Archive | Commentary

Inspired by a song by Bhaghwan Maaji, leader of the adivasi struggle against bauxite mining in Kashipur. Lyrics: Meghnath.  Singer: Madhu Mansuri Hasmukh.  Chorus: Jayanth and Amruta.

This documentary film was brought online at YouTube on 22 June 2009.

Protesters clashed with the Iranian riot police in the streets around Baharestan Square, Tehran, today.

Political power is never good or bad, never really just or unjust; political power is arbitrary, discriminatory, and most of the time violent.  In Iran, the ongoing demonstrations sparked by the election results in favor of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad indicate that such power can never really be monopolized by the state.  Iran’s civil society is fighting; […]

Dear Political Lady, Although I grew up in a community of leftwing activists who respected people of all colors and creeds, I never felt like I “fit in.” Maybe it was my wacky behavior and big red nose.  Or my garish whiteface, purple eyebrows, and bright orange hair.  Maybe it was because I shunned normal […]

“Our young generation particularly showed that it still possesses the same political enthusiasm, awareness, and commitment that we saw in the first generation of the revolution.  However, with one difference: the hot furnace of the revolution created emotions in the hearts of people, later during the war in a different manner, but today the same […]

The five senators voting against $106 billion for Obama’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were three reactionaries — Coburn (R-OK), DeMint (R-SC), and Enzi (R-WY) — and only two progressives Feingold (D-WI) and Sanders (I-VT). Not voting were two sick senators, Byrd (D-WV) and Kennedy (D-MA), and one just disgraced one — Ensign (R-NV). A […]

(This missive is directed at the non-Iranian “peace organizations” who are presently issuing “statements” on the Iran events for whatever organizational purposes they have in mind.  It is not at all intended to be critical of most of the excellent analysis and information exchange occurring, particularly within the Iranian communities.) We Americans love to shoot […]

Mir Hossein Mousavi, the reformist candidate challenging Iran’s authorities on the result of last week’s presidential elections, is a masterful tactician who wants to overturn the re-election of his rival, President Mahmud Ahmadinejad, with allegations of a massive conspiracy that he claims cheated him and millions of his supporters. These supporters, identifiable by the color […]

What a change from three years ago.  Then Mexico’s left was on the march, from the resistance of the teachers and people in Oaxaca City to the mass demonstrations in Mexico City for Andrés Manuel López Obrador, candidate of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).  In 2006, Local 22 of the Mexican Teachers Union […]

Imam Khomeini Square, Tehran, 18 June 2009

  A fact-finding team of nine students from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) recently visited Lalgarh, to probe into the reality of the ongoing movement of the people in the area.  Here we are enclosing the preliminary details of what we saw.  We would like to appeal to your daily news channel to also highlight certain […]

  BBC Brasil Special Correspondent, Geneva President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said this Monday in Geneva that there is “no evidence” that there has been a fraud in the Iranian elections and affirmed that he wants to set a date to visit the country next year. “Look, the (Iranian) president (Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) received a […]

Dueling rallies for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mir-Hossein Mousavi, color-coded (Iran’s national colors for Ahmadinejad, Green for Mousavi). Thousands Join Pro-Mousavi Rally, 17 June 2009 Police and Crowd Hand in Hand, 17 June 2009 Ahmadinejad Supporters Hold Unity Rally, 16 June 2009 Demonstrations Continue in Tehran, 16 June 2009 Téhéran: Manifestation monstre et violence, 15 June […]

The Foreign Ministry of Venezuela condemns the vicious and unfounded campaign to discredit the institutions of the Islamic Republic of Iran, unleashed from outside, to roil the political climate.  The ministry denounces the acts of interference in the internal affairs of Iran, designed to threaten and destabilize the Islamic Revolution. (MPPRE) Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela […]

Rasoul Akram Hospital’s doctors and nurses protest the deaths of seven people last night, reportedly shot by basij. Iran – State TV: Seven People Killed Near Rally SiteVideo by France 24 Doctors and Nurses Protest in Tehran, 16 June 2009Video by Saeid Saeid, born in Kermanshah, is an electrical engineer in Enschede, the Netherlands.

Here comes the hysteria and bold-faced lies.  In the wake of the Iranian election, various commentators and so-called reporters in the United States are reacting as if the end of the world was at hand.  Although nobody knows for certain and everyone only has the words of Western press pundits and an angry candidate to […]

Washington, DC (June 16, 2009) — As the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs prepares to mark up the FY2010 budget tomorrow, the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation sent today an open letter to subcommittee members calling on them to cut off or, at the minimum, condition military aid […]

Hamid Dabashi1 points out that, whatever the truth on the elections, the “fix” has become a “social fact” inasmuch as millions of Iranians are staking their lives on that very belief.  He also pointedly satirizes Orientalist assumptions of the Reading-Lolita-in-Tehran variety and takes the opportunity to remind people that solidarity, not “democracy promotion,” is what […]

Cf. Max Ajl, “Tehran Burning” (Jewbonics, 15 June 2009); and Richard Seymour, “Iran Vote and Protests” (Lenin’s Tomb, 15 June 2009).