Thank you for your post. My comments were not to try and compare western democracy with other forms of democracy. My point was to demonstrate the irony of the discussion in light of the events in Iran. I do agree with you that the West trys to import its democracy often oblivious to the cultural and religious norms of that country. I would also agree the whole comparision of support for dictators in Egypt/Saudia Arabia and opposition to Iran has a smell of hypocrisy about it. Namely we will deride the regime in Iran but remain silent for our support of outright undemocratic oppression our “friends” practice on a daily basis. Along that vein, I personally believe it should never have been a war on terror but one based on ideology. We should have been attacking from day one the ideologies espoused by the Wahhabis and Muslim Brotherhood. Both these organizations form the ideological and material support for most of the worst fanatics across the globe. By selectively ignoring undemocratic regimes in other areas in the Middle East while instead focusing on Iran does a diservice to the people in the region but more importantly erodes any moral authority we may have.

Aside from all that my point on the irony still stands. Iran says it is democractic(even as they term it) but the current events and prior policies point otherwise. You cannot be trully democractic if you justify extra judical killings, rapes, beatings, and outright media oppression. A case in point is Ahmandienjad’s claim that they have free press and freedom of religion which are patently false. The fundamental problem is thet they believe they are doing Gods work. When one takes into account the meaning of God’s word in Islam it only further compounds the issue. The theocracy in Iran has democractic elements but in essense it is a meme constructed to build up the revolution and export it. Protecting that meme or system is the foundation the regime is built on. In their minds all means are viable to protect it. The system is more important than the people it is meant to serve. I believe God is supreme but not the system meant to worship him. The system is man made not divine and that is the crux of the issue in Iran. You have to ask yourself would God would approve of Iran’s behavior of late? I would hedge a bet he might be quite upset.

The grand irony of all this is my belief that the Iranian people are more ideologically aligned with the West than the rest of the Sunni world. I think if we ever get beyond the differences the Iranian people will be a powerful force in achieving reconciliation between the West and the Islamic world.

Thx
Bill

That President Khatami was really much, much worse than we all imagined. A monster really:

“Amir Abbas Fakravar, another student leader who recently arrived in the United States, said he was tortured for 222 days in Iran.

Minou Khomeili, who heads a nonprofit organization in Canada that provides aid to Iranian refugees, said she personally witnessed the rape and murder of a 14-year old girl by Iranian regime prison officials. “I will never forget the way [prison officials] washed the blood off their hands after they killed that girl,” she said.

“If Iran were a democratic country, Khatami would have been arrested for these crimes,” she added.”

http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2006/9/7/194826.shtml

Well, well, well, it seems that President Khatami, the idol of millions of reformers was responsible for rapes in Iran during his term.

Money quote:

“The judge who presided over Atefeh’s sham trial and sentenced her to death by public hanging is reported to have raped Atefeh himself before he personally placed the noose around her tiny neck.”

http://www.iranfreedomconcert.com/lily.html
Instead of siding with the students who had voted him into office, Khatami aligned himself with the rest of his fundamentalist Mullahs, and tolerated the violent beatings, imprisonment, torture, and even murder of the students whose only crime had been their support of democracy and free speech.

Among these students were Ahmad Mohammadi, who died a few weeks ago in jail, and Ahmad Batebi, who, to this day, remains in the infamous Evin prison for his participation in that demonstration.
But the violence towards students was not the only atrocity that Mr. Khatami tolerated.

A dramatic increase in the execution of minors and women, including those who had been raped or had been accused of committing the crimes of adultery or acts incompatible with chastity was also tolerated by our guest speaker here today. Among the victims of such “tolerance” was Atefeh Rajabi, who was sentenced to death by public hanging for having committed “adultery,” even though she was not married, and was only 16 years old.

The judge who presided over Atefeh’s sham trial and sentenced her to death by public hanging is reported to have raped Atefeh himself before he personally placed the noose around her tiny neck. The so-called justification for such despicable act of savagery is the Sharia legal system, put in place by the Islamic Regime and championed by Mr. Khatemi. Under Sharia law, virgin girls are not allowed to be executed, for their purity might open up the doors of heaven to them. To avoid this, virgin girls, such as Atefeh, who are sentenced to death, are raped before execution to ensure their proper place in hell.

Mr. Khatami was more than tolerant of this type of horror, violence, and inhumane treatment to which young Atefeh and countless others were subjected.

He was similarly tolerant of the uncivilized, unethical, and despicable treatment of Zahra Kazemi, the Canadian photo-journalist who was accused of taking photos of the Evin prison in Tehran. Mr. Khatami demonstrated remarkable tolerance when Ms. Kazemi was imprisoned, violently raped, tortured, and ultimately murdered. And ignoring all forms of civilized practice and ethical standards, Mr. Khatami tolerated the denial of access to Ms. Kazemi’s body to not only the Canadian officials who had requested such access, but to Ms. Kazemi’s own son, who, to this day, is fighting to bring his mother’s killers to justice.”

There nothing I could say that will convince you otherwise since you obviously believe that the whole Regime from the SL on down is made up of rapists so I won’t even disturb those thoughts.

But note that a policy of rape for political purposes would be the most stupid, self-defeating path to take for the govt. If the purpose is to intimidate there is a much cleaner, more acceptable method–a 7.62X39 round. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7.62×39

It is interesting that you accuse me of being a liar yet you do not mention a single instance where i’ve lied. Now on to your second point.

I’m not sure where you get the notion that clerics who attack and try to overthrow the Revolution are somehow untouchable. The historical record shows that cleric traitors were arrested and even executed under the regime of the Ayatollah Khomeini.

<I am not one who fetishizes western style democracy as the model to be followed or imposed on other nations and cultures.

As it's the much celebrated 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall, I was watching a tv doc tonight and thought that there are similarities between the ex GDR and Iran. The fact that (at least) 12% fled to the west before they built the wall. And many tried and died afterwards.

That communist régime seems similar to your islamist regime. One difference was that for a women it was far freer in GDR. One advantage for Iranians is more freedom to travel. But many also fled, what is the official percentage ?

You say, Iran is a theocracy with democratic elements, the GDR, means "German Democratic Republic" so they also had 'elements of democracy", and when they finally broke the wall, they had no (or few) problems adapting to full western type democracy. So I think Iranians could.

The problem is for countries who have never had any form of democracy, they need time to learn it. China will too, as they already have 'elements' and no religion to hamper it.

You will note that I said that Marandi was brave for voluteering for the Iran/Iraq war not for what he does now.

The system in Iran as I said has democratic elements which is why figures as different as Rafsanjani, Khatami and AN have been President. Compare that to Saudi Arabia and Egypt over the last 30 years (Countries adored by that Western Democracy America)
There have been periods of greater openness and times such as now where the regime has cracked down and no, of course, the press is not free during these times.

Khatami, as mentioned previously, was elected President twice and I can assure you that the Supreme Leader of that time has not been replaced by his evil twin. What then is the difference between the SL of 1997 and the SL of 2009?

The key difference is that the “reform” coalition of 2009 intended to fundamentally alter the institutions of the Islamic Republic not merely to change or modify this economic policy or that foreighn policy position. All the pro-reformists like to deride the term but the Greens really did want to pursue a “velvet revolution”. Khatami, for one, was quoted before the election as seeking radical change possibly including the elimination of the Guardianship of the Jurisprudent.

Sorry, that won’t do. If you want to overthrow the Islamic revolution pick up a Kalashnikov and fight like the MoK. The Islamic Revolution is not a suicide pact.

With regards to the Khomeini letter. Of course the Ayatollah Khomeini was responsible for earlier crackdowns. He was never the liberal reformer of Green Propaganda. But his attack on Montazeri was due to Montazeri’s betrayal. Montazeri used his position at that time to protect the murderer Hashemi and to undermine Rafsanjani at every turn.

Let me address your points but before I do so I want to point out that we come at this issue from fundamentally different perspectives. I am not one who fetishizes western style democracy as the model to be followed or imposed on other nations and cultures.

To me Putin is following the correct path in Russsia with his Authoritarian/Populist policies, reversing the horrible policies of the westernizing Boris Yeltsin. Yeltsin almost destroyed Russia, Putin has saved it. Similarly China has propered incredibly in so many ways under the authoritarian, non-democratic road which it has pursued over the last two decades (After it abandoned Mao style communism). The westernizers of Tiananmen Square would have done to China what Yeltsin did to Russia.

The criticism of Western style democracy and its application to other cultures has been broadly made by individuals like Lee Yuan Kew, the former Prime Minister of Singapore. See for example: Culture Is Destiny; A Conversation with Lee Kuan Yew
http://fareedzakaria.com/index.html.

In foreign policy many scholars have noted how western “democracies” use/exploit the language of “human rights” to justify agressive war(the invasion of Iraq, vietnam, Panama, Grenada, Afghanistan, etc,.) terrorism in the form of drone attacks etc. As long as the language is correct you can “destroy the village in order to save it”.

In similar manner Catholic intellectuals in the West have pointed out the incongruity of societies that drone on about “human rights” but allow millions of fetuses to be aborted every year. Some devout Catholics have even called this a Holocaust. Interestingly, the Catholic Church had an uneasy relationship with western style democracy for many years. See for example the Vatican’s position regarding Italian Democracy in the 19th and early 20th century.

Is Iran a “western style” democracy with all the characteristics which that implies? Absolutely not. As shaped by the Ayatollah Khomeini it is a theocratic form of government with democratic elements.