a cherished passtime at DU so you should be excluded from feeling you are being singled out. No one is going to make an issue of your self-definition of a white male.
It's not a crime, nor is anyone blaming you for an accidental of birth into a demographic society calls 'white' and 'male.' You could be gay and still be born a white male.
There is no privilege in being born a minority. Aas far as being a 'friend' of anyone here, that is a word of encouragement from a member of the 'white race,' and not an insult to most white men.
I am a white female, and nothing on this board offends me because of my personal race and gender. In fact, I refer to myself as a CCWP (card carrying white person). You may call me that, because I am not ashamed of it.
Please, and I mean this in love, just think about who you really are, not what you fear is being said about you personally, so you won't be offended.
August 3, 2015
Rand and his ilk have been smacked down on this and personhood bills everytime by PBO.
He would have stopped this, too. We must ensure one of our good candidates is in the Oval Office in January 2017.
The GOP set their Social Security timebomb to go off right after the 2016 election. If they don't take the White House, they will not be allowed to do it.
If they get in, there won't be any human rights left and SS and other things will be a distant memory. And they'll have restricted the vote so much a lot of people won't be able to vote.
They've been telegraphing their intentions for years and now are ramping it up. They want the same ALEC laws they've pushed through red states to be national. They'll redefine Constitutional amendment to set up fiefdoms.
Read the Koch brothers agenda to see what they are being paid to do. They have achieved most of their agenda through media and are on the home stretch.
First link, lot of video and text:
Reid: Why The Kochs Are Dangerous For America
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017191768
This one from Sanders shows the list. Take a look to see how close they are to the end:
BERNIE SANDERS Uncovers 1980 Koch Agenda- "What Do the Koch Brothers Want?"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024806298
August 3, 2015
P. S. I had hostile feelings about Clinton from the 2008 election. Even in the midst of Rush's well known strategy called Operation Chaos 2008, where he and those like him on the right actively sought to stir up hatred between Democrats, I didn't like her. It was her alleged supporters who did her in for me. Operation Chaos has been announced for 2016 as well. These are GOP operations used because they do effect Democratic voting patterns by causing them not to vote.
Republicans Should Help Bernie Sanders to Weaken Hillary
by Myra Adams June 25, 2015
...Limbaugh’s efforts prompted a May 8, 2008, Washington Post headline: “Did Rush Limbaugh Tilt Result in Indiana?” Clinton had just narrowly won the Indiana primary, and Limbaugh’s “Operation Chaos” intervention was also deemed successful in several other states where registered voters were able to “cross over” and cast their votes in either party’s primary.
Limbaugh’s rationale was that if Clinton were to win the Democrats’ 2008 presidential nomination, she would be a weaker general-election candidate than Obama — so from February to May, Limbaugh hopped on Clinton’s bandwagon.
Later in the May 8 piece, the Washington Post reported: “But Limbaugh called off the operation yesterday, saying he wants Obama to be the party’s pick, because ‘I now believe he would be the weakest of the Democrat nominees.’”
Obviously, Limbaugh’s “strategery” (a favorite word of his) did not turn out as planned, but his interventionist reasoning should be revived and adapted for the early stages of the 2016 campaign...
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/420262/bernie-sanders-republicans-myra-adams
the link has details on how they used that technique. But they could not defeat Obama in 2008 or 2012 with them. PBO is the greatest president since FDR, who also faced great challenges as president.
That is NOT calling DUers GOP. It is evidence that the media will be playing these games that have worked for them since Nixon's second term. We've been on the ropes and divided ever since, just as intended.
Not to annoy, but it appears the Obamas and Hillary are not at odds in these pictures:
P. S. I had hostile feelings about Clinton from the 2008 election. Even in the midst of Rush's well known strategy called Operation Chaos 2008, where he and those like him on the right actively sought to stir up hatred between Democrats, I didn't like her. It was her alleged supporters who did her in for me. Operation Chaos has been announced for 2016 as well. These are GOP operations used because they do effect Democratic voting patterns by causing them not to vote.
Republicans Should Help Bernie Sanders to Weaken Hillary
by Myra Adams June 25, 2015
...Limbaugh’s efforts prompted a May 8, 2008, Washington Post headline: “Did Rush Limbaugh Tilt Result in Indiana?” Clinton had just narrowly won the Indiana primary, and Limbaugh’s “Operation Chaos” intervention was also deemed successful in several other states where registered voters were able to “cross over” and cast their votes in either party’s primary.
Limbaugh’s rationale was that if Clinton were to win the Democrats’ 2008 presidential nomination, she would be a weaker general-election candidate than Obama — so from February to May, Limbaugh hopped on Clinton’s bandwagon.
Later in the May 8 piece, the Washington Post reported: “But Limbaugh called off the operation yesterday, saying he wants Obama to be the party’s pick, because ‘I now believe he would be the weakest of the Democrat nominees.’”
Obviously, Limbaugh’s “strategery” (a favorite word of his) did not turn out as planned, but his interventionist reasoning should be revived and adapted for the early stages of the 2016 campaign...
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/420262/bernie-sanders-republicans-myra-adams
the link has details on how they used that technique. But they could not defeat Obama in 2008 or 2012 with them. PBO is the greatest president since FDR, who also faced great challenges as president.
That is NOT calling DUers GOP. It is evidence that the media will be playing these games that have worked for them since Nixon's second term. We've been on the ropes and divided ever since, just as intended.
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