Iran: Where is my Vote?

[Fallakin Kuvari]

There were vote totals that hit in the middle of the day yesterday that were unconfirmed, but sent to the European Parliment by and Iranian Journalist. Mousavi had something like 15-16 million, some other guy had 13million and Ahmadinejad had short of 6 million. As I said they were unconfirmed, but interesting if true.

[Lurker]

Here's the text of the letter Fallakin is talking about. I think it's fake.

Salaam Aleikum.

Regarding your concerns for the 10th presidential elections and due to your orders for Mr Ahmedinejad to be elected President, in this sensitive time, all matters have been organised in such a way that the results of the election will be in line with the revolution and the Islamic system. The following result will be declared to the people and all planning should be put in force to prevent any possible action from the opposition, and all party leaders and election candidates are under intense surveillance. Therefore, for your information only, I am telling you the actual results as follows:

Mirhossein Mousavi: 19,075,623

Mehdi Karroubi: 13,387,104

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: 5,698,417

Mohsen Rezai: 38,716

(signed on behalf of the minister)

====

Khamenei backs the election results, denies vote rigging, and says protest leaders will be personally responsible for bloodshed. Not looking good.

[Alluveal]

Wow, Ahmadinejad better hope that shit is not true or he's gonna be fucked sideways with a razor-covered dong.

[Ddrak]

Are you saying that record numbers of Iranians voted for Ahmadinejad out of fear of Mousavi winning? That doesn't fit at all with your Iraq analogy.

Fear of reprisal.

Dd

[Harlowe]

I haven't seen anything that would support that assumption. Do those huge groups of protesters look scared to you?

[Ddrak]

I haven't seen anything that would support that assumption. Do those huge groups of protesters look scared to you?

Those "huge groups" are a couple of thousand at most, and in Tehran only. Iran is a lot bigger than that by several orders of magnitude. Remember, 80% of people (apparently) voted so you can't possibly be trying to say a protest is a representative sample of Iranians, can you?

The protests are largely confined to the affluent northern suburbs of Tehran, which are the center of support for the opposition to the hard line regime there at the moment. Would you consider a pro-Republican rally in Salt Lake City to be a representative sample of American feelings?

Yes, it's good to see public protests in Iran not being ruthlessly put down (yet), but a few thousand protesters doesn't necessarily mean a rigged election no matter how much you want to believe it is so.

As for the "assumption" that there is a fear of reprisal from the hardliners in Iran for going away from their positions, are you serious? Of course there's a fear of reprisal! Did those armed troops at the rallies that were beating up protesters look warm and cuddly to you? You'd be mad NOT to fear reprisal - it's just a case of balancing that fear against the desire to change.

Dd

[Fallakin Kuvari]

Here's the text of the letter Fallakin is talking about. I think it's fake.

Salaam Aleikum.

Regarding your concerns for the 10th presidential elections and due to your orders for Mr Ahmedinejad to be elected President, in this sensitive time, all matters have been organised in such a way that the results of the election will be in line with the revolution and the Islamic system. The following result will be declared to the people and all planning should be put in force to prevent any possible action from the opposition, and all party leaders and election candidates are under intense surveillance. Therefore, for your information only, I am telling you the actual results as follows:

Mirhossein Mousavi: 19,075,623

Mehdi Karroubi: 13,387,104

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: 5,698,417

Mohsen Rezai: 38,716

(signed on behalf of the minister)

====

Thanks, Lurker.

[Lurker]

Those "huge groups" are a couple of thousand at most, and in Tehran only.

I must be watching different protests from some other country.

As for the "assumption" that there is a fear of reprisal from the hardliners in Iran for going away from their positions, are you serious? Of course there's a fear of reprisal! Did those armed troops at the rallies that were beating up protesters look warm and cuddly to you? You'd be mad NOT to fear reprisal - it's just a case of balancing that fear against the desire to change.

None of that explains how "fear of reprisal" would motivate people to vote in record numbers now but not in 2005. You made a bad analogy between this election and Saddam winning in Iraq. You should stop running with it.

[Ddrak]

Those "huge groups" are a couple of thousand at most, and in Tehran only.

I must be watching different protests from some other country.

Yeah, my mistake. I was more referring to the initial protests before it became apparent that the police wouldn't be able to seriously control the numbers, that is the mood *before* the vote, not now. In any case, the most optimistic measure of the largest protest didn't approach the number of people who theoretically voted against the incumbent (3 million vs about 10 million).

None of that explains how "fear of reprisal" would motivate people to vote in record numbers now but not in 2005. You made a bad analogy between this election and Saddam winning in Iraq. You should stop running with it.

Mentioning Iraq once is "running with it"? I mentioned it as a comparison on how elections can go a different way to popular opinion, even with a fair recount. It doesn't take much to think of scenarios where that's the case. Record numbers are easy to achieve if you go through the towns with the army to get people voting (which has the dual effect of getting them voting "the right way" too), for example.

If you really believe poor counting is the only way to rig an election then you don't have a great imagination.

Dd

[Lurker]

Mentioning Iraq once is "running with it"?

You made the bad analogy and then ran with it here, here, here, and here.

Record numbers are easy to achieve if you go through the towns with the army to get people voting (which has the dual effect of getting them voting "the right way" too), for example.

There's been no allegation of that happening. I guess my imagination isn't great enough to explain how the army got millions of people out to vote without anyone hearing about it.

[Harlowe]

A couple thousand? That's just silly. If it were a couple thousand we wouldn't be hearing about it. It wouldn't be the leading story in most venues. It would be a blip on the radar.

Record numbers are easy to achieve if you go through the towns with the army to get people voting (which has the dual effect of getting them voting "the right way" too), for example.

I'm wondering where this is coming from since there hasn't been even a hint of this happening.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Again, you people are applying Western thought, values and logic to a Persian (and theocratically governed) nation. Our thought processes don't apply here.

[Lurker]

Who is that comment directed at?

We're discussing events that are actually happening in Iran and what the people in Iran are saying about it. Ddrak used his imagination to explain the election results, inventing facts out of whole cloth. We pointed out that his fear based landslide scenario didn't happen.

Not seeing where "our thought processes" fit in with any of that.

[Kulaf]

Mentioning Iraq once is "running with it"?

You made the bad analogy and then ran with it here, here, here, and here.

Record numbers are easy to achieve if you go through the towns with the army to get people voting (which has the dual effect of getting them voting "the right way" too), for example.

There's been no allegation of that happening. I guess my imagination isn't great enough to explain how the army got millions of people out to vote without anyone hearing about it.

Umm.....wrong:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31453021/ns ... stn_africa

The Revolutionary Guard, a military force that answers to Iran's supreme leader, is considered a strong supporter of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The Basij was used to mobilize support for him in the 2005 election as well as during last week's vote, Khalaji said.

[Lurker]

Yes, an unarmed wing of the Basij had a mobilization effort for Ahmadinejad. What does that have to do with Ddrak's "fear of reprisal" theory? There's been no allegation that the Basij used fear to supress the opposition vote or to pressure millions into voting for Ahmadinejad. There certainly is a fear of reprisal now against protesters (which is what the article you linked is about), but that's quite seperate and different from a fear of voting.

[Fobbon Lazyfoot]

What I don't understand is this...what kind of nutjob leader requires women as hot as the ones in Iranians to cover up on a daily basis? I mean christ:



That chick on the right is wearing a face mask, a covering, and sunglasses, and she's still smoking hot. Damn.

[Ddrak]

Mentioning Iraq once is "running with it"?

You made the bad analogy and then ran with it here, here, here, and here.

Bullshit. You're trying to claim any reference to fear of reprisal is an analogy to Iraq? That's just plain stupid. The simple fact reported in dozens of news agencies is that there is massive fear of reprisal in Iran and has been for a good 30 years. As Kulaf mentioned, just look at the pure fear of the Basij that's been reported continually for the last decade and try to tell me with a straight face you don't think there's a fundamental atmosphere of fear in Iran.

You can drop your silliness now and just admit that you screwed up with your idea that the general population doesn't fear the Iranian hardliners. Some Rsakian gymnastics about me mentioning Iraq once doesn't make the fear vanish.

I guess my imagination isn't great enough to explain how the army got millions of people out to vote without anyone hearing about it.

I guess not, but don't let your failings prevent you from tripping over them.

Simple fact is I made the statement that a recount is very likely to show the exact same thing as the first counting. There's any number of reasons for this - people's fear of voting the "wrong way", vote stuffing, losing of votes, etc. etc. Unless you actually get everyone back for a vote and magically eliminate the decades of fear rampant in the country you're not going to prove anything.

I do find it amusing that you're decrying the results as a sham and yet continue to use the exact same results to claim the turnout was 85% (the news agencies are making the same mistake so you're forgiven a little I guess). You can't have it both ways - either there was vote tampering and any counts to do with the election are blatantly wrong (by at least ten million by many estimates), which puts the turnout much closer to 60-65% and nowhere near as record as you seem to believe.


@Harlowe:

So I say I make a mistake and THEN you call me on it? /golfclap. I've got some fish in a barrel if you want something more challenging?

I'm wondering where this is coming from since there hasn't been even a hint of this happening.

It was an example of how you can tamper with people's voting. It's happened in plenty of nations before and given the fundamental fear of the Basij in Iran, you'd have to be blind to assume it wasn't happening in the election. You do realize that news reporting from Iran is heavily filtered, right?

Dd

[Ddrak]

Just for kicks, here's an article from way before the election mentioning the influence the hardliners have on actual people's voting:

link

Although the people elect the president, it takes only the slightest hint from the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s highest political and religious authority, and millions of votes will follow his lead.

His hint is not conveyed directly, but through a kind of code that is passed on by local religious leaders.

In 2005, for example, certain clerics exalted the virtues of being baseer, meaning both educated and from the people, a clear reference to Mr Ahmadinejad, a working class professor.

After losing the 2005 elections to Mr Ahmadinejad, Mr Karroubi accused a “network” of mosques, the Revolutionary Guard and the Basij (a radical paramilitary organisation loyal to the supreme leader) of sabotaging the result.

Although what exactly went on in 2005 remains in dispute, there are fears that the Basij, who have millions of grassroots supporters but are supposed to remain politically neutral, could take the election away from the reformists.

There's dozens more articles from before the voting explaining the influence the hardliners have on the actual votes of the people. Am I supposed to believe those votes are being cast out of the love the general people have for the hardliners, or more out of fear? If I'm to believe Lurker/Harlowe then it's apparently the love the people have for their despotic leadership???


As for intimidation, apparently you've stopped reading fivethirtyeight.com after the US elections?

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/06/ ... oming.html

1. Intimidation and electoral violence: Reports of activities of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and paramilitary forces have been widely discussed. If Nate's hunch is correct, perhaps 15% or more of the population was willing to abstain from voting.

Oh dear - intimidation is his #1 point. So much for "no suggestion".

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/06/ ... ctory.html

The swing votes in Iran are not those blue-haired ladies who take 40 minutes in the ballot booth and call the election clerk over every few minutes. They are rather the perhaps 30 percent of the population who were trying weigh the potential risk to their persons or their standing in the community in voting against Mr. Ahmadinejad, against what might be a relatively small benefit in voting for Mr. Mousavi, whose reforms could be easily vetoed by the Ayatollah. These swing voters may also have been worried that their votes wouldn't have been counted anyway: about one-third of Iranians in the survey didn't believe, didn't say or didn't know whether they expected to have a free and fair election.

If you take that 30 percent swing vote and add it to Ahmadinejad's 33 percent base, he could have won the election with 63 percent of the vote, as he ostensibly did on Friday. If you take it and add it to Mousavi's column, Ahmadinejad would have gone down to a solid defeat.

Perhaps both Lurker and Harlowe need to widen their news reading if they really never heard of intimidation affecting voting in Iran?

Dd

[Kulaf]

Well Lurker anyway.....since lately all Harlowe has been is a parrot on his shoulder.

[Lurker]

The simple fact reported in dozens of news agencies is that there is massive fear of reprisal in Iran and has been for a good 30 years.

Then you'll have no problem providing stories about massive amounts of people who voted for Ahmadinejad or failed to vote for the opposition because of a fear of reprisal. You're confusing the fear of reprisal from the hardliners over the protests with a fear of reprisal during the election.

Simple fact is I made the statement that a recount is very likely to show the exact same thing as the first counting.

If there was ballot box stuffing then obviously so. What that has to do with Hussein getting elected, or Bush getting elected in 2004 because Americans were afraid, or fear of reprisal from the army during the election which wasn't a noticible factor this election - the examples you used... no clue.

On the vote count and turnout percentages, as you said there are many ways to tamper with peoples voting. It's possible ballots were swapped instead of added. It's possible only the percentage going to each candidate was altered and not the totals. All reporting during the election indicated that turnout was huge this year and that reporting wasn't relying on the final counts.

You do realize that news reporting from Iran is heavily filtered, right?

You do realize that there's a lot of unfiltered information pouring out of Iran, right? And that someone in the opposition would have mentioned that the election was pushed to Ahmadinejad through the use of fear and intimidation if that's what had happened, right? The allegations were made in 2005 but not this year, and people were watching for it.

I still read Nate. He's awesome, but his "hunch" about intimidation causing people to abstain from voting (based on non-responders to a poll a month before the election) is hardly proof. He's admitted he knows nothing about Iran and is leaving everything but statistical analysis to the experts.



P.S. You're acting like a douche. Kulaf? We'll, he's always been.