Category: Geopolitics

Iran’s president redefines power politics at home

Iran’s president redefines power politics at home International Herald Tribune
In Iran’s theocratic system, where appointed religious leaders hold ultimate power, the presidency has been a relatively weak position. In the multiple layers of power that obscure the governance of Iran, no one knows for certain where the ultimate decisions are being made. But many of those watching are in near disbelief at the speed and aggression with which the president is seeking to accumulate power. They assume that he is operating with the full support of Khamenei.

Ahmadinejad, elected in June 2005, is trying to outpace the challenges buffeting Iran, ones that could undermine his presidency and conservative control. The economy is in shambles, unemployment is soaring, and the president has so far failed to deliver on his promise of economic relief for the poor.

This is a Saudi textbook. (After the intolerance was removed.)

This is a Saudi textbook. (After the intolerance was removed.)
Religion is the foundation of the Saudi state’s political ideology; it is also a key area of Saudi education in which students are taught the interpretation of Islam known as Wahhabism (a movement founded 250 years ago by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab) that is reflected in these textbooks.

Scholars estimate that within the Saudi public school curriculum, Islamic studies make up a quarter to a third of students’ weekly classroom hours in lower and middle school, plus several hours each week in high school. Educators who question or dissent from the official interpretation of Islam can face severe reprisals. In November 2005, a Saudi teacher who made positive statements about Jews and the New Testament was fired and sentenced to 750 lashes and a prison term. (He was eventually pardoned after public and international protests.)

The passages below — drawn from the same set of Saudi texts proudly cited in the new 74-page review of curriculum reform now being distributed by the Saudi Embassy — are shaping the views of the next generation of Saudis and Muslims worldwide. Unchanged, they will only harden and deepen hatred, intolerance and violence toward other faiths and cultures. Is this what Riyadh calls reform? Continue reading “This is a Saudi textbook. (After the intolerance was removed.)”

Immigration solution — invade Mexico!

Immigration solution — invade Mexico!

While this may seem an amusing “Modest Proposal” some experts see Mexico inevitably becoming the 51st State, if Puerto Rico doesn’t beat them to it.

Here is a modest proposal for solving the illegal immigration issue once and for all: Invade and occupy Mexico and admit it into the Union as the 51st state. That way, we can put an immediate end to all of the political hand-wringing on this pressing and volatile issue. Before you dismiss this idea as reckless, consider that there’s something in this plan for every American, regardless of their political stripe.

IRAN OKS ‘NAZI’ SOCIAL FABRIC

IRAN OKS 'NAZI' SOCIAL FABRIC By AMIR TAHER

The law mandates the government to make sure that all Iranians wear "standard Islamic garments" designed to remove ethnic and class distinctions reflected in clothing, and to eliminate "the influence of the infidel" on the way Iranians, especially the young, dress.

It also envisages separate dress codes for religious minorities, Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians, who will have to adopt distinct color schemes to make them identifiable in public. The new codes would enable Muslims to instantly recognize non-Muslims so that they can avoid shaking hands with them by mistake, and thus becoming najis" (unclean).

Jewish MP denies Iran badge plan

From correspondents in Tehran

May 20, 2006

IRAN'S only Jewish MP strongly denied reports in a Canadian newspaper overnight that Iran may force non-Muslims to wear coloured badges in public so they can be identified.

"This report is a complete fabrication and is totally false," Maurice Motammed said in Tehran. "It is a lie, and the people who invented it wanted to make political gain" by doing so. (More)

Even if the badging portion of the new dress regulations are not true, here is some historical re-counting of how this would not be unusual.

An ethos of infidel-hatred, including paroxysms of annihilationist fanaticism, has pervaded Persian/Iranian society, almost without interruption (i.e., the two major exceptions being Sunni Afghan rule from 1725-1794, and Pahlavi reign, with its Pre-Islamic revivalist efforts, from 1925-1979), since the founding of the Shi’ite theocracy in 1502 under Shah Ismail, through its present Khomeini-inspired restoration, since 1979. (More)

May 23, 2006 — EDITORS' NOTE: The Associated Press and others have challenged Amir Taheri's account (published in The Post on Saturday) of the proposed new Iranian dress code, noting that the law does not specify badges for religious minorities. Below is his reply.  I STAND BY MY COLUMN

Indian Soap Operas changing Afghanistan.

Daily Times – Site Edition
Afghanistan is a deeply conservative Islamic society where family problems are invariably kept hidden behind a veil of privacy. The Indian soap operas are gaining popularity with every passing day and changing the culture.

A similar thing happened in Russia, except there it was Mexican Soaps (Novelas) that were the rage. On a trip to Russia, the stars were treated like royalty. These addictive soaps are as important in breaking down cultural barriers, as Rock music was in bringing down the Iron Curtain.

Saudis Nix Pictures of Women in Newspapers

Saudis Nix Pictures of Women in Newspapers – Yahoo! News
King Abdullah has told Saudi editors to stop publishing pictures of women as they could make young men go astray, newspapers reported Tuesday. The king's directive, made in a meeting with local editors, caused surprise as the monarch has been regarded a quiet reformer since he took office in the ultra-conservative country last August. In recent months, newspapers have published pictures of women — always wearing the traditional Muslim headscarf — to illustrate stories with increasing regularity.

IRAN’S (COSTLY) WAR ON AMERICA By AMIR TAHERI

IRAN'S (COSTLY) WAR ON AMERICA By AMIR TAHERI – New York Post Online Edition: postopinion
Nowhere is the cost of the so-called "War against the Infidel" more apparent than in Iran's oil industry. Projections made in 1977 envisaged the Iranian oil off-take to reach a daily capacity of 6.5 million barrels, with another 1.5 million available as emergency reserves. The capacity of the Kharg terminal, the chief export facility for Iranian oil, was increased from 5.5 million barrels a day to 8 million.

But lack of investment, and the virtual impossibility of accessing highly complex technology, has meant a steady decline. Today, the Islamic Republic produces something like 3.8 million barrels a day – a level Iran had surpassed in 1973.

Worse still, Iran has become an importer of petroleum products. Because the Islamic Republic failed to build enough refining capacity, it is now forced to secure nearly half of the nation's needs in gasoline and special fuels through imports. So nearly 30 percent of Iran's income from oil exports is spent on imports of petroleum products.

Iran's gas industry is in even poorer shape. Projections made in 1977 saw Iran emerging as the world's largest exporter of liquefied natural gas by the year 2000. Iran owns the second-largest deposits of natural gas in the world, after Russia, almost 20 percent of the global reserves. Yet it is importing natural gas from Turkmenistan to feed the country's only gas-turbine power station (at Neka on the Caspian Sea).

In Iran, Apocalypse vs. Reform

In Iran, Apocalypse vs. Reform

Fascinating insight into the behind-the-scenes Civil War over the direction of Shiiite Islam. Could our conflict with Iran be solved by the current Grand Ayatolah being suceeded by the Liberals described in this article?

The best known of the liberals is 84 year old Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, once the designated successor to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s first supreme leader, and in recent years one of Iran’s foremost advocates of democracy.

Even more intriguing is Montazeri’s near neighbor, Grand Ayatollah Yusuf Saanei, 68, who, unlike his elder, is still instructing students at his madrassa and delivering regular sermons and fatwas He offers two reasons for optimism. One is the growing demand for change among Iranian youth; those under 30 make up more than two-thirds of the population. The other factor is Iraq — where, Saanei says, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani has successfully updated the role of Islam in government.

Are we running out of oil?

Oil Futures – The Boston Globe

Some experts believe the age of oil is near its end. Others insist that there are trillions of untapped barrels left and that the future of oil depends more on what happens above ground than below.
We’re getting better at stretching our supply. According to Yergin, the 1970s oil shocks set off three decades of previously unheard-of energy efficiency in the US, allowing the economy to grow 150 percent while energy consumption grew only 25 percent. By the time oil production plateaus, he says, ”I think we’ll be driving cars that get 110 miles to the gallon, 120 miles to the gallon.” To assume we won’t be able to adjust in time, Yergin says, ”means you think the technological revolution that began in the 18th century is going to end.”

Yergin, however, is eager to dispel any charge of complacency. He is concerned about the future of oil, he insists, it’s just that what concerns him is taking place aboveground, not below. Today’s tightened supply, after all, is due not to geology but geopolitics the lack of foreign investment in Iran, the chaos in Iraq, the tumultuous politics of Venezuela, rebel attacks in Nigeria.

”It’s politics within countries, the timing of decision-making, the clash of nations, those are the things I worry about. Finding the oil, he suggests, is the easy part.”

The Populist Latin Revolution

While America has been fixated on fighting the Islamo-Facist Revolution, another Revolution has been going on closer to home in Latin America. A revolution that according to provocative Black scholar Shelby Steele started after WWII:

I believe, in a late-20th-century event that transformed the world more profoundly than the collapse of communism: the world-wide collapse of white supremacy as a source of moral authority, political legitimacy and even sovereignty. This idea had organized the entire world, divided up its resources, imposed the nation-state system across the globe, and delivered the majority of the world’s population into servitude and oppression. After World War II, revolutions across the globe, from India to Algeria and from Indonesia to the American civil rights revolution, defeated the authority inherent in white supremacy, if not the idea itself

With the exception of Cuba, Latin America never had their Revolution to end White Supremacy. As blogger Robert Mayer points out in his response to the ” Why isn’t Socialism Dead” (posted on this blog on May 6):

Latin America, next to Africa, is one of the most in-egalitarian continents in the world. Even Eastern Europe is no comparison. Military dictatorships, billionaire oligarchs, and foreign corporations have had their run of the place. Latin America is also still very much undermined by its Spanish colonial past. Most of the very wealthy in Latin American countries tend to be of European descent — in another word, white. Compare that to the poor, who are predominantly of Indian descent.You have yourself a genuine populist witches brew. A brew where people not only no longer believe in democracy, but advocate the complete redistribution of wealth based on racial terms.

Chile has been the most successful Latin Country to make the transition to a Free Market model, but it had the advantage of a relatively small indigenous population of Mapuche Indians to assimilate. Compare that to Bolivia, where they are over half and just elected Morales, a Populist one-of-their-own, who immediately sent the Army out to seize the gas fields. Problem is their neighbors in Brazil & Argentina (Through Spain) were the investors who developed those fields. Again they are relatively successful primarily European-descendant countries with their own Populist movement histories, as portrayed in the musical “Evita” and starring Madonna in the film version. Now the indigenous populist revolt has spilled over their borders to effect their Socialist economic well-being.