Blogging the democratic revolution
The Times has an incredible piece on how fast and how hard the revolutionary winds of change are hitting Europe. Europeans everywhere are rejecting the Franco-German centralized-welfare-statist model and embracing the Anglo-Roman ideal of freedom and rule of law. It’s happening at breakneck speed, and among people no one ever expected such enthusiastic support from….
Let’s get one thing straight: whether it was Rafsanjani or Ahmadinejad who was selected to win, it doesn’t really matter. When looking at Iran, one only has to know that irregardless of anything, the Guardian Council and Supreme Leader Khamenei in particular control the political levers of the country. Michael Ledeen puts it eloquently, much…
Last week, I wrote about how the media got the story wrong on Iran. Hopefully, they will not make the same mistakes that they made then. To help them out, I’m going to compile articles and photos that show that the Iranians once again boycotted the sham elections in huge proportions. The word has to…
They have started. Venezuela’s oil workers in the eastern part of the country have launched bitter protests against corruption and lost jobs. Their actions have shut down the refineries and the state oil company doesn’t sound as though it is in good shape. As oil hits $60 a barrel, there may be a revolution on….
UPDATE: The regime was forced to move the Los Angeles station. New location is listed at the link. The regime is simply relentless! Here is the list of polling places that will be set up tomorrow. If there is one in your hometown or nearby, investigate! Assemble! Protest! Call the FBI. I’m currently in Sacremento…
When discussing the move towards democracy in Eastern Europe, I always try to remind of the revitalized GUAM alliance, which is meant to secure economic independence toward Russia and move toward western values. The A in GUAM stands for Azerbaijan, which is generally more repressive than the others: Georgia, Ukraine, and Moldova. After the opening…
For those of you have have read my report on the Iranian polling station in Tucson, you may be pleased to know that the Washington Times, in an article entitled “Iran’s sham election — on U.S soil,” has picked up my experience as well as that of Will Franklin’s down in Houston and will be…
Brilliant Italian journalist Oriana Fallici explains why she’s a revolutionary in an amazing interview with Tunku Varadarajan of the Wall Street Journal editorial page. “In the beginning, I was dismayed, and I asked, how is it possible that we do not have Cavour . . . just one Cavour, uno? He was a revolutionary, and…
Hugo Chavez has threatened to cut off oil to Paraguay, just as the Austral winter begins. This is a new major incident of Paraguay abuse from the Venezuelan dictator. His gall and malice know no bounds. He made the threat as a parting shot against the small helpless South American nation at a Mercosur conference…
Kirk just yesterday wrote a great article detailing the way that the U.S. strategy is moving forward to deal with political reform in Egypt. I think linking our aid to moves in the direction of sustained political openness is definitely the best way to go. In light of reading his article, I though I’d check…
Your profession is a noble one. A free press is foundational to a free society. In challenging powerful institutions to answer the hard questions others fear to ask, journalists have led to the collapse of corrupt leaders and helped ensured our democracy. You have done so by reporting the truth in spite of the threats…
I have traditionally been a supporter of the foreign aid that the United States gives to the Egyptian government, mainly on the premise that the soft authoritarianism of Hosni Mubarak’s government was the only alternative to an Islamist takeover which could throw the region into war. Following the 9/11 attacks and further reflection, however, I…
Article 72 of Hugo Chavez’s custom made constitution reads “All magistrates and other offices filled by popular vote are subject to revocation.” With such revolutionary prevision as background let me expand into the most notorious case of political prosecution in today’s Venezuela. Since there are no precedents of a systematic attempt at silencing and imprisoning…
As I mentioned here last April, Luis Ramirez at Voice of America is the best China reporter there is. I noted his daring efforts to report the truth about what is going on in China and and cited his long string of impressive pieces. I was right. Luis has now won one of the most…
Flying to Sacremento in the morning. Updates will be around lunch time! UPDATE: Missed my first flight so I had to go through Vegas. But they have wi-fi in the airport. I’m lovin’ this. I have to board for Sacremento in a minute, so it’s relatively impossible to scramble my thoughts together into a coherent…
This makes political influential number three after Rafik Hariri and Samir Kassir. Former Community Party leader George Hawi was killed in a car-bomb blast in Beirut’s Wata Mosseitbeh middle-class neighborhood at midmorning Tuesday in the latest link of a chain of political assassinations that rocked the nation in connection with Syria’s expulsion from Lebanon. He…
I’m going to take Gary’s banner and run with it here: how is it that the blogosphere is getting this story so wrong? I usually don’t like to open my mouth too wide too quickly, but when the media isn’t even shooting, the blogosphere simply can’t afford to miss the mark. What I mean by…
Tony predicted an Aoun loss, so obviously that was going to be the outcome. Er, and it was! Saad Hariri’s alliance swept all 28 seats, cementing him in parliament with a 72 seat majority in parliament and shutting out the possibility of an Aoun 1/3 veto. Beirut, Lebanon – The anti- Syrian Opposition dealt a…
Andy at Siberian Light is hosting this week’s carnival of revolutions! Check it out for all of the past week’s democracy goodness. And Gary Metz has the Iran week in review up. Gateway Pundit has news up about Rice pushing democracy in Egypt and more protests in Bahrain. Bingo quote: “For 60 years, my country,…
I will be updating this post with more pictures as I find them and as they are sent to me. So if you have photos from anti-regime demonstrations, send them to me! Click “more” for the photos.
I usually do an analysis every week right before each election round in Lebanon; this being the last. However, Tony at Across The Bay, who is a Ph.D. candidate in Ancient Near Eastern Studies, has an analysis that I agree with so much that I asked him if I could simply reproduce it here. It…
Overview: According to the document released by the Iranian government, a polling station for the presidential elections in Iran was located near me in Tucson, Arizona at the Southern Arizona Association for Visually Impaired (SAAVI). I drove there around 9am and the receptionist confirmed that, indeed, voting would be from 3pm-7pm. I arrived back on…
To hear the OAS tell it, Lucio Gutierrez was this noble guy who just happened to be president of Ecuador and due to crazy people out there, got overthrown, and isn’t it a terrible thing when presidents, no matter what they act like, get thrown out? Instability, instability, oh is anything worse than instability? Well,…
Bolivia has been a favorite host-target of Sandalista parasites for years and years. Because no news organization ever cared about this country, it was they who framed the news and the debate about what was really going on in Bolivia. They tell us Bolivia’s just a simple story of the rich oppressing the poor, all…
Heading out there now. Full report to come. UPDATE: I’m back. I acted like a freelance journalist and sat down with the poll monitor for an interview for about an hour and a half. Am working on the report of what I learned about this process, and most importantly, what goes on inside this guy’s…