Anyone Following...

[Burr]

Ali Karimi, Mehdi Mahdavikia and two others are 'retired' after sporting green wristbands in World Cup qualifier in Seoul

Their gesture attracted worldwide comment and drew the attention of football fans to Iran's political turmoil. Now the country's authorities have taken revenge by imposing life bans on players who sported green wristbands in a recent World Cup match in protest against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election.

Okay so it's nothing compared to what else is going on there, but that's pretty sad.

I wonder if FIFA will impose any sanctions against the Iranian football association, since they aren't particularly keen on politics mixing with their sport. Iraq was banned from participating after Saddam's son took over and started torturing players for losing..

[AcquiredTarget]

It's starting to die down link

Overwhelmed by police and left with limited alternatives, Iranian demonstrators resorted Tuesday to more subtle ways of challenging the outcome of the presidential election: holding up posters, shouting from rooftops and turning on car headlights.

But the restrained expressions of discontent appeared to be scattered as Iran's ruling clerics dealt the opposition new setbacks, making clear they have no intention of holding a new vote and setting up a special court to deal with hundreds of protesters arrested in more than a week of unrest.

[MaximusPaynicus]

Turning on car headlights? Really? Has Iran fallen to the point where Interstate Batteries is now the Great Satan?

[Reffy]

Originally Posted by AmazedsatSuma

Its being covered heavily in the news because it's Iran, a powerful country whose unoffical national anthem was pretty much death to America. If this was some kind of genocide in the Sudan (Darfar) it will get far less attention.

And Reffy we know this is really a CIA operations sooner if the reanimated corpse of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi retakes the throne

Yeah but I'm not aware of a single foreign protest movement that has ever been covered by news media and embraced by the American public (to the point where some are questioning if the president is supporting the protesters enough). In the mainstream media there seems to be a consensus that the protesters are righteous and whats more, the US government should have a policy of supporting the protesters.

In my opinion this alone should be raising some eyebrows.

[LowVoltag3]

Flashback: Similarities of Operation Ajax (First CIA Iranian Coup) Vs what's happening right now.

[AmazedsatSuma]

Originally Posted by Reffy

Yeah but I'm not aware of a single foreign protest movement that has ever been covered by news media and embraced by the American public (to the point where some are questioning if the president is supporting the protesters enough). In the mainstream media there seems to be a consensus that the protesters are righteous and whats more, the US government should have a policy of supporting the protesters.

Other then the '06 French protests, which was about controversial bill about labor, this is really the 1st protest in the 24 hour news cycle that has got any real attention stateside.

If the collapse of the U.S.S.R. cable networks/RSS Feeds/blogs/etc, wouldn't you agree we would atleast see the same amount of coverage plus MSNBC attacking Regan hourly for using language that may be too harsh? If you just think about it, these protest are getting about as much coverage if a hurricane hit stateside. This is just the nature of the beast.

And lastly, if you didn't get the last line in my other post, I was trying to point out that the CIA did help stage a coup in Iran in the year 1953, so we have been know to get our hands dirty in Iran from time to time.

[Reffy]

Originally Posted by AmazedsatSuma

Other then the '06 French protests, which was about controversial bill about labor, this is really the 1st protest in the 24 hour news cycle that has got any real attention stateside.

If the collapse of the U.S.S.R. cable networks/RSS Feeds/blogs/etc, wouldn't you agree we would atleast see the same amount of coverage plus MSNBC attacking Regan hourly for using language that may be too harsh? If you just think about it, these protest are getting about as much coverage if a hurricane hit stateside. This is just the nature of the beast.

And lastly, if you didn't get the last line in my other post, I was trying to point out that the CIA did help stage a coup in Iran in the year 1953, so we have been know to get our hands dirty in Iran from time to time.

Well of course we've gotten our hands dirty, haha. The OSS (precursor to the CIA) was helping orchestrate the fifth columnist movement in eastern Europe with the help of former Nazis. After that the CIA organized the bay of pigs, and dont forget Nigeria, Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan... essentially the whole cold war. I'm simply pointing out that today I'd hope the CIA has fully realized that in the modern operation of covert activities propaganda is fundamental.
As such, I would hope our CIA is competent and effective enough to conduct an operation that would get this kind of media response rather than response a la bay of pigs. Maybe its expecting too much, but to me the real story here is the potential CIA involvement with these protests...I'm very curious for hard evidence of this occurring.

[Token White Guy]

Protesters are now fighting the Republican Guard.

[Burr]

Just like any tool, the power works both ways..

The Revolution Will Not Be Digitized

Crowdsourcing to identify protesters

[AcquiredTarget]

Well, I guess if you can't hold Americans as hostages, sorry I meant arrest for fomenting disturbances then go after the British