Values Voters

     Values voters scored a victory in national elections on June 24 this year. The new conservative President, elected with a strong mandate despite claims of voting irregularity, promised to bring back traditional religious values. His campaign was geared strongly towards religious conservatives and the socially and economically depressed, who helped sweep him into office. Analysts say that his appeal to the poorer classes came strongly from the perception of him as a populist and a "man of the people". After the election, he was heard saying, "the [religious] revolution of [2005] will, if God wills, cut off the roots of injustice in the world. The wave of the [religious] revolution will soon reach the entire world." It's difficult to pin the President down, however, since he usually "avoids interviews with independent journalists, or avoids answering questions by asking other questions and asking them not to ask 'complicated questions'". (src: Wikipedia)
     As you may have guessed, this President is not George W. Bush, although if you change the date from June 24, 2005 to November 2, 2004, there would not be much difference. No, this president is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the hard-liner president of Iran who was previously the mayor of Tehran and possibly one of the Iranian terrorists who held American hostages in 1979. It's far too early to say what his legacy as president will be, but as mayor, he strengthened religious rule, promoting separate elevators for men and women and put a serious religious emphasis on city cultural centers.
     Conservatives get all aflutter when you compare their man to Adolf Hitler. So, assuming Ahmadinejad did not participate in the hostage taking (US government analysts say his facial structure does not match the man in the picture, despite otherwise resemblence), let's compare him to Bush. Hey - why not? Despite the fact that Ahmadinejad has not started a reckless war, has not pushed legislation to rape the environment, and has a declared goal of pushing national oil wealth towards the poorer elements of his society, there is a lot to compare. And Ahmadinejad is not an international criminal, so what do the GOP apologists have to whine about? Now, granted, Ahmadinejad is not a great person. And he's certainly not the leader I would want for myself or my country. He's not even the leader I would wish on anyone else, even the Iranians, whom I know very little about. Then again, neither is Bush, whose destructive policies have divided and set back this great nation for a generation or more.
     Basically, Iran is experiencing a "backlash" against the liberal policies of the past few years. The Values Voters there were tired of seeing uppity women without veils and men without beards. They were looking for a return of the "good old days" of 1979, when they hardly had to harass women showing their ankles in public, because none dared to. They find the US and George Bush tired and hypocritical when talking about freedom. Islamic Iranian voters want the freedom to repress women, so why does Bush feel their freedom is less worthy than that of the reformers. The reformers, led by previously popular president Khatami, were destroying the Islamic ways of Iran and were leading the nation into godlessness. Or, at least that's how Iranian conservatives see it. Reformers are upset. "I want the rights and freedoms that everyone is entitled to," said lyricist Payam Eslami. "Normal rights. Nothing more."
     Those words could have been uttered by a homosexual in the US. Unfortunately, it seems the majority of Americans don't understand why they should care. Why they should care about women in Iran or gays in America or how the two are connected. We're like the proverbial frog in the pot of slowly boiling water. The water around is getting warmer, but we can't tell whether we're just getting comfortable or whether we're getting cooked until it's too late. For the people who were feeling just a little too chilly before, calls to lower the gas flame are ridiculed, shut down, and called traitorous. At least 51% of Americans don't think we'd hit the boiling point. Surely the flame will drop long before then. But we only have to look to our neighbors around the world to see what happens when extremism and religious intolerance hits the boiling point.

First they came for the communists,
I did not speak out
because I was not a communist.

When they came for the social democrats,
I did not speak out
because I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists
I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews
I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew;

And when they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

-Pastor Martin Niemöller (1892-1984)