What the Iranian Government Could Use Now

A U.S. embassy to sic 'students' on, to distract the attention of Iranian anti-government protesters. If only the ayatollahs didn't shoot their bolt with that strategy 30 years ago. Here are a few tweets from Iranian protesters, courtesy of Andrew Sullivan's Atlantic blog (the photo above is from his blog as well):

- reports of large pro-Gov Baseej militia in front of UK embassy Tehran

- Khamenei indicate in last Friday prayers that Gov relationship with UK will become bad

- we expect that Gov will arrange for demo outside UK embassy to become serious - maybe cut diplomatic ties with UK

- Gov demos outside UK embassy in Tehran today shouting 'death to England' - 'death to BBC'

"Death to England"? "Death to the BBC"? What red-blooded Iranian Islamic revolutionary can get excited about that? Another Iranian Twitterer notes,

- Today is aniversary of raiding of USA embassy in Tehran 1979 - #Iranelection - today Gov planning anti UK demo outside UK embassy!!!!

Somehow, I doubt that stirring up the pot with the U.K. is going to help the Iranian establishment much. At this late date, using the U.K. to stir up revolutionary, anti-Western, or anti-imperialist sentiment sounds as archaic as cries of "Perfidious Albion" -- probably, even to Iranians, who seem especially sensitive about past perceived slights to their national honor. In any case, the U.K. has already started to evacuate the families of its diplomats. What happens if it evacuates its embassy too? What's Khamenei going to do, have his 'students' lay siege to the Canadian embassy? I doubt even the most zealous Islamic revolutionary would get excited about that. Khamenei and Ahmadinejad would be better off hoping that the Stratfor's George Friedman is right, and that the anti-government protesters represent only a vocal minority, with the current Iranian establishment enjoying broader popular support. Time will tell, I guess.

George Friedman on the Iranian Election

Interesting column on the Iranian election by George Friedman of Stratfor, "Western Misconception Meets Iran Reality" (Hat Tip: RealClearWorld). Below are a few excerpts:

There are undoubtedly people who want to liberalize the Iranian regime. They are to be found among the professional classes in Tehran, as well as among students. Many speak English, making them accessible to the touring journalists, diplomats and intelligence people who pass through. They are the ones who can speak to Westerners, and they are the ones willing to speak to Westerners. And these people give Westerners a wildly distorted view of Iran. They can create the impression that a fantastic liberalization is at hand — but not when you realize that iPod-owning Anglophones are not exactly the majority in Iran.

[...]

Some still charge that Ahmadinejad cheated. That is certainly a possibility, but it is difficult to see how he could have stolen the election by such a large margin. Doing so would have required the involvement of an incredible number of people, and would have risked creating numbers that quite plainly did not jibe with sentiment in each precinct. Widespread fraud would mean that Ahmadinejad manufactured numbers in Tehran without any regard for the vote. But he has many powerful enemies who would quickly have spotted this and would have called him on it. Mousavi still insists he was robbed, and we must remain open to the possibility that he was, although it is hard to see the mechanics of this.

It also misses a crucial point: Ahmadinejad enjoys widespread popularity. He doesn’t speak to the issues that matter to the urban professionals, namely, the economy and liberalization. But Ahmadinejad speaks to three fundamental issues that accord with the rest of the country [piety, corruption, and an assertive national security posture as a salve for Iranians still bitter over their country's pyrrhic draw in the Iran-Iraq War -- Friedman elaborates on each of these issues in his column].

[...]

Perhaps the greatest factor in Ahmadinejad’s favor is that Mousavi spoke for the better districts of Tehran — something akin to running a U.S. presidential election as a spokesman for Georgetown and the Lower East Side. Such a base will get you hammered, and Mousavi got hammered. Fraud or not, Ahmadinejad won and he won significantly. That he won is not the mystery; the mystery is why others thought he wouldn’t win.

The image above, of a post-election protest, comes from Andrew Sullivan's Atlantic blog, where he is posting the tweets of some of those tech-savvy Anglophones who Friedman notes are not exactly representative of the broader Iranian society.

Comparing Bear Market Declines

Hat tip to Andrew Sullivan for this chart.

"News Flash: Economists Agree"

Hat tip to Atlantic blogger Andrew Sullivan for linking to this post by Greg Mankiw, the Harvard economist and former Bush Administration Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers: "News Flash: Economists Agree". From Mankiw's post,

The recent debate over the stimulus bill has lead some observers to think that economists are hopelessly divided on issues of public policy¹. That is true regarding business cycle theory and, specifically, the virtues or defects of Keynesian economics. But it is not true more broadly.

Mankiw goes on to list fourteen propositions on which a majority of economists agree, according to various polls of the profession. The fourth one is the most relevant to the recent stimulus debate:

Fiscal policy (e.g., tax cut and/or government expenditure increase) has a significant stimulative impact on a less than fully employed economy. (90%)

Mankiw adds,

Note that the proposition about fiscal policy (#4) does not distinguish between taxes and spending as the best tool for purposes of macro stabilization. Maybe that question should be added in a future poll. I doubt, however, that the answer would make it onto this list of widely agreed upon propositions.