- In Iran, the neo-cons got what they hoped for. Iran's
President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and his rhetoric about Israel being moved
to Europe and the Holocaust never occurring is made to order for the neo-cons
who want the United States and Israel to attack Iran's nuclear sites. Ahmedinejad,
the arch conservative mayor of Tehran, was elected in a surprise victory
last June replacing moderate President Mohamed Khatami. The neo-cons and
their allies -- the terrorist Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK) based in Iraq and
the pro-Shah exiles -- called for a boycott of the election in radio and
TV satellite broadcasts to the country. That and Iran's stagnant economy
and high unemployment had the desired effects for the neo-cons who want
a war with the Iranian regime: Ahmedinejad coasted to victory beating the
favorite of the old Reagan-Bush guard who helped facilitate the Iran-contra
deal from the Iranian side -- former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, a multi-millionaire
pragmatist.
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- The neo-cons wasted no time in attacking Ahmedinejad.
They falsely said that he was one of the U.S. embassy hostage takers and
that he was an international assassin who traveled to Austria to murder
a dissident. Ahmedinejad, whose Muslim conservative base is similar to
George W. Bush's base of a conservative group of fanatic fundamentalist
Christians and some Jews who favor an expansionist Israel, ratcheted things
up by playing the Israel and Holocaust denial cards.
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- Iran's pragmatists, who now include the Ayatollah Seyed
Ali Khamanei, slowly began to see the trap the neo-cons laid for Iran by
helping to engineer Ahmedinejad's victory. Khamanei has promoted Rafsanjani
to head the Expediency Council, a sort of referee arbitration council that
settles policy and legislative differences between the Parliament (Majles)
and the mullahs. Khamanei has also positioned Rafsanjani close to him at
public appearances -- a sign that Rafsanjani may be the next Ayatollah
after Khamanei's death and is increasingly calling the shots. Essentially,
Ahmedinejad, who wants to pack the government with Revolutionary Guard
elements, has seen his power checkmated.
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- The neo-cons would have us believe that Ahmedinejad is
the new Saddam. However, Saddam never had religious leaders who checked
his power. Iran is not Iraq and the neo-cons cannot sell us a new (and
costlier) war based on the same old tired rhetoric and myopic viewpoints.
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- http://waynemadsenreport.com/
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