Done
We went to vote at around noon expecting less people at lunch time. It took us about 3 hours and a half to cast our vote.
See also: Election day in Iran
‘Our’ Iran
Iranian elections: live
Update 1: Poll closed. Voting was extended four times.
Update 2: Moussavi’s website: Despite many irregularities in polling stations Moussavi is leading by a large margin.
Update 3: According to sites close to Ahmadi-Nejad, he has won the elections with 69% of the votes
Update 4: Snippets from Voters: IRNA (The Iranian News Agency) claims with 20% of all votes counted, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad leads the race. IR’s official Iran news agency, has declared Ahmadinejad the winner of the election.
Update 5: پیام دریافت شد؛ اصلاحات را فراموش کنید
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- The Man Who Could Beat Ahmadinejad: Mousavi Talks to TIME
- Congress-Ahmadinejad Secret Love Affair Continues: The Iran Refine Petroleum Sanctions Act, by Trita Parsi
- Philip Weiss: Obama’s Iran man is still pictured on site calling for sanctions on Iran
- “Don’t Cry For Me Ahmadinejad”: “When it comes to the Iranian presidential elections, Jerusalem is convinced that it is in fact Iran’s current president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is the best candidate to serve Israel’s interests. ‘We’re better off with him getting elected,’ said a senior political source. ‘The prevailing opinion here is that Ahmadinejad just speaks his mind. How are the others any different? They’re just nicer, but they think exactly like him.’”
I’m am here with my breath held for you, Homie. I want whoever truly won the popular vote to be your next president, but I’m having a very hard time finding stuff that isn’t so biased it can’t be trusted. It seems that officials are giving it to AN by a landslide, but MM is crying foul, saying there was fraud, and I hope this does not lead to dangerous streets.
I just forced myself to read the latest AP piece, and down near the bottom was:
So it sounds as though MM really IS Iran’s Obama, and that is not a good thing. NOT a good thing, the wealthy and the youth voting together, if you think about it, cannot be a good thing.
I hope at least that this all will have served to impress the ayatollahs that certain more liberal positions should be considered, but the idea of violence in the streets over an election that cannot have made a substantive change really upsets me. The vaunted Mr. Obama has barely deviated from his predecessor, except in presentation alone, and I’m finding that somehow harder to bear.
Stay safe, dear friend. Stay safe.
xoxoxox
To say that only the wealthy and the kids voted for M is not accurate. I just wonder why they bothered to have an election.
Well, the AP is very seriously not a trustworthy source anymore, and so we do well to consider the source. I just watched al Jazeera for the latest, but it’s very restrained about the whole thing. A reporter in Tehran said a Mousavi press conference was scheduled for 2pm, but that there is no confirmation he will actually appear. If the kids are going postal, we’re not likely to find out anything more convincing.
The reason, or the excuse, for shutting things down is the threat of rioting.
I’ll tune in again at the top of the hour, see if they have anything new. At least they have a guy in Tehran, who can actually go talk to the officials and the campaign people.
I know I wonder why we bothered to have an election here, too. It isn’t, I don’t think, ultimately as different for us as most people would insist it is.
Whatever happens, I think the real powers in both our countries have a very good idea how the general population feels. This ought to be a good thing in and of itself. Seems they could care less, here, but that doesn’t automatically apply in Iran… does it? Probably. Maybe not.
Just stay safe, please.
I’ll weigh in if I get anything better on my end before I have to crash. Please, also, send any news on your end.
They hear Mousavi’s last announcements at 1:30 a.m.?
My friends and I are all here in Toronto wide awake. I’m frightened and nauseous.
In the Bay area there was a huge fight b/c there weren’t enough ballots. I heard the screaming and yelling on the phone. Mousavi said that in many places in Iran it has been the same story.
Mousavi’s headquarters in Tehran aren’t answering the phone (of course!) … They answered it every time we called during the week.
I meant to say : “Did you hear” ……. I’ve been wide awake more than 24 hours.
They have announced the results since early hours of the morning but no one is congratulating the winner, no Victory speech so far. It feels like a self-inflicted “shock and awe”.
I’m too old to stay up 24 hours. I’m trying to make it to one more al Jazeera report, where they say they expect an announcement in “moments”….
I did hear earlier some guy talking about the irony of Mousavi complaining about election irregularities… alluding to a maybe not great record on this when he was prime minister and the anchor woman sort of snickering about having the same thought… but, well, quoth Sgt Schultz, “I know nuthink!”
Right now, trying hard to play detached observer, I see there are decent arguments on each side. I just want to stress to you guys that you cannot underestimate the perfidious intentions of the rulers of the Western world. We make so much sound virtuous and reasonable that is pure poison. We could be behind the entire perception of Mousavi’s popularity everywhere, even in Iran. Or, Mousavi, and those who voted for him, just got robbed, big time, but I am SO wary of the effect of our culture on newcomers, especially the effect of our elite on the aspirations of those who have lived with so much less freedom and leisure. That freedom and leisure is the basis for so much slavery and suffering and toil and death and dislocation.
And the internet is a very effective tool for convincing people, especially youth, of stuff that brings them together and sucks their votes out of them… or only seems to.
I don’t mean to sound paranoid, but, the right thing MIGHT have happened… or… not.
???????????????????
Flipping back to al Jazeera now and then dropping like a stone.
Good luck, and stay safe. xoxoxox
Unless I am totally blind – which is not impossible – I don’t think that the West has anything to do in M’ s popularity. More precisely, I find that it was generally downplayed by western medias until the last day when it was too obvious to ignore.
I think that the average Iranian is more sophisticated in his way of accepting necessary compromises than all the big shots put together.
I perfectly understand your point and I know that this is a deja vu possibility. But, again unless I have lost all my judgmental qualities, I am 100% sure that this is not the case. We had the same will expressed in many elections during Khatami’s mandate. It is not anything new nor implanted.
If I was to look at foreign influences, I’ll watch the center of power. Treacherous alliances, remember?
If no plausible compromise is announced, this will be the last Iranian elections – at least for me.
Update 5: We got the message. Forget reforms.
Heartbroken. And a bit afraid right now.
Hi Tori.
Outraged, If you can read the Update 5 or ask Kamran to translate it for you. I think it says it all.
Reading it slowly. (It’ll probably take me an hour!) Kamran is hopeless. He just read it and said, “I have to go post this.”
Tori, my Iran hurts.
Homeira, in my opinion it’s so soon to talk about forgetting reform. I think we should wait a few days and then think about it.
boogi-jan
I hope too. This is what the slap on our faces sounds like.
[...] In any case, the pro-Ahmadinejad tilt of Bolton, Pipes, Abrams and the rest of the crowd that gave us the Iraq war is a demonstration of perversity unlike any I’ve ever seen in American politics. (ht2 Forever Under Construction) [...]