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Meet The Firm Whose $95 Billion In Assets Keeps Iran's Ayatollah In Power
Bloomberg may be in hot water for scuttling an article that "might anger China" as exposed over the weekend, but that was only after winning investigative prizes for its series of reports exposing the epic wealth of China top ruling families in 2012: a topic that has received prominence at a time when the forced wealth redistribution plans of developed and developing nations, usually originated by these same uber-wealthy families, is all the rage. Another country, whose oligarchic wealth had largely escaped press scrutiny, was Iran. At least until today, when in a six month investigation culminating in a three-part report on the assets of the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Reuters exposed Setad, an Iranian company that manages and sells property on order from the Imam.
In a nutshell, the company has built up its wealth by seizing thousands of properties from Iranian citizens. According to the investigation, Setad’s assets are worth $95 billion – 40 percent more than Iran’s total 2012 oil exports. It is this confiscated "wealth" that has allowed the Iranian clergy, and especially the Ayatollah, to preserve their power over the years.
In a little more than a nutshell, Reuters explains just who Setad is:
Pari Vahdat-e-Hagh ultimately lost her property. It was taken by an organization that is controlled by the most powerful man in Iran: Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. She now lives alone in a cramped, three-room apartment in Europe, thousands of miles from Tehran.
The Persian name of the organization that hounded her for years is "Setad Ejraiye Farmane Hazrate Emam" – Headquarters for Executing the Order of the Imam. The name refers to an edict signed by the Islamic Republic's first leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, shortly before his death in 1989. His order spawned a new entity to manage and sell properties abandoned in the chaotic years after the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Setad has become one of the most powerful organizations in Iran, though many Iranians, and the wider world, know very little about it. In the past six years, it has morphed into a business juggernaut that now holds stakes in nearly every sector of Iranian industry, including finance, oil, telecommunications, the production of birth-control pills and even ostrich farming.
The organization's total worth is difficult to pinpoint because of the secrecy of its accounts. But Setad's holdings of real estate, corporate stakes and other assets total about $95 billion, Reuters has calculated. That estimate is based on an analysis of statements by Setad officials, data from the Tehran Stock Exchange and company websites, and information from the U.S. Treasury Department.
Just one person controls that economic empire – Khamenei. As Iran's top cleric, he has the final say on all governmental matters. His purview includes his nation's controversial nuclear program, which was the subject of intense negotiations between Iranian and international diplomats in Geneva that ended Sunday without an agreement. It is Khamenei who will set Iran's course in the nuclear talks and other recent efforts by the new president, Hassan Rouhani, to improve relations with Washington.
Unlike developed nations, where the first priority of the super rich is to flaunt their wealth, Iran's supreme leader lives a spartan lifestyle and has not been found to abuse the massive monetary holdings of Setad. However, as Reuters points out, "Setad has empowered him. Through Setad, Khamenei has at his disposal financial resources whose value rivals the holdings of the shah, the Western-backed monarch who was overthrown in 1979."
Logically, the next question is just how did Setad accumulate its vast asset holdings. The answer, just as logically, is simple: confiscation.
How Setad came into those assets also mirrors how the deposed monarchy obtained much of its fortune - by confiscating real estate. A six-month Reuters investigation has found that Setad built its empire on the systematic seizure of thousands of properties belonging to ordinary Iranians: members of religious minorities like Vahdat-e-Hagh, who is Baha'i, as well as Shi'ite Muslims, business people and Iranians living abroad.
Setad has amassed a giant portfolio of real estate by claiming in Iranian courts, sometimes falsely, that the properties are abandoned. The organization now holds a court-ordered monopoly on taking property in the name of the supreme leader, and regularly sells the seized properties at auction or seeks to extract payments from the original owners.
Just like in the US where the 1% effectively have molded the status quo into a wealth preservation mechanism, with profound control over not only the capital markets and the regulatory framework but over all three branches of government (simply note how many bankers have gone to prison for the systemic crash of 2008), so in Iran the Ayatollah has shaped society in a way that will ultimately benefit first and foremost him, as well as not only preserve his wealth but facilitate even greater accumulation of confiscated assets under any and all pretexts.
The supreme leader also oversaw the creation of a body of legal rulings and executive orders that enabled and safeguarded Setad's asset acquisitions. "No supervisory organization can question its property," said Naghi Mahmoudi, an Iranian lawyer who left Iran in 2010 and now lives in Germany.
Khamenei's grip on Iran's politics and its military forces has been apparent for years. The investigation into Setad shows that there is a third dimension to his power: economic might. The revenue stream generated by Setad helps explain why Khamenei has not only held on for 24 years but also in some ways has more control than even his revered predecessor. Setad gives him the financial means to operate independently of parliament and the national budget, insulating him from Iran's messy factional infighting.
Like every usurpation of power and wealth, Setad's beginnings were humble and, to an extent, noble.
When Khomeini, the first supreme leader, set in motion the creation of Setad, it was only supposed to manage and sell properties "without owners" and direct much of the proceeds to charity. Setad was to use the funds to assist war veterans, war widows "and the downtrodden." According to one of its co-founders, Setad was to operate for no more than two years.
Setad has built schools, roads and health clinics, and provided electricity and water in rural and impoverished areas. It has assisted entrepreneurs in development projects. But philanthropy is just a small part of Setad's overall operations.
One can probably imagine that the founders of the Fed also had noble intentions. Instead they created a dormant century-old monster, intervening in the economy to preserve the wealth of the American financial oligarchy, and whose wealth-transfer capacity has only emerged on the scene in the past five years. So it is not surprising that as absolute power corrupts absolutely, so it is in Iran as it is in the US:
Under Khamenei's control, Setad began acquiring property for itself, and kept much of the funds rather than simply redistributing them. With those revenues, the organization also helps to fund the ultimate seat of power in Iran, the Beite Rahbar, or Leader's House, according to a former Setad employee and other people familiar with the matter. The first supreme leader, Khomeini, had a small staff. To run the country today, Khamenei employs about 500 people in his administrative offices, many recruited from the military and security services.
The full Reuters article, the first of three, has much more detail on the asset holdings of the Setad, on its expropriation strategies, on the cover up to hide the full extent of the organization's involvement in society, and much more, however the broad strokes will be largely familiar to those acquainted with the tactics of any and every oligarch - be they clergical, political or financial - when preservation of power through wealth and money (and confiscation thereof) is the only prerogative.
And while Iran's wealth confiscation scheme may be extreme by Western standards, at least it is a honest daylight robbery, but what's worse is that it pales in comparison to what goes on every month not in some enclave of despotic banana republicanism, but the US itself.
Because putting Setad's $95 billion in estimated assets in context, these amount to just over 5 weeks of the Fed's QE, which for those who are not worried about losing their "access journalistic" credentials and are willing to call a spade a spade, is merely asset confiscation and wealth transfer of the most insidious type: one where those whose assets are handed over to the wealthy, are oblivious of what has just happened and are in fact grateful for the privilege of having been robbed under the auspices of the "fairness doctrine" and for the pursuit of the "greater good."
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The Ayatollah is doing God's work, which apparently pays very well, as evidenced by Lloyd Blankfein.
He's like Ben Bernanke, David Koresh, and Donald Trump rolled up into one. Oh and General Zod rolled up in that gown too.
Same shit, different country.
Government seizure of private property which is in turn handed to a private corporation. That can never happen in 'Murica!!!
Yes, what a surprise. But, that's why I come here to ZH, to learn more, even if it's the same.
How did it come to this---every nation on earth is ruled by scum, all at the same time? I bet it doesn't turn out well.
IC, that is an extremely salient point, and one which has come up repeatedly in my thoughts and conversations about getting out of Police State America --- the fact is that EVERY country on earth (to the best of my knowledge) is moving toward fascism and totalitarianism, with liberty on the retreat around the globe. Given that trend, what is the point of leaving the pot only to end up in the frying pan? And WHY and HOW is this trend so damnably universal?
So Ayatollah has more worth than the Rotschilds made in 250 years? Really?
Must suck to be a Rothschild.
2 things:
If there is a power transfer a wealth transfer will occur as well (and vice versa).
Most of this wealth came from the supporters of Shah's regime. Well yeah it was confiscated and same or at least similar thing happened after the secession of American colonies and after the American civil war in 1865.
So how many old wealth came from source like that in USA?
Government is a criminal enterprise so it's going to behave similarly everywhere.
What do you want, him to keep his assets in fiat? Hard assets baby.
Whether he is a bad dude or not, is missing the point.
I'm becoming leery of articles that suggest a shake-up in the Iranian power structure. One, because it isn't our business how countries 10,000 miles away choose to structure their government and two, because it usually American/Israeli propaganda...
Where in the fuck have you been?
I agree with you though. It's none of our business.
Well said indeen RTM.
If we could only mind our own business like we "didn't" in 1953 in that Country?
This is why we've run deficit(s) as large as we have since 1971, and why we haven't won a conflict that we've started since 1951.
Oh and lest we forget. Happy Veterans Day and all the wonderful memories that go with the lies of how courageous and heroic "we haven't been" for far too many years and counting. To celebrate, the link below on our most recent fiasco in the last decade and the lies that have gone with each coup and war we've initiated.
http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5966/p/dia/action/public/index?action_KEY=2724&start=75
See the difference is that when we use the word OUR/S, we generally mean us as in the people that agree with the position as individuals.
When you say OUR/S you meant everyone collectively.
There is a difference between the two. THe English (British) iteration of OUR/S means something entirely else, and that is the version you are using.
Thanks for the clarification.
And getting to the point of your comment. Don't you wish we were talking about "everyone else" but U.S.!
So Nemo, how have you served the citizens of this country? By eating Doritos while playing Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto with your so called friends that would report you to the cops in a second just for a bag of weed?
If you want to object to the premise of the US going to war with Iraq fine, lay out and your case and refer to what "facts" you have gathered, but don't tie your fucking bullshit to Veterans Day as a way to draw attention to your bullshit leftist on-line list of fakers and posers that are nothing more that an easy way to get a list of morons to SPAM.
You're a spineless piece of shit. You obviously stand for nothing and have no honor. Shitbags like you are the first to taste death because you piss yourself and pray for death when shit gets "real". Obviously you have no clue what I am referring to right now, but when you begin to experience life beyond your parents basement, you may start to get a fucking clue,
Those in uniform are just as complicit as their leaders in the crimes against humanity committed by this nation. None of the wars fought in the last 70 years have had any sort of justice behind them. They have been acts of thievery. And our soldiers nothing but mercenaries for a criminal State.
Time to grow the fuck up and live in the real world Wahooo. Your faulty premise to start with is that people are good. Get it through you head, humans are evil, wicked, and despicable creatures by nature. Look back over history and examine what happens to those who gain power. The Iranians thought the Shaw was oppressive and a brutal dictator. Did you read the article, how does today's current regime differ ?
Looks across the US, it is a resource rich land. A country with vast natural resources. So, without a military how long do you think we would remain a "free" ( yea I know the definition of that word gets weaker by the day) country? You don't think Japan, China, Russia, or even Germany would hesitate to make you a slave dog picking cotton in Alabama at the first opportunity?
See, you pacifist fucks like to live in your bong and throw rocks at the ones that actually protect your sorry fucking ass. Sure, it sounds good to you to bash the military and call our soldiers mercenaries, but that shows how fucking naive you really are. Try that "just can't we all get along BS in Russia for example and see how long it will take you pull some guys dick out of your ass after you've been pimped out.
No, I don't agree with a good deal of the military actions our piece of shit politicians have gotten us into since before the war of Northern Aggression actually. I do however know that without the very military you curse with contempt you fuck, your ass would speaking another language with the taste of the whip upon your back, , if not an un-identified corpse in a mass grave outside of San Francisco. Lest I forget, FUCK YOU !!!!
" Lest I forget, FUCK YOU !!!!"
Coming from Dirk Diggler, that's kind of anti-climax.
~Peter North
Dirk,
Thanks for the informative education on our stroll through the Middle East especially our install of the despot 'Shah' Pahlavi 60 years ago. And just like Van Thieu in Vietnam, Pinochet in Chile and yes Saddam Hussein in Iraq we are just fine with them being "dictators" as long as they are our dictator(s)... Am I right?
Not sure I buy your notion that we have to obliterate other sovereign Nation(s) otherwise we will somehow lose our own sovereignty in order to preserve our resource rich land and remain "free"?
By the way if you are still active duty good luck on those potential upcoming adventures you will be taking part in in Syria. I notice that most of the men and women in uniform are finding that to be a progressively unpleasant taboo subject. Won't be anything like the autonomy and "freedom" in the mayhem department we've had in other parts of the ME these last 12 years?!
By the way. It might not be a bad idea for you to brush up on your Russian and (Chinese dialects) given the fact that we don't own much of anything anymore in this "resource rich" land of ours, thanks in large part to that ever growing disproportionately large and dysfunctional MIC that we've created that doesn't have enough American jobs anymore to pay for it. It will also help assist in communicating with the Russian and Chinese soldiers in Syria that we may be fighting and on the receiving end of a polite "reach around"!
Dirk:
You volunteered for hell. Whether because you wanted to or because you came from middle America with few career choices for folks who didn't want to go to college.
No one on ZH will buy your bleeding heart line of crap. Save it for HLN and Fox News; USAToday.
Stop laying it on so thick. Besides, I don't know of anyone who voluntarily went there post-9/11 and came back with the same mentality thinking we were actually fighting the bad guys.
It's becoming too obvious now and the pride that existed during WWII had been cooled during Vietnam and is now just hanging by a string.
Larry Dallas
Dick Jiggler stated:
I have found that most people tend to judge humanity in general based on their own subconscious image of themselves.
"Get it through you head, humans are evil, wicked, and despicable creatures by nature."
Try to stop seeing things through "moralistic lenses" , DirkDiggler11. See things as "cybernetics" (sorry, but I love this word) . And don't forget you are human too .
Humans are living organism built for survival, and that can imply a lot of things we generally don't like to talk about .
My dad was drafted (enslaved) during Vietnam. He was attacked by your kind while on R&R in the college town of Williamsburg, Va. Dad and his buddies lit the jerks beard on fire with their cigarette lighters. Then, they'd watch him slap it out. Then, they lit it again! That's the most hilarious story he told about his two years of indentured servitude.
+1 Dirk
I serve them by telling the unvarnished truth about what America actually "says" and "does".
Truth is always the most painful when words and deeds are in opposition -wouldn't you concur? Nothing like telling the liar to his face.
So tell me about your experiences in the places you've been and how we've made it better for ourselves and those we've liberated from there "mortal coil"?
P.S.
Interesting comment about calling the cops on your neighbor? Sounds like your on-board with the badge and assault rifle program post 9/11?
Do not forget the trillons spent on the war on poverty which has resulted in more people in poverty.
Not all debt is the result of MIC a big part of it has been wasted teaching people how not to take care of themselves.
Every nation which has engaged in warfare has veterans. Veterans are a byproduct of war not the cause or the creator of the conflict.
Nice to hear from you RTM. Did you throw the son out of basement or attempt to sign him up for ACA../lol
Don't be a stranger, post a bit more.. miss your humor.
Dude.
Update your bias file. Obama is now enabling the iranians at the expense of the wishes of Israel.
Don't get stuck in the past.
Gotta be flexible, move fast, like the Viet Cong.
can anyone say .... land tax? henry george to the rescue!
Yep yep. I get the feeling more and more that the ADL have somehow gotten their hooks into zerohedge, which considering the brotherhood relationship they have with the central banking system, cannot be a good thing...
He's like the Jim Bakker of the muslim set...where's Tammy?...lol.
Sad and despondent ... so little eye shadow, so much burka ....
I pity her mirror. She makes Madeleine Albright look attractive.
Thought only "banksters" did god's work. Oh...wait a minute...powerful people hide behind religion!
Billions? Why not start a bank in Brazil with the money? What? He did? Oh.
shades of the TEmplars of old; doing God's work and making huge money based on Trusts of lands "donated" to them; and spoils from raids on trade caravans in Holy Land. A militia with an ambitious agenda over centuries builders of a chain of "temples" all gravy trains. It ended badly.
In their case Ayatollah Khomeini was Bernard of Clairvaux.
How history rhymes and Holy men ensure that Papal "indulgences" pay for their theocratic ambitions and power time and time again. Bankers and holy men are a recurrent breed like Oligarchs and cockroaches.
I could not possibly sign up to that, unless it included shag-a-delic babes. Like traditional conquerors had.
I guess the Ayatollah and Setad found out about the US asset-forfeiture program and decided to emulate it.
I've got an idea. Let's do an article on the wealth of the juice. Or is that's what's going on here. The finger pointing will keep the heat off.
Over.
When is Reuters going to do this expose on Rothchild cartel?
rothschilds own reuters, so never..................
''J. W. McCallister, an oil industry insider with House of Saud connections, wrote in The Grim Reaper that information he acquired from Saudi bankers cited 80% ownership of the New York Federal Reserve Bank- by far the most powerful Fed branch- by just eight families, four of which reside in the US. They are the Goldman Sachs, Rockefellers, Lehmans and Kuhn Loebs of New York; the Rothschilds of Paris and London; the Warburgs of Hamburg; the Lazards of Paris; and the Israel Moses Seifs of Rome.''
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-federal-reserve-cartel-the-eight-famili...
fuck you CH1
"If you like your falafel stand, you can keep your falafel stand." (Unless we like it more...)
Reminds me of the Nazi Winterhilfe charity, which raised money for various humanitarian purposes. But there was no public accounting and a lot of the money supposedly went into the pockets of high-ranking Nazi officials. And refusing to donate could be hazardous to your health.
Edward Griffin is right when he talks about the Left-Right paradigm.
The democratic battles and undemocratic wars don't arise between political factions because the parties have opposing socio-political philosophies, but simply over who will seize control of the levers of power and who is to benefit from the power and control it grants them.
Whichever one wins, the population get the same results.
As we now see exposed in Iran: corruption and despotism where the Shah was removed from office 1979 by the Islamic do-gooders on grounds that he was corrupt beyond redemption, but who are themselves even more corrupt than he ever was. The Ayatollah having amassed a fortune in excess of USD 95 billion from fascist policies of property confiscation and the rest of it with an army of thugs to enforce it.
That was not persian/muslim bashing. It was an expose on the greed of power. We all agree their is greed of money in our world and sometimes we even see or hear someone something go down because of it. But greed of power? Society hasnt even accepted that as a human law that should never be broken, but somehow greed of money has all the attention. This is exactly what this article is showing, greed of power running in broad daylight.
Ben Bernanke and all them PHDs are not trying to bill gate their way out of this world. They are the fucking dorks who think being right or smarter than those around you in class someone hiw makes them a better human in society. We all knew a few of those pricks
That was not persian/muslim bashing. It was an expose on the greed of power. We all agree their is greed of money in our world and sometimes we even see or hear someone something go down because of it. But greed of power? Society hasnt even accepted that as a human law that should never be broken, but somehow greed of money has all the attention. This is exactly what this article is showing, greed of power running in broad daylight.
Ben Bernanke and all them PHDs are not trying to bill gate their way out of this world. They are the fucking dorks who think being right or smarter than those around you in class someone hiw makes them a better human in society. We all knew a few of those pricks
interesting yes ? you replied to a comment, yes I saw it too, then in a refresh it was gone.
by the author or by the site ?
What's the over/under for there being a Wall Street firm "managing" some of these assets?
HSBC was already caught "managing" assets for Mexican drug lords and Iranian based "terrorist" groups.
Isn't that the place where clergy rule, women are 'frustrated', sheep are nervous and men are scared?
Or is that most of the ME?
Um, yes.
"Meet The Firm Whose $95 Billion In Assets Keeps Iran's Ayatollah In Power".
Thought you were going to say Goldman. They'd probably call their clientele 'bearded muppets'
We've heard this quote (usually stated incorrectly) so many times it is boring but it really applies to just about everyone:
"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." John Acton
Religious leaders, politicians, business titans are part of humanity so they are not immune to the above.
Here is anothert quote by Acton:
"Liberty is the prevention of control by others."
Sounds good and I suppose that's why liberty is such a rare commodity in our world.
This guy, Khamenei, when he was a student in Paris, was a communist. Quite amazing really.
Do you know who paid for his education?
Sounds like the have a form of UN Globalist Democracy in Iran.
No different than what the banks did with their fraudulent home loans that they (surprise!) foreclosed on and have either kept the real estate or sold it to their hedgefund buds.
Clearly this means we must invade a redistribute that wealth. The only reason this article was published in the first place is to push hostilities with Iran. I have an idea' how about an expose on the 1% who control all the wealth in this country? We wouldn't want to do that and make anybody uncomfortable now would we Bloomturd?
The best bit was the last paragraph. The rest was short on facts and long on linguistic acrobatics to sell the old clichés on the Iranian regime. How is a property not abandoned if the owner(s) fucked off abroad and left it to decay since 1979? What part of their philanthropy is meant to be sinister? Or how unusual is it to employ 500 people to administrate a $95 billion property portfolio among other investments?
Surely power corrupts and there's nothing like rolling in money to facilitate corruption, but I've heard the exact same undertones of false accusations about catholics and our charity organisation, cafod (I'm catholic). Constant vigilance for corruption is part and parcel of any large organisation, because people being the greedy apes they are, some will take advantage of their positions. That's a different matter altogether from alledging that a charitable organisation is based on theft, fraud and corruption without citing a single case to prove it.
It reads like a propaganda piece by Mossad - "They say they are charitable and on the surface they help people, but they must be doing evil, because.... well, they're fucking iranian. Right? Nudge nudge wink wink". Tired of this bullshit. The Iranians never did a thing to me or my country, yet right now we're fucking starving their kids to death (or trying to) with sanctions because apparently they're only allowed to have stone age technology, and should only have rocks to defend themselves with against Israel's nukes and our MIC hungry for their oil. It's fucked up beyond belief if you have even a tiny inkling of the cardinal virtues.
+1
That is one bitchin' comment.
Thanks for clearing that up. As I understand your information concerning Iran they have never and never will provide soldiers, arms or support for religious gruoups in other countries. The Iranians only have a purley defensive military. Iranian men and arms currently in Syria are not Iranian. What amazing and kind people the Iranians are.
Thanks again, see you at the Shia Mosque on Friday.
As my late father was fond of saying, "the top 1-2% of people in all societies, regardless of the system in their country, are always red neck capitalists. They are always the ones that give capitalism a bad name."
Might not be much left of that corrupt regime if Saudi Arabia-Israel & France sit down and talk together.Some say the deadline for a strike on Iran is within one year but most say it could be six months or less.If the Saudis join in with Israel and give them air support and allow flights to cross their territory, that Iranin religious nutcase of a dictator better take cover deep in some mine somewhere.BunkerBusters can go pretty deep.
"Iranian religious nutcase." ?
Are the nutcases in the western world that have elevated government and banking to the status of religious bodies any better?
Is the world really in the mood for another mess like Iraq and Lybia and Syria?
I admit that for some this is the goal.
I see a day when Shia and Sunnis spend time holding hands, embracing, with smiles on their faces forgetting the hundred of thousands deaths caused by their faith. Unless of course the evil CIA and Mossad do something that forces them to start killing each other. Because everone knows that the conflict between Shia and Sunni is the result of external elements not as a result of differences in Islamic belief.
Always follow the money if you want to know the real deal under the cover of nicey words and smiley faces. To wit, this:
Oil prices will fall if Iran is brought back into the fold.
Britain's Wahabbist Saudi Arabia will be denied its sole fascist theocracy. Iran can counter that.
Britain's Mi5 funded Muslim Brotherhood (Hitler's Arab Nazis) will be weakened.
Zionists will weep for their lost plot, aided mostly by the un-Federal no-Reserve Board of private shareholders who live mostly in Britain, Europe and Israel. And they will use ordinary jews, christians and muslims as body bags, a human shield, just as they did in WWII when the Zionist Congress declared:
'One cow in Palestine is worth all the jews in Europe.' Notice that Rothschild led Zionist leadership always keeps its own sons and daughters safe and happy at home, while throwing others into the wars for their profit.
End the Fed. Stay out of foreign wars. This is constitutional.
Let other nations decide their own ways. We can trade with them, peacefully. There is no need to interfere in their sovereignty, but there is the want of the globalist central bank cartel to command all.
End the Fed.
the figures are misleading, but... i'm not in a mood to argue 'eminent domain'? suffice to say, iran is a democracy within a theocracy-- a grand republic (jmo?)
politics in iran are too say the least, very democratic?!? for instance; quoting pgs 198/99... "The Age of Deception" by Mohamed ElBaradei c.2011...
"as the security (7/2006) council began edging its way toward a resolution, javad vaeedi, larijani's deputy, came to see me (elbaradei). the gist of the conversation was that the iranians were prepared to agree to suspension, but not as a precondition of the negotiations, only as an outcome. suspension would also need to be linked to some type of security assurance. "we want to know whether our counterpart is an ally or an adversary," vaeedi told me. "the issue is not just the nuclear program. it is the entire future relationship between america and iran."
he explained the situation facing ahmadinejad domestically. "if he only announces the suspension of nuclear enrichment, without something about security in return, the ahmadinejad administration will collapse." what vaeedi said next was both illuminating and disturbing. the previous negotiating team-- the group headed by rouhani, who had served under the khatami administration-- was now opposing any move to suspend enrichment and except the package. the problem was not the offer itself, which was obviously much better than the previous year's package. their concern was that acceptance of the offer and negotiations with the united states toward normalizing relations would make Ahmadinejad a National HERO. that was the last thing they wanted, so they were busily undermining the very solution they had worked so hard to achieve.
i signed. tehran had been spending way too much time watching d.c. politics, i thought." end quote
ref: "Politic's of Iran" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Iran
Ps. $95 bn in reserves for a country the size of Iran with no revenues and huge inflation problems is a very,... very poor argument from the 'yellow journalist at bloomberg/tel aviv'!
thankyou tyler
great read :-)) jmo
Ps2. 'The Age of Deception' is a short and fasinating read-- very insightful and timely,...
Old adage, "Money flows to power", not the other way around.
Long before the war machine rolls on the field, the public mind must be conditioned to accept it and to desire it. This is what this Reuters-Rothschild piece is about.
Strangely, I miss the time Marla Singer would relish and joke about Israeli commandos executing civilians in international waters.
At least you knew then that warmongering Zionist disinformation was merely an identifiable part of Tyler Durden's peronality, and not necessarily the dominant one.
It seems Tyler has solved his split personality problem.
Its not TD who has a split personality it is Ayatollah Iran.
A theocracy whose genitor has overtly stated : "I would sacrifice the whole of Iran's historical heritage to make my belief in Shia God prevail", is a recipe for moral and national disaster. This proclamation by Khomeiny and its subsequent "pouring into concrete" by his successor has created a black hole of ideological dimensions that goes beyond the Zionist conundrum, as its a death wish for the nations who have espoused Islam as ideology in the past. Its morally debilitating for the whole region.
Iran is a nation with a cultural and military history like none other in Asia (except maybe China and India). To negate that in the name of creationist theocracy is an insult to the humanist thread that is the socle of western civilization. Unacceptable and dangerous.
The west has to patiently defuse this ideological regression, that it has fueled in its own careening, hegemonic, criminal past momentum; similar to its previous Papal corruption under Dictatus Papae and Innocent III / Latran council IV days, which created the Crusader colonial zeal and the Inquisition and led to Papal demise as spiritual force of west. Maybe, the Iranian people in the end will solve this internal problem; that is the true historical route. But we should not be a party to this ideology by becoming indifferent to its regional sway.
Cannot let either the clerics of Qom or of Mecca take us back there to the dark neo feudal age on the backs of their black gold wealth. No way. Except that the west has now become NEO FEUDAL itself under Pax Americana impetus, making the Iranian theocracy look like minor benign wart in comparison! Awesome, unbelievable irony of our times.
But for the sane who still claim to values of western republicanism its no excuse for war mongering on the Iranian people who be the first victims of this distortion of their own history.
Whence my thesis that Iran is a split personality country like the Sunni Arabs on issues of world geopolitics; alas, at par with Pax Americana hubris, as that of its Templar zionista spin-off of Balfour declaration days.
$95 Billion? Nothing. The FED prints 85 billion a month so the 95 billion they have is only one month of QE plus the loose change that is under Uncle Benny's couch cushions.
Funny, Islam seems to be another form of Socialism, get everybody to agree to nationalize on behalf of the state, transfer property to the state, launder, then sell off at fire sale prices to international Socialist bankers.
Iran has expanded state debt since the revolution yes?
This is a very fucking nice read