Iranian Election Extravaganza (Part 1)

Thanks to Wikicommons.

Everyone can stop holding their breath (which is good because we at US Democrazy were turning blue in the face) the Iranian presidential election results are in!  

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (seen here on the left), the incumbent and international lightning rod, has been declared the winner of Friday’s elections.

According to his supporters, Mr Lightning rod shocked the world by winning a stunning 62.6% of the vote.

Shocking indeed as many were predicting a tight race.

So was the election rigged?

Here are some reasons why the election may have been “massaged”.

Here are some explanations to the contrary.

Generally, the chorus of opinion (outside of Ahmadinejad’s supporters) seems to think the election was less than fair.

Over at the Daily Beast, Suzanne Maloney is simply wondering  how much the vote was tampered.

Ibrahim Yazdi, ex-foreign minister of Iran, said in an interview,

Many of us believe that the election was rigged. Not only Mousavi. We don’t have any doubt. And as far as we are concerned, it is not legitimate.

There were many, many irregularities. They did not permit the candidates to supervise the election or the counting of the ballots at the polling places. The minister of the interior announced that he would oversee the final count in his office, at the ministry, with only two aides present.

Tempers are now flaring. The supporters of the losing candidates, especially those backing the runner up Mir Hussein Moussavi, have taken to the streets.

These gatherings have turned violent as protesters and police clash.

And we thought the Bush/Gore 2000 election dispute was crazy!?!