Rice: Iran Vote Goes Against Democracy

[maddezmom]

WASHINGTON - Iran's presidential election shows the country is out of step with democratic reforms in the Middle East, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday in the Bush administration's first public reaction to the balloting.

"I just don't see the Iranian elections as being a serious attempt to move Iran closer to a democratic future," she said in an interview on ABC's "This Week."

President Bush denounced the election a day before Friday's vote, saying it was designed to maintain power in the hands of an unelected few who denied ballot access to more than 1,000 people who wanted to run. Rice repeated that criticism Sunday, noting that all the women who wanted to be candidates were not allowed on the ballot.

"Any election in which thousands of people are disqualified by fiat and in which women are disqualified as a class barely deserves to be given that title, particularly in a place that several years ago seemed to be moving in a different direction," Rice said on "Fox News Sunday."

~snip~
more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050619/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_iran/nc:693;_

But, Iraq and Afghanistan are democracies? Go figure! :shrug:

[grytpype]

1. Rice, shut the fuck up!

The last thing democracy and reform movements need is for you to butt in!

[xray s]

2. I guess she would disqualify all US elections before 1964 then

Just shut up Condi and prepare your statements for the impeachment hearings.

[Spazito]

3. Condi should go check out the disenfranchisement of untold

thousands of voters across the United States during the last two 'elections'. She would find her comments apropos to the US, maybe even more so than Iran elections.

[amber dog democrat]

4. We need to practice Democracy here first.

Since 2000 it aint happened yet. Condenscention Rice may STFU.
Condasleeza, mendacity is thy name.

[GHOSTDANCER]

14. More like reinvent democracy here. Our version needs a critical update.

And it shouldn't be the one held up like a poster child for all the world to follow.

[Mythsaje]

5. Reform in Iran

would probably be more successful if the U.S. would butt out!

Calling them 'part of the axis of evil' didn't help the reformers any, I'm willing to bet.

[rustydog]

6. Condi wouldn't recognice democracy if it impeached her leader

She is so anti-democracy it is scary. I hope she ends up behind bars.

[Zomby Woof]

7. She's the dumbest fucking asshole alive

Next to her husband.

[jayctravis]

8. Um...elections are bad?

Maybe I haven't been paying attention, but wasn't that the backup criteria the misadministration used to justify Iraq? That they don't have elections?

[Rose Siding]

9. "Saudi women barred from voting"

The Saudi interior minister has said women will not be allowed to vote in the country's municipal elections starting in February 2005.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3734420.stm

[Endangered Specie]

10. a rigged 'democratic' presidential vote...

wonder where they got THAT idea from :shrug:

[Robeson]

19. Maybe they got that rigged election idea from here.....

... http://www.bushflash.com/gta.html

[Selteri]

11. I guess that is another case

of the pot calling the kettle black.

By Bush's own statement - He is not fairly and duly elected.

[cliss]

12. Hm.....interesting statement.

"...particularly in a place that several years ago seemed to be moving in a different direction", Rice said.

What does she mean here, different direction? Is she referring to Our Boy, the Shah of Iran? Who we planted in Iran to do our Oil Bidding? Is that the one she means?

Yes, the Peacock Throne, the Farah Diba and all its ostentatious glory. Of course, it didn't last very long, did it CondaLoser. It caused the Iranian Revolution, and the rise of new Fundamentalism, and the Ayatollah Khomeini.

Is THAT what you mean?

[Igel]

15. The simplest way to take it is for her to mean

Khatami and the reformist movement that he was part of.

[MisterP]

18. maybe she meant the genuine reformist movement (not neoliberals) that *

er, ruined with his Axis of Evil speech

[Blaze Diem]

13. HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA..ZombyWolf post..

She's the dumbest fucking asshole alive
Next to her husband.


-------------
Thansk for the damn best laugh of the day...

I also wish she'd just shut the hell up..
Clearly they have nothing more to say to the world nor the American citizens who have thrown them the biggest clusterfuck of a party ever.
Our damn taxes have paid for their food, clothes, entertainment, LIES, and mega-security long enough. This country needs to sue everyone of them for fucking damages..I don't care if they all have to die in poverty..Liars and Thieves everyone of them.

No one is listening to Condi or George anymore. They are a laughing stock!!

[drdtroit]

16. "designed to maintain power in the hands of an unelected few"

Sounds familiar, eh?

[acmavm]

17. Uh oh! Bombs Away Iran, they're building their case as we type.

.

[Gay Green]

25. I hope Tehran has an underground subway system...

...that the residents can take refuge in and THEN seal off from any incoming thermonuclear warheads in case of another Attack of the Shrubbery.

[dbonds]

20. Wish I had the proper text version of Lewis Blacks shaking his head

like he is trying to remove slime while making that BLaBLaBLaBLa sound.
Yes, voting is out of step with democracy - this shows where her fucked up little brain is.

[Kipling]

21. Condi, is that a giant redwood in your eye?

[marbuc]

22. For Condi and her ilk

"Democratic reform" only applies to those movements those promote "free market" privatization. Note their hostility to Chavez. Nope, cannot have a nationalist Democracy, only corporatocracy!

[Chauga]

23. She's right.

They went against democracy because we gave them every reason to hate it. What a fine example * sets.

[Behind the Aegis]

24. The irony

They "voted" against "democracy." Bizarre. Perhaps Rice was confused because people were actually voting and the votes were counted...I mean...how democratic is that?! :crazy:

[Eloriel]

26. Oh good. I guess that means

we can go bomb the living hell outta them, impose another of OUR versions of (managed) democracy at the point of a gun (or bottom of a bunch of bombs). Sounds good to me. Yeah, and what makes that okay is the Rule of WE CAN and no one can stop us!

:sarcasm:

[Zech Marquis]

27. why Conni, because they actually COUNT the votes?

how can these thugs go around saying that any election is illegitimate? :shrug:

[Johnywolf]

28. Iran War?

In 2007? Educated guess!

[Frederik]

29. and Egypt and Saudi Arabia and Pakistan...

[Robeson]

33. They support our Imperialism.....

...so makes them good Democracies...:sarcasm:

[GetTheRightVote]

30. Ricebowl needs to go back & make sure she said it right with *

She may have gotten her lines wrong. Lies and more lies, just because * could not control them as they do the other false Democracies in the new world order.

:kick:

[LynnTheDem]

31. "Democratic" such as overthrowing democratically elected leaders, Rice?

Let's ask the people of Haiti about your idea of "democratic".

[otohara]

32. Thanks to You and Your Bosses

insults don't work, do they asses of evil?

[kineneb]

34. Hey Condi- the middle east has no traditions of "democracy"

Having lived there, I know their traditions have more to do with tribal structures and monarchy than any connection to democracy. The peoples of the region must create democratic governments from the ground up and on their own terms. BushCo cannot impose false democracy from without.

BushCo: making the world safe for the MegaCorps.

[Carolab]

35. Experts: Bush Remarks Spurred Iran Voters

By BRIAN MURPHY, Associated Press Writer
2 hours, 24 minutes ago


TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's spy chief used just two words to respond to White House ridicule of last week's presidential election: "Thank you."


His sarcasm was barely hidden. The backfire on Washington was more evident.

The sharp barbs from President Bush were widely seen in Iran as damaging to pro-reform groups because the comments appeared to have boosted turnout among hard-liners in Friday's election — with the result being that an ultraconservative now is in a two-way showdown for the presidency.

"I say to Bush: `Thank you,'" quipped Intelligence Minister Ali Yunesi. "He motivated people to vote in retaliation."

Bush's comments — blasting the ruling clerics for blocking "basic requirements of democracy" — became a lively sideshow in Iran's closest election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. And they highlighted again the United States' often crossed-wire efforts to isolate Iran.

{snip}

But the harder the United States pushes, even with the best of intentions, the more ground it has seems to lose among mainstream Iranians, who represent possible key allies against the Islamic establishment, say some analysts of Iranian politics.

"Unknowingly, (Bush) pushed Iranians to vote so that they can prove their loyalty to the regime — even if they are in disagreement with it," said Hamed al-Abdullah, a political science professor at Kuwait University.

{snip}


http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050619/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_bush_backfire_1