The Fall of Khamenei

Iran's attempts to put down the opposition may lead to Khamenei's eventual downfall

If anyone had asked what the state of Iran would be in the early 2010's in the 90's or even during Bush's first term, none would've guessed it would be anywhere close to the possibility of revolution.

Heck, if you had asked myself and other international relations analysts last year shortly after the contended Iranian election about where Iran would be today, we would also have been skeptical that any sort of regime toppling movement was at hand. I know many of us hoped this to be true at that particular time, but the fierceness that the Revolutionary Guard confronted them with and the dwindling support for opposition at the time really made it hard to predict any significant shift.

However, it seems with the continued protests, and specifically with the protests of last week which were the deadliest since the post election protests, it seems that not only has the opposition been bestowed new life, the opposition has begun to be injected with the type of courage and self determination that is a requirement for any successful revolution.

Iran has become a shining example of the idea that revolution comes from within, and not from without. They've gone through one major regime change in the last 30 years through grassroots revolution. It seems there's still much much life left in that same spirit that freed them from the Shah in 1980.

What's different between now and the first protests a few months back is the degree to which the Khamenei regime is taking on the opposition.

We've seen executions, harassment of opposition figures and known associates, and other such actions that perhaps seem necessary to the Supreme Leader, but in hindsight is becoming major fuel for the opposition.

The two biggest weapons in the Supreme Leaders arsenal are becoming the strongest incentives for Mousavi supporters to protest and garner support. Mousavi has yet to be arrested, but the moment he does become arrested and the moment arrests spread beyond just those protesting could be a loud cry for open rebellion from supporters.

We can know for sure that Khamenei and Ahmadinejad aren't stupid. They know they need to walk a fine line with how they deal with this threat to their power, and it's evident in how they've required Revolutionary Guards to not carry weapons.

They certainly learned a very powerful lesson with the death of Neda, an innocent bystander during post-election protests, and the lesson is that killing the opposition provides a strong rallying cry for them.

With this realization, it's hard to understand why the Iranian paramilitary group called the “Basij” would continually instigate the deaths and severe injuries of protesters. They've been central to most violent outbursts in these protests and almost surely responsible for the deaths in the Ashura protests this past week. They are admittedly hard to control centrally. These men answer to different clerics throughout the country who may or may not feel strongly against the opposition.

The more reckless the Basij becomes, the more incensed the opposition will become. This will be key in how Iranians view their government and whether or not this becomes a larger issue for Khamanei.

The Basij is composed of about one million men, one of the largest in the world. If this group continues to mobilize, it's not hard to imagine a state where Iranians feel their home is becoming a military state and openly reject the Basij involvement in such 'peacekeeping'.

It is of course to early too predict any sort of outcome in Iran, but one thing is sure is that this problem has gotten much more intense and much more problematic for the Iranian regime than they or anyone else could have predicted. Hope faded shortly after the initial protests but it's been revived and re-strengthened by a spirit of persistence and self determination. The opposition hasn't done much to expand their operations, but the Iranian government in their attempt to clamp down has done more for the opposition's cause than they could hope to do on their own.

Even if the opposition doesn't succeed in toppling Khamenei, if this becomes a truly persistant problem for him and Ahmadinejad, then they will be forced to take action that may end up giving Mousavi supporters even greater reason to maintain their opposition.

The Iranians need the support of the West. It is time for a new era in Iran and we must hope that there is some sort of success there, for the future of the Mousavi opposition may hold the key to the future of the Middle East for years to come.

HC Senate Vote Imminent : Quick Thoughts before the Vote

UPDATE: As of after a few minutes after midnight CST tonight, the Senate health care bill has officially PASSED the U.S. Senate.

The Senate vote which will likely be the most crucial vote in this whole thing is scheduled to happen within less than ten minutes of this post.

It's almost a sure thing that it will pass, but what truly bugs me is how slow we will reap benefits and how that could really be a big problem for dems next year. In future pieces I will go into detail about what this may mean for democrats.

In the meantime, let's forget all that stuff of little relative significance, affordable health care is finally within reach and discriminatory acts by insurers will finally come to an end. We didn't get the most progressive bill, but considering how fragile the dem majorities are in the Senate, it doesn't need to be said that we are blessed to have actually gotten something out of the 'legislative black hole' that is the Senate. People will no longer need to fear dying from cancer or dying from some obscure complication of a treatable disease that wasn't taken care of because they lacked insurance.

I won't go on too long. Any comment I can make now has been repeated and retold in every way possible.

This truly is history. Such an emotional moment of solidarity this is for those whose lifelong cause has been for HC reform. I can just imagine how Vicky Kennedy and her family must feel right now. Most of Ted Kennedy's political life has been to make this moment a reality. Here we finally are.

Maybe one day when we reap the benefits of this bill the people of America will wake up and realize that the system we have is not as broken as they think. We still can make change happen. It might not be all of the change we would like, but we all make compromises in our every day life. That won't cease to happen in politics or in our daily lives.

Don't let your desire to 'get back' at republicans and desire to get the most progressive bill blind you from the real accomplishments of this bill. We can't deny that doing nothing is unacceptable and trying to lie to ourselves that having pushed a public option or a single payer system might have worked under some oppressive undertaking of reconciliation puts too much weight behind an option that could've been political suicide for the democratic party.

Let's remember the work that has been done to get here.

It is not for naught.

We have come through victorious, so let us take up our cross and walk. We have much work left to do to restore these blessed United States of America.

We did it, guys.

THE MEDIA SPOTLITE|| MSNBC||Unemployment rate unexpetedly drops to 10%

The blog will begin this segment that will happen sporadically when there's huge breaking news that is very consequential to Americans. All things featured on 'The Media Spotlite' will be credited to the appropriate copyright owner.

MSNBC.com

The Labor Department said the economy shed 11,000 jobs last month, the smallest monthly loss since December 2007. That's much better than the 130,000 losses Wall Street economists expected and also an improvement from the 111,000 cuts in October.

The unemployment rate fell to 10 percent from 10.2 percent in October, a 26-year high. Economists had expected the rate to remain unchanged.

***commentary to come shortlly***

WEEKLY SPECIAL FEATURE || Obama's TRUE plan for Aghanistan: A Road to Victory

Admittedly, Afghanistan and the war on terror poses one of the most difficult problems America has had to deal with in its history.

With so many variables, so many things going on at home, with a waning desire to war at home and a raging desire to defeat the western Goliath from Islamic extremists, there is really no room for errors in the decisions that must be made.

We can afford none of these decisions to be made in haste. What we do from here on out will be more consequential to whether or not we can stabilize Afghanistan than everything we've done in the past eight years. To that end, it is definitely a credit to our President that he took his time to review all available information and make his decision.

The defined mission in Afghanistan from the start has always been murky at best, but the reality of the situation is that our new objective there is to make sure Afghanistan can take care of itself, whether or not the administration will freely admit this. Our original mission was to find and kill Osama bin Laden and exterminate the Taliban and al Qaeda from Afghanistan, but it is my belief that the administration knows well that continuing to pursue that as victory is a lost cause and simply not possible. This, of course, would be a very tough message to convey to Americans and perhaps politically toxic.

We undoubtedly have our work cut out for us regardless of what our mission is for our stay there.

My estimation and perception of what the goals of Obama's plans are and the rewards they may or may not reap runs contrary to most criticisms out there. They contain good strategies that perhaps take the appearance of bad ones if you take the administration's goals and arguments at face value. My biggest point to make is that I believe that what the President hopes to do with this plan isn't what he's telling us publicly for the sake of not telling Americans a few hard truths.

While there is few who really care to argue the pointless 'war of necessity' vs 'war of choice' debate, Afghanistan and Pakistan are both countries with endemic corruption problems that are so bad, that a total of about 400 Taliban fighters in both countries are having the success of destabilizing Afghanistan over the long term, and increasing violence in Pakistan. As is the case in most insurgency wars, we find ourselves facing maybe a hundred Al Qaeda operatives in the entire country of Afghanistan in what amounts to trying to find a needle in a haystack. The country is largely urban with little villages sparsely covering the country's territory.

The Taliban's ability to do so much with so little manpower has lent at least some credence to the argument that leaving Afghanistan might result in the re-establishing of the country as a safe haven-one of Obama's big selling points for this and the previous surge.

While the 'safe haven' argument has big holes in it, the government in Afghanistan now doesn't have the capability to deal with the insurgency that exists now. Leaving them suddenly does leave the possibility open for a successful coup in what would essentially be a power vacuum.

The President perhaps has overemphasized this point to try to sell his new war strategy, but the reality is that if the government we've helped create in Afghanistan is driven out of power, the entire mission in Afghanistan would have been for nothing, the mission will have been an utter failure, and the fault of which would immediately be placed on the President and the democratic party regardless of who actually initiated the war. There must be at least some confidence in the administration and military officials that there is still time to at least leave a legitimate and self sustaining government behind.

We won't eradicate the threat of terrorism there by killing a couple of Taliban fighters every few days and weeks as we have been for some time now. After so many history lessons, it's become apparent to everyone that guerilla warfare isn't susceptible to overwhelming force and huge war spending budgets. In Vietnam our combined forces against the Viet Cong numbered well over a million, outnumbering them two to one and that effort failed.

So why does the administration seek to expand troop numbers if overwhelming force doesn't work?

The key to POTUS' plan lies in the withdrawal date.

The administration has warned Hamid Karzai that the commitment in Afghanistan is not open ended, and despite Robert Gates' assertions to congress that the withdrawal date is flexible, there's several indications that the intention of having a withdrawal date is truly a last straw for our commitment in the country and it isn't to be taken as lightly as some would like to.

There is a big increase in funding for police and army training requested by the President, as well as a big increase in American military personal specifically assigned to train them. The withdrawal date puts pressure on Karzai to root out corruption and make sure funds are being used to train and equip soldiers. The withdrawal date is at the very least testing whether or not Afghanistan's government is serious about stabilizing their country. The time line, even if not followed through, forces the hand of Karzai into making at least some progress at the risk of losing our support.

The withdrawal date also serves as an exhortation to the nation and allows Afghans the chance for self actualization, to do what Iraqis have done and rise to the occasion of protecting their homeland; eventually having less ill will towards America as we become less and less involved.

This move combined with a significant temporary surge in combat troops gives legitimacy to the counter-insurgency strategy being used in Afghanistan. It gives the possibility of one day transferring control over by using the overwhelming force of combat troops to protect population centers as well as the areas where Afghans are being trained to defend their country. It also makes it possible to streamline the process for training Afghans with few interruptions and minimal deaths; something that had been a huge problem in Iraq.

The plan makes use of the best parts from Bush's Iraq surge strategy and has stronger versions of tactics used previously. However, the faults in the plan lie in how large the troop increases are, how expensive the increase will be, and our inability to act against al Qaeda in Pakistan.

If the plan to train, cut, and run indeed does work, adding over 50% more troops is probably pushing it. Lives will be needlessly lost and large amounts of money will be needlessly spent that is sorely needed at home. There also needs to be an increased consideration for expanding the drone bombing programs they have for attacking al Qaeda in Pakistan. Our policy towards them will be critical when trying to end this war.

If we do this correctly, we have a reasonable chance to turn things around in Afghanistan and leave something stable that can at least provide its citizens security. Clearly, the matter on what our mission in Afghanistan has shifted, and the war is now truly winnable. What we can accomplish and whether or not Afghans step up to the plate will determine success or failure. Iraqis ended up stepping up and doing very well for themselves. Here's to a repeat of that so we can bring our soldier's home soon.