Pure Evil: Iranian Ghouls Charge Family of Dead Protester a $3000 'Bullet Fee'

It doesn't get any sicker than this. How can people be so unspeakably cruel and evil as to do something like this to a mourning family?

And our president wants dialogue with these monsters?

The family, clad in black, stood at the curb of the road sobbing. A middle-aged mother slapped her cheeks, letting out piercing wails. The father, a frail man who worked as a doorman at a clinic in central Tehran, wept quietly with his head bowed.

Minutes before, an ambulance had arrived from Tehran's morgue carrying the body of their only son, 19-year-old Kaveh Alipour.

On Saturday, amid the most violent clashes between security forces and protesters, Mr. Alipour was shot in the head as he stood at an intersection in downtown Tehran. He was returning from acting class and a week shy of becoming a groom, his family said.

The details of his death remain unclear. He had been alone. Neighbors and relatives think that he got trapped in the crossfire. He wasn't politically active and hadn't taken part in the turmoil that has rocked Iran for over a week, they said.

"He was a very polite, shy young man," said Mohamad, a neighbor who has known him since childhood.

When Mr. Alipour didn't return home that night, his parents began to worry. All day, they had heard gunshots ringing in the distance. His father, Yousef, first called his fiancée and friends. No one had heard from him.

At the crack of dawn, his father began searching at police stations, then hospitals and then the morgue.

Upon learning of his son's death, the elder Mr. Alipour was told the family had to pay an equivalent of $3,000 as a "bullet fee"—a fee for the bullet used by security forces—before taking the body back, relatives said.

Mr. Alipour told officials that his entire possessions wouldn't amount to $3,000, arguing they should waive the fee because he is a veteran of the Iran-Iraq war. According to relatives, morgue officials finally agreed, but demanded that the family do no funeral or burial in Tehran. Kaveh Alipour's body was quietly transported to the city of Rasht, where there is family.

Obama is having one of those bouquet-tossing "press conferences" today. Does anyone in the White House press corps have the onions to ask him why we should have dialogue with these maniacs?

Paid to Stare at the Wall

Nothing like having a cushy union deal to take advantage of.

Hundreds of New York City public school teachers accused of offenses ranging from insubordination to sexual misconduct are being paid their full salaries to sit around all day playing Scrabble, surfing the Internet or just staring at the wall, if that's what they want to do.

Because their union contract makes it extremely difficult to fire them, the teachers have been banished by the school system to its "rubber rooms" — off-campus office space where they wait months, even years, for their disciplinary hearings.

The 700 or so teachers can practice yoga, work on their novels, paint portraits of their colleagues — pretty much anything but school work. They have summer vacation just like their classroom colleagues and enjoy weekends and holidays through the school year.

"You just basically sit there for eight hours," said Orlando Ramos, who spent seven months in a rubber room, officially known as a temporary reassignment center, in 2004-05. "I saw several near-fights. `This is my seat.' `I've been sitting here for six months.' That sort of thing."

Ramos was an assistant principal in East Harlem when he was accused of lying at a hearing on whether to suspend a student. Ramos denied the allegation but quit before his case was resolved and took a job in California.

Because the teachers collect their full salaries of $70,000 or more, the city Department of Education estimates the practice costs the taxpayers $65 million a year. The department blames union rules.

"It is extremely difficult to fire a tenured teacher because of the protections afforded to them in their contract," spokeswoman Ann Forte said.

Now starting this week they get the entire summer off.

What a deal.

'Don't Worry. It's Just One Bullet and It's Over'

These maniacs in Iran might think they can hide what they've done from their own people, yet now the entire world knows what evil they're capable of.

Neda Agha-Soltan's memory will live a lot longer than the 26 years she had on earth, senselessly murdered in broad daylight by subhuman thugs.

Sure, they'll try to silence the people, but I'm optimistic they're too late.

The young Iranian woman whose gruesome killing has become a rallying cry for the nation's opposition movement eerily predicted her violent death by gunfire -- but was determined to protest against "the injustice of it all," a friend said yesterday.

As the violence continues to escalate on the streets of the embattled Middle Eastern nation, the beautiful philosophy student, Neda Agha-Soltan, 26, who had been engaged to be married, is being hailed as Iran's Joan of Arc.

The government yesterday blocked a wake for her in a central Tehran mosque for fear that the outpouring of grief would lead to more anti-regime protests, her fiancé, Caspian Makan, told the BBC.

"The authorities are aware that everybody in Iran and throughout the whole world knows about her story," Makan said.

"They were afraid that lots of people could turn up."

The 40-second video of Neda's death has not been aired on Iranian state-sponsored TV, but many in the country -- and worldwide -- have seen it on the Internet.

It captures Neda, shot in the heart, in her last moments of life, bleeding to death on the street as a friend wails, "Don't be afraid! Neda, dear!"

As the life leaves her face and blood pours from her nose, a white-haired man, her music teacher, yells, "Stay with me!"

Since the video made shock waves across the Web, her photo has been held aloft at demonstrations all over the globe.

But to her relatives, she is more than just an icon of change.

She loved Persian pop songs and her piano lessons, was the second of three children, and was passionate about travel.

In turns mischievous, smart and caring, Neda studied to become a tour guide and took Turkish language courses in the hopes of leading Iranian tourists on trips abroad, friends and relatives said.

On Saturday, the day she was killed, her friend told The Los Angeles Times that she had tried to persuade Neda to stay away from the massive march.

"I told her, 'Neda, don't go,' " the friend, who gave her name only as Golshad, told the paper.

But Neda was adamant.

"She said, 'Don't worry. It's just one bullet and it's over,' " recalled Hamid Panihi, the music teacher and friend who was with her when she died.

"She couldn't stand the injustice of it all," he told the paper.

Neither can most of us. Don't worry though, there won't be any repercussions from the hot dog crew.

Meanwhile, it appears the hairy munchkin could soon be jettisoned to sooth protests.

Iran's powerful mullahs are considering replacing the nation's hard-line "supreme leader" or forcing the resignation of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in hopes of ending the 10 days of angry protests by pro-democracy demonstrators, it was reported yesterday.

A committee of religious leaders would take over for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to the plan secretly under review by members of Iran's Assembly of Experts, sources in the holy city of Qom told Al Arabiya TV.

Another option to end the crisis is the resignation of Ahmadinejad, the news channel said.

Considering Ahmadinejad came in third, that's the least he should do.

Check out Amir Taheri on the differences between now and 1979.

In 1979, the people looked to the Shiite clergy for leadership. This time, the clergy is pushed into the background. The new "moral references" of Iranian society are no longer clerics; they are intellectuals, academics, lawyers and independent trade-union leaders. Whatever the struggle's outcome, one thing is certain: Mullahs will never regain their position of moral authority in Iranian politics.

Another difference is that the ruling elite in 1979 had little stomach for a fight. Many of its members had homes and investments abroad and thus could just pack and leave -- they weren't forced to fight with their backs to the wall.

But the overwhelming majority of today's ruling elite has no fallback position. If driven from power, "Supreme Guide" Ali Khamenei or Ahmadinejad would have nowhere to go. They have no choice but to fight to the bitter end. This time, it is in the opposition camp that one finds most of those who can pack and go to golden exile abroad.

Maybe there'll be some teaching posts available at Berkeley.

It's curious, but has anyone noticed the American left, still seething over the Florida recount nine years ago, has been virtually silent over an actual stolen election?

Funny how that is. They're outraged daily over some innocuous Rush Limbaugh comment taken out of context, yet can't summon the energy to decry a murder in broad daylight in front of the entire world.

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Obama Shows His Concern For Iranian Protesters

Maybe he'd care if they called themselves community organizers.

Via IBD.

'There's No Thought to Rescinding the Invitations to Iranian Diplomats'

Should be an interesting Fourth of July. The Norks will be lobbing a missile at Obama's home state of Hawaii while at the same time some morons from the State Depeartment will be breaking bread with Iranian diplomats.

What the hell is going on here?

The United States said Monday its invitations were still standing for Iranian diplomats to attend July 4 celebrations at US embassies despite the crackdown on opposition supporters.

President Barack Obama's administration said earlier this month it would invite Iran to US embassy barbecues for the national holiday for the first time since the two nations severed relations following the 1979 Islamic revolution.

"There's no thought to rescinding the invitations to Iranian diplomats," State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters.

Not even a second guess. There's no thought, while Iranians are murdered on the streets, to even considering postponing this idiocy.

"We have made a strategic decision to engage on a number of fronts with Iran," Kelly said. "We tried many years of isolation, and we're pursuing a different path now."

But he said it was not clear if Iranian diplomats had accepted the invitations.

The State Department has said that the invitations are largely a symbolic gesture of goodwill and that the July 4 barbecues were not intended to take up substantive policy matters.

If we had a real president, he'd probably tell the Iranians to go shove a hot dog you know where. But no, we must have dialogue with these monsters.

OK, Please Go Away Now

The things that wouldn't leave are inched ever closer to the door.

The U.S. Supreme Court will not revive a lawsuit that former CIA operative Valerie Plame brought against former members of the Bush administration.

The court on Monday refused to hear an appeal from Plame and her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson.

A lower court last year threw out the lawsuit in which Plame and Wilson accused former Vice President Dick Cheney and several former high-ranking administration officials of disclosing her identity to reporters in 2003. Plame and Wilson said that violated their constitutional rights.

Of course these two never quite will go away. Even worse, the loathsome Sean Penn will soon be playing that hack Wilson in an upcoming movie, sure to receive critical acclaim and few box-office receipts.

ESPN: All Obama, All the Time

You can't even tune in to a sports network to avoid the ubiquitous presence of Barack Obama. For several months now ESPN has been gushing over Obama making NCAA picks and more recently relentlessly "reported" that Obama liked the Lakers in six over the Magic. Funny, but I missed the update on that after LA won in five.

Anyway, with Iran in turmoil and the North Koreans threatening to light up his home state for the Fourth of July, ESPN today announced Obama's sports viewing for next June.

U.S. President Barack Obama has accepted an invitation to attend the opening ceremony of the World Cup finals in South Africa next year, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said on Monday.

President Obama, whose late father was Kenyan, has indicated he will attend the event on June 11 next year when the first World Cup to be staged on African soil begins.

Blatter told a media briefing: "The World Cup in Africa will go well, there is no doubt.

Of course ESPN is owned by ABC, which is now owned by the White House, so I guess if you like tuning in there but can't stand Obama, it might be time to find alternate viewing.

The way things are going, a year from now it'll probably be a good idea if Obama leaves the country.

'We Cannot Accept To Have In Our Country Women Who Are Prisoners Behind Netting'

Oh my. Nicolas Sarkozy better watch out or someone will call him a right-wing extremist.

In comments which will reignite the debate about religious clothing in the country, he said the full-body garment was "not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience".

Mr Sarkozy used the first presidential address to a joint session of France's two houses of parliament in 136 years to declare his support for a ban, even before hearing from a parliamentary commission set up to study the issue.

"We cannot accept to have in our country women who are prisoners behind netting, cut off from all social life, deprived of identity," Mr Sarkozy told the special session in Versailles.

"That is not the idea that the French republic has of women's dignity.

"The burka is not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience. It will not be welcome on the territory of the French republic," the French president said.

A group of 58 MPs from the Left and Right has called on Parliament to take action against women adopting what they called oppressive head-to-toe Islamic dress that "breaches individual freedoms".

André Gerin, a Communist MP, led the motion for the latest inquiry, calling the burqa and niqab "a moving prison" for women.

Women's rights campaigners, including some Islamic groups, have backed the calls for measures to curb the small but growing trend of wearing burqas among France's five million Muslims.

Fadela Amara, a rights campaigner of Algerian background, who is the Housing Minister, said that was alarmed by the number of women "who are being put in this kind of tomb".

She added: "We must do everything to stop burqas from spreading."

Naturally, the Ice Cream Man has no problem with these moving prisons.

President Barack Obama attacked European laws on religious clothing in a speech in Cairo last week in which he said that the United States prized freedom of religion and would not "tell people what to wear".

Mr Sarkozy responded by telling Mr Obama in Normandy earlier this month that French principles of equality meant that people should not display religious affiliation in state institutions.

I never thought I'd see the day when I had more respect for the president of France than I do for the President of the United States.

Geez, even a Communist MP is on the right side of the issue. Yet Obama, who wants to dictate every aspect of our lives, has no problem apparently with women being kept subservient.

They've Taken My Kodachrome Away

Honestly, I didn't think they were even making Kodachrome any longer. Whatever the case, expect to hear the song a few times today.

Sorry, Paul Simon, Kodak is taking your Kodachrome away. The Eastman Kodak Co. announced Monday it's retiring its most senior film because of declining customer demand in an increasingly digital age.

The world's first commercially successful color film, immortalized in song by Simon, spent 74 years in Kodak's portfolio. It enjoyed its heyday in the 1950s and '60s but in recent years has nudged closer to obscurity: Sales of Kodachrome are now just a fraction of 1 percent of the company's total sales of still-picture films, and only one commercial lab in the world still processes it.

Those numbers and the unique materials needed to make it convinced Kodak to call its most recent manufacturing run the last, said Mary Jane Hellyar, the outgoing president of Kodak's Film, Photofinishing and Entertainment Group.

"Kodachrome is particularly difficult (to retire) because it really has become kind of an icon," Hellyar said.

Simon crooned about it in 1973 in the aptly titled "Kodachrome."

"They give us those nice bright colors. They give us the greens of summers. Makes you think all the world's a sunny day," he sang. "... So Mama don't take my Kodachrome away."

Police State of New York

The accidental governor is talking tough. I doubt many are listening. Though considering what's going on in the world, the threat of using state police to force politicians to go to work seems awfully ironic.

Governor David Paterson says enough is enough. Fed up with the fighting in Albany, the governor is ordering Senators back into the state house – and he plans to keep them there until the squabbling stops.

"Over the last couple of weeks, the senators' conduct has been laughable – but what's going on around here is no joke, and I don't find it funny!" Paterson said.

Saying he's not amused Sunday, a stern Gov. Paterson ordered a special state Senate session for Tuesday.

"To the senators, I tell you: you have inconvenienced the lives of all New Yorkers for a couple of weeks, and now you will come back to work and do the people's business," he said.

The governor warned Senators, who have refused to pass bills since the coup in Albany, that they'd better show up or else.

"If the Senators do not cooperate with this order, I will convene a special session everyday until they do," Paterson said. "That includes Saturdays and Sundays, that includes Fourth of July. There will be no excuses, and there will be no tolerance to non-compliance to this order."

While the governor can't force senators to vote on or debate bills, the state constitution grants him the power to call a special legislative session – and experts say he can even keep the senators in the state house with the help of state police.

"I think, at the extreme, he does have the power to call them in, and use the power of the police to bring them in, to get them all in the same room," state constitution expert Richard Briffault says.

Maybe they can vote to impeach this clown when they show up.

Is ACORN Working In Iran?

How else can you explain having more votes than eligible voters in 50 cities? Do they do it Chicago-style there, where the dead are still voting?

In 50 Iranian cities the number of votes cast in this month presidential election exceeded the number of eligible voters, the state's election watchdog admitted today.

The surprising admission by the Guardian Council was, however, designed to undermine the claims of the defeated candidates that the vote was rigged.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's main rival in the hotly-disputed election, and the other two losing candidates have claimed that the vote exceeded eligible voters in as many as 170 districts.

Abbasali Kadkhodai, a spokesman for the council of senior clerics, told the state television channel IRIB: "Our investigation shows that the number of districts they announced is not correct. Based on our preliminary report, 50 districts face this issue."

Mr Kadkhodaei also argued that voter turnouts of more than 100 per cent were not unusual because Iranians can cast their ballots where they want. Although it is summer in Iran and some of the cities in question are in desert areas, he suggested some voters might have gone to them on holiday.

Sure. Now maybe the Obamas of the world would buy this tripe, but I suspect the Iranian citizens won't.

Meanwhile, more confrontations are coming.

Iran's Revolutionary Guard is threatening to crush any further opposition protests over the disputed presidential election and warns demonstrators to prepare for a "revolutionary confrontation" if they take to the streets again.

The country's most powerful military force ordered demonstrators to "end the sabotage and rioting activities" and said their resistance is a "conspiracy" against Iran.

A statement posted Monday on the Guard's Web site warned protesters to "be prepared for a resolution and revolutionary confrontation with the Guards, Basij and other security forces and disciplinary forces."

In case nobody noticed, our Dear Leader showed so much concern over the weekend that he managed to go for ice cream and then went golfing.

Seems to me he's going to have to find something new to do today.

Another burger run, perhaps?

Update: Don Surber also wonders about Chicago-style voting.

Rangel 'Niece' Springs Thugs

Seems the rotten apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

A Port Authority police lieutenant who officials believe is the niece of Rep. Charles Rangel helped spring a trio of suspected pot smugglers from jail -- just a month after trying to get a mentally ill, gun-toting Navy castoff on a flight out of JFK, The Post has learned.

The Internal Affairs unit has now opened a second probe into Lt. Coretta Smith, a 15-year veteran who sources said came to the rescue of the suspects. They had been pulled over on the George Washington Bridge with stacks of cash in a car wreaking [sic] of marijuana.

Wreaking of marijuana? OK, we'll overlook that egregious misspelling. Now as to whether this Smith is related to Rangel should be ascertained definitively before they run with this story, but we'll see how things progress.

Whatever the case, it seems Smith should not be wearing a uniform if these allegations are true.

Smith has so far been spared serious charges from the airport shenanigans. Insiders believe she is getting lenient treatment because of her high-powered uncle, who has great influence over federal grants to the agency as dean of the New York congressional delegation, the sources said.

Rangel did not return calls.

Smith stepped back into hot water Monday, when PA cops stopped a 2003 Buick on the New Jersey side of the bridge after they suspected its driver was intoxicated.

"I smoked a joint," the driver, Robert Timmons, 27, allegedly admitted to PA Police Officer Leonel Gonzalez.

A police dog smelled pot in a woman's purse. It contained several bundles of cash with "a strong odor of marijuana all over the money," according to a police report, and there was also pot residue in the car.

The officers took Timmons, of Paterson, NJ, and his passengers, Tyre Gyasi, 19, also of Paterson, and a girl, 17, into custody.

Smith, who had been assigned to a Port Authority station house in New Jersey that evening, got involved.

For reasons that remain unclear, she refused the request by Gonzalez, the arresting officer, to alert the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office.

"That's not your call. It's the lieutenant's job, and I am not doing that," Smith said, according to sources.

She also refused to authorize a criminal history check of the trio, sources said.

"They could have given the names Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Minnie Mouse, and they would have been let go," said one law-enforcement source.

Read the rest.

It will be interesting to see what super crimefighter Mike Bloomberg has to say about this case.

Aww, Poor Chris Dodd Is Offended

No discounts for snakes

You would think a guy up to his eyebrows in ethical problems would know better than to whine about alleged unfair treatment. Then again, we're talking about Chris Dodd, the man who keeps snakes supplied in oil. Knowing Dodd, it's a good bet the snakes pay above-market rate.

Sen. Chris Dodd, the dubious Democrat from the Nutmeg State, told a recent interviewer that it was "offensive" that the media would suggest that his wife, Jackie Clegg Dodd, has potential conflicts of interest because she sits on the boards of four pharmaceutical firms.

With Sen. Ted Kennedy ailing, Dodd is the Democratic point man for upcoming health-care legislation.

Of course, this is the 21st century. Spouses of powerful pols have their own -- often quite successful -- careers.

Of course, everybody knows that Mrs. Dodd received no special consideration because of her powerful spouse -- because Sen. Dodd says so.

That's the same Chris Dodd who "just happened" to get sweetheart mortgage loans as a "Friend of [Countrywide Financial founder] Angelo [Mozilo]" -- a relationship that is the subject of a Senate Ethics Committee probe.

That's the same Dodd who "just happened" to buy out a friend's share of an Irish cottage -- for well below what should have been the appraised value.

Only after a public-interest group raised questions did the Dodds finally have the cottage re-appraised -- whereupon the property's value jumped to $660,000, from between $100,001 and $250,000 just last year.

How about that: In the midst of a worldwide recession, his vacation home doubles in value in just one year -- as property values across Ireland plunged 40 percent.

If it weren't for that protective shell of having the (D) after his name, Dodd not only would have been booted from office long ago, it's a good possibility he'd be cooling his heels in a federal penitentiary.

Instead, he'll be the point man on a potential multi-trillion dollar boondoggle we'll all be saddled with in the name of change.

Not a comforting thought.

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Profile In . . . .

A Leader Buffoon We Can Believe In

[....]

But in an interview released Sunday, Obama argued: "The last thing that I want to do is to have the United States be a foil for those forces inside Iran who would love nothing better than to make this an argument about the United States. We shouldn't be playing into that."

The president spoke Friday during an interview with CBS News' Harry Smith. It will be broadcast Monday on "The Early Show."

He told Pakistan's Dawn newspaper, in an interview published Sunday, that the United States has no way of knowing whether the disputed Iranian election 10 days ago was fair or not. Iranians should be able to peacefully protest the results in any case, Obama said.

That interview was also done last week. Obama said nothing about the crisis in public on Sunday, although a spokesman said he discussed Iran with foreign policy advisers in the Oval Office for more than 30 minutes. He later went golfing in Virginia.

[....]

Amazing.

Daily, for the past week, Iranian patriots - including many women - looked Evil in the eye and chose to confront it. This asshole issues written statements with little or no meaning. At least he had - allegedly - a discussion with his advisers for more than 30 minutes Sunday morning.

Before he went to spend the rest of the day playing cow pasture pool.

It doesn't take much of an imagination to guess what the Empty Suit-in Chief would do when Putin's goons roll again into Georgia, or gets adventurous and has them go on R&R in either Latvia, Estonia, Finland or Ukraine.

Shame, shame, shame.

Excerpted from The AP

Murder in the Streets of Tehran

Just disgusting.

A disturbing video of a young woman purportedly shot to death on the streets of Tehran during post-election protests is becoming a touchstone for the opposition.

The horrific footage, posted on YouTube, shows the victim who was watching the protests with her father, collapsing after what sounds like a spray of gunfire is heard in the background.

The gunman, who was "hiding on the rooftop of a civilian house, aimed straight [at] her heart," said the video's poster, a doctor who made a desperate bid to help.

"I am a doctor, so I rushed to try to save her," he said of the victim, known on the internet as "Neda," which means "voice" in Farsi.

Barack Obama was so disturbed he took an extra 30 seconds to decide which flavor of ice cream he wanted.

Perhaps he can rub it in a bit more today by hitting the golf course.

More here.

Sky News foreign affairs correspondent Lisa Holland said: "In movements for change there are usually defining momements, and in Iran this may well be one of them.

"There is a palpable sense that after this there is no going back - that the course to take on the theocracy of Iran has been set."

Obama Approval Hits New Low

The imperial president's honeymoon is over. Just imagine what his approval numbers would look like if 99% of the media weren't in his back pocket.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows that 32% of the nation's voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-four percent (34%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -2. That’s the President’s lowest rating to date and the first time the Presidential Approval Index has fallen below zero for Obama (see trends).

Sixty percent (60%) of Democrats Strongly Approve of the President’s performance but only 8% of Republicans share that view. Sixty-one percent (61%) of Republicans Strongly Disapprove.

Check out our weekly review of key polls to see “What They Told Us.”

The Presidential Approval Index is calculated by subtracting the number who Strongly Disapprove from the number who Strongly Approve.

H/T realwest.

Sign of the Times: Women Helping Lead Iranian Revolution

It's images like this seen around the world this past week that reflect the face of the opposition in Iran: Young women unafraid to appear publicly to denounce the stolen election.

To the iconography of revolution -- the man in front of the tank in Tiananmen Square, young people ripping shards off the Berlin Wall -- we can now add this: the red nail polish, black eyeliner and side-swept bangs of young Iranian women.

So conservative by American standards, yet revolutionary by Iranian ones: these women, who by law can do and say and expose and adorn almost nothing, are agitating for the most basic human rights in the smallest of ways. And it is these tiny acts of rebellion that the Iranian government, which has further constricted the rights of women since the election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005, cannot abide.

"I do not know a single woman who is pro these laws," says a 29-year-old Iranian woman, who has lived in the US for the past 11 years. "They are not as bad as the Taliban, but it's all relative."

The women of Iran are on the verge. They are more literate and highly educated than men (63% attend university), and, as in the US, women comprise 50% of the vote. Ahmedinejad's challengers -- even Karroubi, the cleric! -- made a point of soliciting the female vote, appearing in public with their wives, or speaking to the need for more women in parliament or positions of power. Mousavi, the so-called reform candidate, shrewdly deployed his wife, political science professor Zahra Rahnavard, as a vocal campaigner. Her electrifying effect on the electorate led to comparisons to Michelle Obama.

"I really like her," says the Iranian ex-pat. "She could be very influential and help change the suppression of women. She's educated and very open-minded. A lot of people follow her."

Well, that appreciation is likely soon to wear off as Mrs. Obama is even more silent than her feckless husband.

Still, say a prayer and keep these young ladies in mind. They show far more courage than any meal-mouthed politicians who are too busy hiding under their desks while making the really tough choices.

Meanwhile, while state TV says 10 people have been killed in clashes, an Iranian-American woman this morning on Fox said she's been told as many as 200 have been killed in Tehran alone.

More on what to expect in the coming weeks from Amir Taheri.

Surprise! Anti-Israel Sentiment Surging

Count supporters of Israel among those who've been sold out by Barack Obama. Of course with one community giving the man 80% of their vote, they probably shouldn't be surprised they're taken for granted.

For all the qualms that anti-Obama "smears" would depress support in the Jewish community, Jews rewarded Obama with nearly 80% of their votes, more than they gave John Kerry.

Just six months into the new administration, however, it is becoming increasingly clear that those who harbored suspicions about Obama's approach to the Middle East had good reason to be worried. A confluence of factors -- including his administration's undue pressure on Israel, a conciliatory approach to authoritarian Muslim regimes, and the baseless linkage of the failed "peace process" to the curtailment of the Iranian nuclear program -- point to what could become "the greatest disagreement between the two countries in the history of their relationship," as Middle East expert Robert Satloff recently told Newsweek.

This dramatic shift in American policy began several months ago when the administration signaled that it would make the cessation of Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank the centerpiece of its policy to revamp the region. And that approach, mostly hinted at through anonymous leaks, became as good as official when Obama delivered his vaunted address to the Muslim world in Cairo earlier this month. In that speech, Israel (and, specifically, its policy of settlement construction) was the only state to merit specific criticism from the president of the United States. Among all the degradations and injustices in the Middle East, from the abhorrent treatment of women in nations like Saudi Arabia, to Syrian-backed assassinations of pro-sovereignty politicians in Lebanon, to the arrest and imprisonment of gay men in Egypt, the leader of the free world singled out America's one, reliable democratic ally in the region for rebuke.

Considering Obama spent 20 years listening to the unhinged anti-Semite Jeremiah Wright and that crackpot Father Pfleger, is it any surprise he sold out the Israelis?

Of course people tried to send out the warning during the election cycle, but if you dared to point out Obama's history, they complained of smears, which not means telling the truth.

Now, not even six months into his presidency, all the bigots are free to come out of the closet.

Unfortunately, the President seems to be paying no domestic political price for turning on Israel. Given the historic support that the American public has shown for the Jewish State, this is in and of itself a disturbing sign. But when an American administration's rhetoric and diplomacy render Israel the obstinate actor and portray its supposed recalcitrance as the main obstacle to peace, public opinion will follow.

The percentage of American voters who call themselves supporters of Israel has plummeted from 69% last September to 49% this month, according to the Israel Project. Meanwhile, only 6% of Jewish Israelis consider Obama to be "pro-Israel," a Jerusalem Post poll found, pointing to a disturbing gulf between the two nations. There are even signs of rising anti-Semitism, as a survey by Columbia and Stanford professors found that 32% of Democrats blamed Jews for the financial crisis.

Obama is turning America against Israel, for what exactly? The false hopes of improved relations with Arab nations and a nuclear-equipped Iran. That is not what he promised in his campaign, and neither a fair practice or a fair trade.

'I Only Wish She Hadn't Used the Clonidine On Me'

It's not often you read about female serial rapists.

A YOUNG Russian woman, a devoted collector of horror films and spiders, is on trial for sedating and raping 10 men.

The police were shocked that 32-year-old Valeria K., a quiet good-looking woman from the city of Tambov, was the mysterious rapist who abused 10 local men after poisoning them with clonidine, Life.ru reports.

Valeria, who has already been nicknamed the Black Widow for her love of spiders, would get acquainted with men and invite them to her place.

She gave them drinks with clonidine, which almost immediately sent them to sleep for almost 24 hours.

After that, she undressed her victims and raped them, tightening a rope on their male organs to keep them erect.

Waking up in hospital with clonidine poisoning and penis trauma, all the victims could remember was a friendly brunette who gave them drinks.

Not all of her victims her victims were left traumatized.

At present, the police know about ten of Valeria’s victims, although one of them refused to file a complaint against her.

“It was great,” the unnamed man said.

“I like hot women. I only wish she hadn't use the clonidine on me.”

Club Gitmo Grad Behind Yemen Slaughter?

A little something for Barack Obama to think about as he rushes to close down Guantanamo Bay. Obviously facts can be stubborn at times.

The fate of three of nine foreigners abducted in Yemen last week is known — their bodies were found, shot execution style. The whereabouts of the other six — including three children under the age of 6 — remain a mystery.

But terrorism experts say their abductors and killers are almost certainly not a mystery. They say the crimes bear the mark of Al Qaeda, and they fear they are the handiwork of the international terror organization's No. 2 man in the Arabian Peninsula: Said Ali al-Shihri, an Islamic extremist who once was in American custody — but who was released from the U.S. detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

And if al-Shihri is behind the gruesome murders and abductions, they say, it raises grave concerns that the scheduled January 2010 closing of the Guantanamo prison and the release of most of its prisoners to foreign countries will galvanize Al Qaeda and compromise American national security.

The nine foreigners — four German adults, three small German children, a British man and a South Korean woman — were abducted on June 12 after they ventured outside the city of Saada without their required police escorts, according to a spokesman from the Yemeni Embassy in Washington. Days later the bodies of Rita Stumpp and Anita Gruenwald, German nurses in training, and Eom Young-sun of South Korea were found shot execution style in the Noshour Valley in the province of Saada, an area known to be a hotbed of Al Qaeda activity.

Stumpp and Gruenwald attended a Bible school, and Young attended a Christian missionary school in South Korea. Other members of the group had ties to missionary organizations, and all six adults worked for World Wide Services Foundation, a Dutch international medical relief group.

No one has claimed responsibility for the abductions and murders, but experts say killing women and children is considered off-limits among many jihadist groups — though not to al-Shihri, a Saudi national who was released from Guantanamo in November 2007 and sent to a Saudi Arabian "rehabilitation" program for jihadists. It wasn't long before a "cured" al-Shihri was released from the program, crossed into Yemen and rejoined Al Qaeda, with whom he quickly rose to deputy commander.

I see that Saudi rehab is really paying dividends.

Previously.