Let us therefore suspend disbelief and admit it is logically possible that – just maybe, however unlikely it looks – this was a fair fight and the incumbent won. That still leaves the left having to decide where its sympathies lie.

This isn’t going to turn into the Georgia argument all over again, is it? I remember the mess people got into ‘choosing sides’ on that occasion.

‘ . . . . socialists must extend solidarity– not to mention whatever concrete support they can possibly give . . . .’

I often wonder about this. I mean do you ever actually give anything concrete? When I go an work somewhere that is what I tend to do. But what does ‘socialist solidarity’ actually mean?

I also tend to have opinions like ‘it would better for the US to rely so heavily on airstrikes in Afghanistan because these kill lots of civilians and alienate people from the regime’. Or ‘it is good that Charles Taylor is in custody in the Hague because he committed terrible crimes and was destabilizing Liberia, but bad that the ICC Prosecutor tried to indict Sudan’s President for genocide because he probably is not guilty of this specific crime, but he threw all the aid agencies out of the country as a result.’

These are concrete opinions rooted in actual events and outcomes. The above article seems to say ‘none of us really know what happened in Iran at the moment, but it is important that we take a position using a set of theoretical principles based on the writings of dead Russians that enable us to the reduce all the complexities of the world into a sort of spectator sport where we can be up for one side or the other’.

moany shatterface got what s/he wanted in the end

Or rather ‘it would better for the US not to rely so heavily . . . .

“If re-elected, the masterplan is to privatise state-owned holdings – especially the oil industry – for the private enrichment of a few hundred individuals.

Nor should Mousavi be mistaken for a liberal democrat. He was one of the props of theocracy in the 1980s, and instrumental in the murder of thousands of leftists.”

So sad it is too that Chavez in Venezuela found himself calling on an Ahmadinejad re-election, solely on the basis of the anti-imperialism ticket. Chavez is practising ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’, and for all the good work he has done – what with distributing oil wealth on social projects, and PDVSA providing state-subsidised products that were dwindling in numbers in supermarkets – it makes me sick to think that anti-American rhetoric trumps the holocaust denials, the neo-liberal economic policies, the theocratic burdens, and the moral policing.

Carl (3): Feel free to go back to gossiping about Guido if you want…

Have I missed something? Of course I want it to have been rigged, and for the majority of Iranians to support the slightly less crazy right-wing candidate, but what evidence is there?

Ahmedinajad won last time, as a surprise outsider, without any of the benefits of incumbency. So he must be extremely popular. So why shouldn’t he win a landslide this time?

Sure there are lots of people on the streets. Lots of people voted for the losing candidate whatever the correct result is.

If Western governments or media had any evidence, we would have heard it by now, surely? I’m not saying it wasn’t rigged, but who knows?

Dave – suspend my disbelief, ‘cos I gots some!

How, in anyone’s books, can 13 million paper votes be counted in 3 to say, 5 hours?

The only vote that counted in the Iranian election was the top mans, he declared the rigged vote for the weasel – and therefore expected the people to accept it – they didn’t, and good on them for not doing so.

Good article, Dave.

I wondered how long it would take for one of these articles to show up. Oh the failings of the left…

Joe Otten @7: “If Western governments or media had any evidence, we would have heard it by now, surely?”

How would western governments have such information? If we take media coverage in the days leading up to polling at face value, there has been no opinion research in a form that we would recognise. From what I have briefly researched, there was no independent scrutiny (eg comparable to scrutiny by the EU or African Union at elections in “new democracies”). Thus we have to assume that media and governments don’t know. And even if governments did know, courtesy of the spooks, they might consider it counter productive to appear to intervene at this stage.

What we do know is that Ahmadinejad was popular outside major cities owing to social spending during his incumbency. And that the opposition were popular in wealthier cities, where post election demonstrations have taken place. Neither piece of information tells us whether the elections were honest.

Qualitative information suggests that a lot of reformists held their nose and voted for Mousavi. Dave Osler didn’t mention Ahmadinejad’s paranoia and holocaust denial, but Mousavi didn’t demonstrate those attributes and was thus a preferable candidate under the restrictions of the election. All Iranians, not just the street demonstrators, deserve better.

All 13 million votes didn’t have to all be counted to declare a victor. It is sufficient that a statistically significant portion of the votes are counted (which can be as low as 5%) and this process speeds up if the counting is done at district level (multiple counts going on simultaneously.)

Hass (12): you are thinking of an exit poll, not an election.

This is a contest between two poor choices, but whatever the result of the election the protests themselves mark a distancing between the people and the State which is an essential starting point for (later) democratic reform.

Click on this link and join in this exciting game. http://yahoda.mybrute.com

This Iranian election just seems wrought with fraud. Seems to me like Del Dover has the best take on it I’ve seen yet – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5doiiGgcGGM

I’m sorry, I thought this was a liberal-left website?

Surely that means it’s anti-socialist, so why should we care what socialists think?

Fuck off Gadsden, you tedious wanker.

I am not thinking of an exit poll, thank you. The laws of statistics are the same.

I think that trying to work out with whom one should sympathise is a pretty arse-backwards way of trying to understand a situation. Obviously our sympathies – whether socialists or just decent people – should be with the people. To say that one side or another or both is part of the hegemony of a ruling class is true, but not useful. I agree with Conor’s point about practical outcomes (although I think at least one dead Russian is important to discussions of power – not Lenin or Trotsky but Bakunin). The nuances of difference between the different factions within the power structures may result in very different outcomes for the people; to say this is not to take sides, but just pragmatism.

I know very little about Iran. I found that what Reza Aslan had to say in this discussion:

http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/20520

… was food for thought. Not from a left perspective (Aslan seems to be a fairly centrist Democrat) but from the perspective of someone who has lived there and understands it from the inside.

Richardd – that’s a pretty politically illiterate comment, if I may say so.

(18): elections aren’t declared on ‘statistics’, they are declared on actual votes.

Since voting behaviour varies widely, particularly in rural and urban Iran, you can’t say ‘We’ve counted 5% of the votes, let’s just multiply those results by 20 and save the effort.’

EVERY vote counts.

Or should do.

@2 Conor: “it is important that we take a position using a set of theoretical principles based on the writings of dead Russians that enable us to the reduce all the complexities of the world into a sort of spectator sport where we can be up for one side or the other”

LOL

I am having that weird feeling again of agreeing with everything Conor Foley says on LC. He is right. This abstract talk of concreteness is silly. And most of us are completely undeluded about the undemocratic nature of the Iranian state and the leaders of both factions currently in conflict. It is only the far leftists who seem to think Iran is a ‘democracy’ and then only, it seems to me, at tactical moments. The reason to prefer Mousavi to Ahmadenijad isn’t that Mousavi is a man of the people, a revolutionary, or a democrat, but because he is a bit better (if taken at his work) than Ahmnadenijad and would fractionally improve the freedoms of Iranian people by removing some of the restriuctions upon them that would have the left in this country screaming ‘fascism’ from the treetops should they be instituted here. He also plans to restructure the economy in ways that may or may not improve things, but it is unlikely he can make the Iranian poor much poorer, let’s face it.

Tx John,

Great photos here:

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/06/irans_disputed_election.html

I often wonder about this. I mean do you ever actually give anything concrete? When I go an work somewhere that is what I tend to do

That’s not an option that most people have, unfortunately. Air fares costing as much as they do and all that.

I don’t necessarily think that people actually have to go somewhere in order to support a political struggle in that place. Similarly I think that opinions on a “grand” level can be legitimately formed – and changed if more facts become available. Is that a natural part of the process of political discourse.

Or, given the issue with “dead Russians”, is this just a Trot thing?

It is clear that the reformists drew their support from the urban areas. These were naturally the areas most accessible to journalists. However, even the BBC felt unclear of the outcome.

I am sure we have all, at some stage, participated in a campaign where we have got too close to a candidate and felt sure of the outcome only to be shocked. I have felt confident I was backing a winner only to see a bad third place. In Iran where there are not the checks and balances of an open press or our long experience of democracy, it is only natural that those whose candidate was declared a loser should feel confused, frustrated and cheated. That does not mean they were cheated.

The urban/rural split is a phenomenon seen in many countries. In Zimbabwe, Mugabe’s support comes from rural areas (helped by rigging and violence). What worries me is if governments come to be toppled by the urban parties, then that is not a victory for democracy and will not lead to stability. An urban based reformist government and a rural Taliban is not the way forward (Pakistan?).

And for the west – elections are not rigged just because you did not get your way. That is true whether in Venezuela or Iran.

[20] You can say what you like, but socialism and liberalism are incompatible; so either this is a site of the liberal left or of the socialist left. Given the name, I assume it’s not socialists.

So we, the people of this site, aren’t socialists; we’re liberals. So surely a piece about what socialists should do belongs on socialist conspiracy?

Richard: you obviously don’t know what socialism is, if you think it’s necessarily incompatible with liberty. Equally, you clearly don’t know what a nebulous term “liberal” is, if you think it’s necessarily incompatible with many people’s definitions of socialism.

Just an aside really. I think Ahmadinejad may well have won. And that the left, the right AND the centre are confused on this one. Here, there and everywhere. Not least in Iran.

How to you count millions of votes in a few hours? You SORT THEM and you PILE THEM or you WEIGH THEM to get a basic modal result or ranking. That doesn’t necessarily give you exact numbers of course – though my first industrial job and the second too relied on weighing things that were in some cases much much lighter than ballot papers. We rarely if ever got the quantities wrong. Either way.

The candidates were/are very similar. One or two perhaps more charming and slightly less batshit wingnut than some of the others.

Having said all that it IS a fascinating stand off. And already a tinderbox.

The urban-rural split would be an important point if Ahmadinejad’s claim was that the rural vote had carried him through. Instead, however, he’s claiming to have won big EVERYWHERE – all the big cities and Mousavi’s home town included. This is simply not credible.

Also, didn’t some big reformist organisations boycott the ’05 election and back Mousavi this time? And they’re claiming 84% turnout. A higher turnout generally means a higher proportion of women and a lower average age, both factors which should tell against Ahmadinejad, not in his favour.