Why, when I read this article, does it feel like deja vu?
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Iran reformists want U.S. to tone it down
Nuclear rhetoric helps a faltering Ahmadinejad stay popular, they say.
By Kim Murphy, Times Staff Writer
February 11, 2007
TEHRAN — It is a few weeks before the Iranian new year, and already the narrow market streets in south Tehran are boiling with extra shoppers. Houses must be cleaned, new curtains hung on the windows, the table laid with fresh linens. No child should leave home without new clothes and a few crisp bills in his pocket.
These neighborhoods of tight-clustered houses, dingy auto parts shops, cheap shoe stores and endless ribbons of honking, fuming cars were the bosom of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's sweep to the presidency in 2005.
"Most people voted for Ahmadinejad because he promised they would never have to feel sad again on New Year's Eve in front of their children," said Farshid Bakhtieri, a 21-year-old computer salesman. "Everyone right now, they feel nothing but regret.
EDIT: Sound fammiliar?
"One person says he voted for Ahmadinejad because he would create jobs. And there are no jobs. Another person says it was because he would build houses. No one can afford these houses," Bakhtieri said. "He is like all the other politicians in the history of Iran, all of them coming with lots of promises, but no one follows these promises. He is exactly like the others."
Tens of thousands of Iranians will gather in the streets today for what is supposed to be a ringing public endorsement of Iran's 28-year-old Islamic Revolution and its embattled drive for nuclear power.
But many Iranians say the international dispute over Iran's nuclear program has become a rallying point for a president who otherwise would be facing substantial public dissatisfaction over soaring inflation, rising unemployment and widespread censorship.
This has been a source of frustration to Iran's reformists, who dealt the president's party a blow at the polls in local elections in December but complain that the Bush administration's threatening rhetoric has pulled the rug out from under them.
"You are harmful for us. We try to tell politicians in Washington, D.C., please don't do anything in favor of reform or to promote democracy in Iran. Because in 100% of the cases, it benefits the right wing," said Saeed Leylaz, a business consultant and advocate of economic reform and greater dialogue with the West.</U<
"Mr. Ahmadinejad tries to make the international situation worse and worse. And now with the U.N. Security Council resolution, he can say, 'Look, we are in a dangerous position, and nobody can say anything against us, because the enemy is coming into the country.' Exactly like George W. Bush in Washington, D.C. They are helping each other. They need each other, I believe."
The government and clerical establishment have gone to great pains in recent weeks to stress to Iranians that the nation's independence is under threat. More than anything else, a strong sense of national pride has pushed Iran toward developing a nuclear power program, which the U.S. and other nations believe is aimed at building a nuclear weapon.
"Our revolution was a gift from God. If we don't say 'Thank God' every day, we will lose this gift and all we have," Ahmad Khatami, a hard-line cleric from Qom, reminded hundreds gathered for Friday prayers at Tehran University last week. "Attacking the government and the parliament and the judiciary is fanning the flames of the enemy."
Ahmadinejad's approach has been broadly popular in the provinces and among many in Tehran fed up with the wealth and corruption of those in power. The slight president, who typically wears a tan jacket, lives in a simple house and drives a normal car.
He has tried to give the lower classes a bigger share of Iran's oil wealth and has been known to respond to constituents who write to him about problems with a handwritten note, directing them to take it to the nearest bank for a loan.
But the state's share of the economy has swollen, and the Tehran stock exchange has lost more than a quarter of its value over the last 18 months. Unemployment stands at an official 11.5%, and little new foreign investment is coming in.
Meanwhile, prices are increasing at a dizzying rate. Tomatoes have risen threefold in the last year, while housing prices in more prosperous north Tehran appear to have doubled.
Bakhtieri said his mother, a university librarian, was one of several public employees who got a raise shortly after Ahmadinejad was elected, only to see it taken back when the government couldn't afford it. Some employees even had to repay the extra money they received, he said.
Bakhtieri said many Iranians blame their troubles on Ahmadinejad's generous aid programs to Afghanistan, Central Asia, the Palestinian territories and Latin America.
"I don't know why, when our people need lots of things, they have to be spending all this money in other countries," he said.
Economists say the inflation can be traced to the amount of money in circulation doubling over the last 18 months.
The government ordered banks to grant millions of dollars in new loans to small and medium-sized businesses. Bad loans put the banks at risk.
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