In the comments section of my previous article on the elections in Iran, altigerrrr make a very good point that the Guardian Council could not prevent Mousavi from running because he is a reformist. I understand that, but that is not quite what I meant. In fact, I like the idea of giving the Iranian people as big a choice of candidates as possible - that is the basic goal of any democracy. So I don't see being a "reformist" or a "conservative" as either good or bad (as I mentioned yesterday - I find these concepts rather meaningless to begin with). But here is what puzzles me:
The Iranian Guardian Council is composed of 12 jurists who are highly respected and who are entrusted with a vital mission: to vet Presidential candidates. I therefore assume that they must have access to the very best information about these candidates available to the Iranian government.
One of the very basic activity for any intelligence or security agency is to maintain very detailed and carefully crafted psychological profiles of all key personalities in any important country or political movement. I assume that the Iranian intelligence and/or security agencies have exactly the same basic set of tasks as their colleagues in any other country.
The Iranian security services *must* have had a very detailed psychological of Musavi. If not, then they are not doing their job properly. Likewise, I assume that the members of the Guardian Council should have been given access to this profile. If not, then there is something fundamentally wrong in the structure of the Iranian government. Intelligence work is composed of three "A": Aquisition, Analysis and Acceptance. The latter means dissemination to the relevant decision making bodies.
Musavi's psychological analysis should not have to include such vague political categories as "reformer". What is should have contained is a clear warning that the guys is an ambitious politician who will place his personal ego over the welfare of his country and that should he be allowed to run, he would not accept a defeat without trying to create chaos.
The Iranian security services should have figured out what kind of guy Mousavi is, they should have passed on this information to the Guardian Council, and the Guardian Council should have either taken action directly or, at least, passed this information to the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei who should have stopped Mousavi. But none of that happened.
The question is why? (Considering the highly sensitive nature of this question, we will probably never get an answer to it).
Finally, Mousavi could have been nailed for his corruption and the way his wife used Musavi's political infuence to to obtain her academic positions. But other than having Ahmadinejad mention that once, nothing was done.
But what is the point of having a vetting system, a Guardian Council and a Supreme Leader if none of that can prevent the likes of Mousavi to run?
Another thought:
HAS ANYBODY SEEN ANY EVIDENCE OF ELECTION RIGGING OTHER THEN THE RIOTS THEMSELVES?
Yep. Nothing. Nothing besides the riots and grand statements by politicians.
Which just makes me wonder how some, shall we say, "less than critical" minds can simply assume that the elections were rigged ONLY on the basis of riots (which, according to my info, were limited to one city and were not that big - not by Iranian standards for sure).
The Saker
