Obama Effect, In Full Effect!

[angee_is_mad]

Great article in NYT about what is going on in Iran and could Barack Hussein Obama have something to do with it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/21/weekinreview/21cooper.html?ref=politics

“We don’t want this regime to fall. We want our votes to be counted, because we want reforms, we want kindness, we want friendship with the world.” — Ali Reza, an Iranian actor, on the sidelines of protests in Tehran.

[HopeOverFear]

1. Word.

[applegrove]

2. I agree. I thought that Obama admitting that the USA messed with Iran in the 1950s

by putting the Shaw back on the throne went a long way towards creating the conditions in Iran in which Amandineajad opponents could feel fully justified in wanting reform.

[angee_is_mad]

5. Yep

I did also. I was speaking with a young Egyptian who was from Cairo and his mother told him that the whole city was going crazy when he went over there. And yes, Obama even have Arab groupies. Mo's mom told him that the young (and old) ladies wanted to get as close to him as possible.

[Number23]

3. In Full Effect! Word to ya motha...

Okay, I feel old now... :)

Edit: Money Quote here - "If Tehran’s hardliners are incapable of making nice with an American president named Barack Hussein Obama who preaches mutual respect and wishes them a happy Nowruz, it’s pretty obvious the problem is in Tehran, not Washington,” Mr. Sadjadpour said."

Absolutely.

[HopeOverFear]

4. LOL

[Colobo]

6. Change is spreading... like a wildfire!

[angee_is_mad]

7. Except on here

sometimes.

[Fearless]

9. Now if it could spread a bit over here...

:shrug: Too much to ask for? I get that our problems aren't nearly as bad as theirs are and can be, but still, it's no excuse.

[Tarheel_Dem]

8. I'm not registered, but I agree with the sentiment. Sadly, I think the president's

efforts are appreciated more thousands of miles away than they are, here at home. The Neocons are salivating, they think this is our chance for another Iraq. I certainly hope the president and his advisors step lightly here, and won't be bullied into another takeover.

[Clio the Leo]

10. I wonder if he's having trouble sleeping tonight....

.... obviously their cause is right and his speech was right .... but I think if I were him, seeing all of the violence, it would cause me a great deal of heartache wondering how much of a role in all of it I'd played.

I think it would be one of those times, as he said Friday quoting Lincoln, when I'd be "driven ... to my knees (in prayer) by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go."

[angee_is_mad]

11. Not sure how to take this post

but I'm sure he has had many sleepless nights, before the Iranian elections.

Hell the Blue Dogs is enough to keep anyone awake.

[Clio the Leo]

12. Don't mind me....

... my mind is rambling.

Allah Akbar.

Good night. ;)

[liberalmuse]

13. The catch? Obama's change only works in countries....

where citizens are willing to lay their lives down for it.

[angee_is_mad]

14. You may have a point

interesting.

[NYC_SKP]

15. I read your subject line as "Obama Erect, Fully Erect!

My bad.

:P

[angee_is_mad]

16. You NASTY!!!!

lol

[Cha]

17. Nobody wants bush's kind of Democracy except

neocons.. "On one side, a handful of supporters of President Bush said Iranian protesters had taken to the streets because they were emboldened by President Bush’s pro-democracy stance, and the example of Shiite democracy he set up in Iraq.." How emboldened do they think the enemy is by cheney hawking his crap on corporatemedia to the point of saturation?

<snip>> "During the Bush years, Iran’s regime was able to coalesce support by uniting the country against a common enemy: President Bush, who called Iran a pillar of the “axis of evil” in a speech that alienated many of the very reformers whom the United States was trying to woo. For much of his administration, even as he strengthened Iran by toppling Iran’s nemesis Saddam Hussein, Mr. Bush struck a confrontational public line against the Iranian regime."

President Obama has actually been doing something about Democracy..

"He has offered direct talks between his administration and the Iranian regime, without preconditions. He has videotaped a message directly for the Iranian people, on the celebration of Nowruz, the 12-day holiday that marks the new year in Iran. In the video, with subtitles in Persian, he directed his comments not just to the Iranian people but to Iran’s leaders, and referred to Iran as “the Islamic Republic,” further flagging a willingness to deal with the clerical government. He even went so far as to quote from the vaunted Persian poet Saadi, dead for 700 years now.

Mr. Obama has also removed the ban against American diplomats around the world consorting with their Iranian counterparts. And in his Cairo address June 4, he accepted responsibility for America’s part in the enmity between the United States and Iran."

Thanks for the article, angee.. interesting analysis and very informative.