While he rattles sabers on the international stage, all is not rosy for the Thug-In-Chief on the home front. From SMCCDI:
Fire forced the closure of the Navab Metro Station in the Iranian Capital. The incident which is believed to be an act of arson took place today and on the same day that many of Tehran's Collective Bus drivers observed a protest action.Official sources have attributed the fire to a short circuit but curiously the same motif was used in order to justify the burning of a collective bus, happened the day before, in southern Tehran.
Several other Metro Station were damaged and some of their drivers bowed by strikers' supporters who some of them were heard shouting slogans by calling for the solidarity of Metro drivers with the Bus company's strikers.
Many Iranians and especially youngsters have shown their support of strikers by attacking militiamen who were appointed as bus drivers or by smashing the windows of the collective vehicles.
Many of the strikers and their family members, estimated at more than 1000 individuals, have been injured or arrested by brutal militiamen. The fate of many of the arrested activists is unknown and some have been transferred to section 240 of the infamous Evin Political Jail located in North Tehran.
Their colleagues have called on the free world and western unions and human rights' association to intervene for their immediate releases.
Don't expect Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, or any other so-called human rights activists sticking their collective oars into this story. For starters, it doesn't involve the US, Israel or Bush.
I wonder what those loony lefties we see hawking copies of Socialist Worker around town every Saturday, brandishing their brainless placards attacking Bush and Blair as war criminals, showing solidarity with Hamas and other terrorist organisations, and petitions demanding withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan have to say about this. Nothing, I suspect.
I have long suspected that Iranians would support a Regime change...I believe thay want a secular society, with a little prodding who knows????
Chuck:
Your assessment is more accurate than you realize.
Check out the FreeIran Web Site.
We should support them and the USA should support a Regime Change in Iran.
militiamen who were appointed as bus drivers
Hmm. At least in the US, driving a bus requires special training and a commercial driver's license. And they're just handing the keys to Basijis? Is the Koran a driver's-ed manual, too?
Better stay off the sidewalks in Tehran!
A Turkish news source is reporting that Iran will test a nuclear weapon in March. The article goes on to explain that the US is fighting an "economic" war with Iran under the guise of a "War on terrorism". The war with Iran, according to the source, is due only to the conversion to Petrodollars. Moreover, the "US keeps getting more and more agrressive," says the author.
That's funny, I seem to rememeber Iran mentioning wiping a country off the map. I guess that is not at all aggressive.
http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id=105626
To reject the Islamic government would be to reject Islam. These hairy, scowling mullahs have been at the helm for a long time now, and the Koran teaches that their term in office should be, well, eternity.
"I have long suspected that Iranians would support a Regime change...I believe thay want a secular society, with a little prodding who knows????"
I'm a bit wary of the free access the Western media has had lately to so many secular Iranians within Iran who want to pursue a more Western lifestyle.
I'm not saying it's untrue, I'm just questoning the timing of the reporting.
Just a few weeks ago there was a special on this subject on SBS Australia showing many young Iranians.
This portrayed these Iranian youngsters as good natured rebellious kids doing everything possible to avoid the tyrannical glare of the Islamic leaders, identical in every respect to their Western kin, pursuing activities like, go-Kart racing, paintball(!), downloading banned music off the internet, etc.
Like I said, the timing of this free access to all these Iranian kids who are "just like us" was striking.
Direct confrontation will not beat the spread of islam through jihad. They thrive on confrontation. It only proves their point and makes them fight harder.
The West must develop a well-funded strategy to promote rotting away islam from within. A difficult task considering the level of islamic ignorance and all the islamic apologists imbedded in the Western leadership.
We shouldn't get our hopes up for a popular uprising in Iran. Look what happened in China's Tienamin (SP?) Square several years ago. The Iranian Mullahs are thoroughly ruthless despite their public hyperbolic buffoonery.
All may not be quiet in China, Arakis-- this article lists a few examples of "growing social tensions."
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/01/23/china.clash.ap/index.html
All it takes is a sufficient number of people to rise up-- the military and paramilitary orgs can't kill the entire country. I think if Iran was able to overthrow the Shah, they can eventually overthrow the mullahs.
The mullahs are ultimately cowards, I believe, and when push comes to shove, the most hardcore of the hardcore will flee, and moderate clerics, as well as those who just want power under any circumstances, will throw in their lot with the anti-mullah revolution.
ABC News' Bob Woodruff-- God bless him and his cameraman-- did a report from Tehran a few weeks ago that made it apparent that the mullahs are on rather thin ice with the youth who make up the majority of the country. It's largely a question of where "the line" is, beyond which sufficient numbers of Iranians will decide that enough is enough.
Teheran is probably missing its former mayor...
30/40-somethings enjoy an almost celebrity-status in their own right. There's a whole generation gap, and everyone knows it's because of the Mullah's over-enthusiasm for the war.
I see an opportunity for CAIR to go to Iran and demand that striking workers be released and have their civil rights restored. I think that is a way we may never hear from them again. I am sure that they can have enough "killed while escaping" to open up enough cells for the visiting CAIR members.
CAIR would never do that. If they do anything, one would expect nothing more than a strongly worded memo issued from the safety of their homes in the US, where they enjoy the freedom to express their views.