12:08 pm
Iran: An Aborted Green Revolution?
I had hoped to provide some analysis on Iran’s election, but I’m pretty late to the game and there’s already a lot of good commentary out there. In fact, I think Michael Tomasky hits many of the points I would have made, particularly that what Ahmadinejad (and others running the country) did is tantamount to a coup:
The way the customs and normal practices were broken; the way the results were announced so prematurely; the way the internet and cell-phone capabilities were shut down; the way dissent is being shut down. These are anti-democratic practices to put it mildly, and they are hallmarks of coup-like behavior. In any case “coup” isn’t a legal term and there’s a bit of subjectivity in it.
And as to the results themselves. I mean, honestly, people. A guy who was polling at 39 percent a few days earlier got 64 percent? Fine, fine, polls may be unreliable, but that is a new definition of unreliable.
Or consider this. According to figures, 11.2 million more Iranians voted this year than in 2005. And Ahmadinejad allegedly received 7.2 million more votes than he did in 2005. That would mean that the incumbent got about 65 percent of all new voters. Really? In a country with double-digit unemployment, inflation near 25 percent, and the bulk of his populist promises from four years ago not only not delivered on but crashing to failure?
. . .If you’ve managed the economy that badly and the electorate bulges by about 28 percent (roughly speaking, 40 million to 29 million), I don’t care how adept you are at religious demagoguery, you are not getting 65 percent of that 28 percent. If you can demonstrate to me that anything like this has ever happened anywhere, I will look into it and report back fairly. But I doubt you can. Remember, we’re talking 25 percent inflation.
I would likely have bought it, as would’ve most people, if they’d followed procedures and announced on Sunday morning that Ahmadinejad got 52 or 53 percent. So it’s not that I (and others) don’t imagine he could have won. It’s about the circumstances, and to some extent the highly improbable 64 percent number.
That was my first reaction as well: 64 percent? Really? You’d think that authoritarians would have figured out by now that if you’re going to steal an election you should at the very least look credible.
I’d find it interesting to see another number here: what percentage of the electorate is in Tehran as opposed to other parts of the country? If Iran is like many countries outside the West, a huge percentage of its population is in its largest city. This is important for one simple reason: Mousavi’s strength is primarily in Tehran. If the population in the outlying regions is larger, then an Ahmadinejad victory is slightly more plausible.
The best way I can make this point is to pass on two photos from The Big Picture blog. First, a voter in Tehran:
Next, a line of voters in Qom:
I want to be careful not to oversimplify this. The Big Picture also has photos of a woman in full hijab voting in Iran. And clearly Ahmadinejad had significant support in Tehran, particularly among older and male voters. But as Tomasky noted, the notion that 65 percent of those who did not vote in the last election chose Ahmadinejad stretches credulity, particularly given the fact that his campaign never demonstrated any Obama-esque organizational capacity.
As I write this, the situation remains in flux. Mousavi’s supporters continue to demonstrate, in defiance of a ban and despite beatings over the weekend, and Mousavi himself appeared at a major rally in downtown Tehran. And Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameni has urged an review of reports of irregularities (which may be a tacit recognition of the absurd outcome or may be merely a stalling tactic designed to slow down or stop the street demonstrations).
Over at TPM, Josh Marshall wonders whether Khameni’s call for a review of the results is the first crack:
On the face of it, Khamenei could call for a review and then decide that it all checks out and that’s the end of it. But it’s my experience that that’s not how these things play out. When regimes ride these crises out successfully they almost always do so with a united phalanx. You simply do not grant the premise of the critics. Force, much as we like to think otherwise, is often quite efective. (See Tienanmen [sic] Square.) Once you do, once you legitimize the premise of the protests, which can quickly shift the momentum of the drama, it’s a very slippery slope for the regime.
Perhaps more fundamentally, the people running the regimes aren’t idiots. They know the pattern too. And the decision to break the united front, to get into a discussion of the legitimacy of claims against the regime, usually signals internal dissension that is making that united stance unsustainable. In other words, this sort of development is perhaps not a cause of regime weakness but a symptom.
There’s some merit to his point, but as he himself notes, this might be a pro forma move designed to add further legitimacy to the results.
The other big unknown, of course, is the response of the Obama Administration. To date, it’s been pretty muted, which some on the right have regarded as an abandonment of Iran’s pro-democratic forces. But as Spencer Ackerman has noted, the Iranian-American community doesn’t want the Administration to say much right now, recognizing that anything other than a call for respect for human rights would in all likelihood be counterproductive.
UPDATE: Via Andrew Sullivan, who has done extraordinary work tracking the events in Iran, raw video of today’s demonstration:
Photos: Qom — AP/Kamran Jebreili; Tehran — REUTERS/Caren Firouz, both via The Big Picture and used under the principle of fair use.