Archive - 2008 - Article

Five days in Tehran

Tehran is a very large and beautifully picturesque city with many hidden worlds within worlds to discover, which runs downhill from the foothills of the Alborz Mountains in the north all the way down to the edges of the Dasht Kavir desert in the south. Never far from the skyline is the immense Mount Damavand whose snow capped peak can often be seen rising above the clouds like the Mount Fuji of Iran. Since the revolution, 30,000 trees have been planted in Tehran and it is one of the greenest cities you will ever see anywhere on the planet. The traffic is jammed like L.A. or NYC but there is a subway system which is clean and efficient and like NYC or Paris, the city never sleeps>>>

Russia Strikes Back

After a long time being used as a leverage to extract greater concessions from Russia, finally on August 14, 2008 with great fanfare and at a much higher price, Poland conceded to letting the U.S. use part of its territory for establishing a sizeable military base in northern Poland run by American military personnel and armed with 10 U.S. global interceptor rockets. Among the most crucial factors that spurned the binding of the agreement at this moment in time were the extremely tense relations between Russia and the U.S. over the crisis in Georgia, which in turn motivated Washington to upgrade the terms of the deal with Poland. Apparently the White House was in such a hurry in the early days of the Georgian crisis to wrest the Polish accord that it was ready to pay practically any price to entice the pro-imperialist Polish ruling elite>>>

لطیفه ای که دیگر ما را نمی خنداند

در گویا نیوز خبری دیدم مبنی بر بهایی بودن هادی خرسندی، کلیک کردم و سر از اصغرآقا در آوردم. رفتن به اصغرآقا آسان است ولی بیرون آمدن از سایت خرسندی، که همواره با خرسندی همراه است، مکافات دارد. سخت است از آن همه مطالب دلچسب و طبع روان و قلم شیرین و بانمک دل بکنی! به هر حال، شایعه برای ایرانی جماعت صنار خرج برنمی دارد. هر کسی بنابه نحوه ی تفکر خود، به دیگری تهمت می زند و در سایت اینترنتی و یا در روزنامه و یا مجله ای منتشر می کند و قانون هم در آن کشور گل و بلبل، فقط جیب وکلا را پر می کند و لطیفه ایست که دیگر ما را نمی خنداند.>>>

Repercussions far and wide

As Israel contemplates military action to halt Iran's nuclear ambitions, it is essential to take a closer look at Iran's most powerful man - Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - and his views toward the Jewish state. A clearer understanding of the precise challenge Iran poses should disabuse Israeli leaders of the idea that force is the best way to neutralize it. Although Khamenei was an underwhelming compromise choice to be succeed Ayatollah Khomeini when he died in 1989, a confluence of factors has made him more confident and powerful now than ever. Externally, these include soaring oil prices, together with Iranian leverage in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine>>>

Who Killed the Sport of Wrestling?

You might've seen or heard of Ara Abrahamian, the Armenian born Swedish wrestler who dropped his bronze medal on the mat to protest judging at Olympics wrestling. Most people in the media blamed him for poor sportsmanship. IOC officials took away his medal. What you may not know is that, without a doubt, Abrahamian lost his chance at gold only because of bad calls. Noone disputes that. He had also previously lost the world championship because of bad calls. Can you see why an athlete may feel it is worthless to train and try in this sport? If you watched ANY of the wrestling matches at the Olympics this year, you saw a strange sport that nobody understands>>>

Pulled out of fire

One of my architecture professors a the University of Houston is leaving the school and I went by today to pick up a notebook of mine that she had kept. I hadn’t been back in the building for a couple of years - the smell was still there. It’s not a bad smell, it’s not a pleasant smell, it’s just its own smell. Maybe it’s the years of chipboard shavings, or the sawdust of bass wood or the mold spewing from the AC grilles that we affectionately called “vent vomit” - whatever it is, you can’t miss it. It was there the day I went for orientation in the Fall of 2002 - making a u-turn of sorts and going back to school, I found myself in an unfamiliar yet familiar place>>>

46 Signs

If you think that the US economy is not in recession, you are correct. The official definition of recession is at least two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth. However, after nearly eight years of resilient downturn, U. S. economy has not experienced any single quarter of negative growth yet. Consequently, the U. S. economy is not officially in recession. But who cares about government definition. Most of us have been feeling the pinch of economic slump in recent years. The late president Aegean once said “A recession is when your neighbor loses his job; a depression is when you lose yours.”>>>

ناصر زرافشان و انتخابات کانون نویسندگان

مقاله‌ی‌ من در باره انتخابات اخیر کانون نویسندگان، تحت عنوان «سانسور زنان در انتخابات کانون نویسندگان» که در تاریخ ۲۲ تیر ماه ۸۷ منتشر شد ، اظهار نظری بود از سر احساس مسئولیت و ادای دینی نسبت به زنان میهنمان که روزهای سختی را در مبارزه برای کسب حقوق انسانی خود پشت سر می‌گذارند . آن مقاله با واکنش‌هایی، بویژه از سوی تنی چند از منتخبین انتخابات اخیر کانون نویسندگان روبرو شد. پاسخ سه‌گانه‌ «زهرا قلهکی»، آقای ناصر زرافشان و خانم فرخنده حاجی زاده با شکل و محتوای تقریباً یکسان به مقاله من به روشنی اهمیت موضوعی را که روی آن دست گذاشتم می‌رساند. متأسفانه بنا به دلایلی قابل فهم ، نامبردگان کوشیده اند با طرح اتهاماتی واهی، تحریف مقاله و بل گرفتن از اشتباهی که در ذکر نام دو نفر کرده‌ بودم، توجه افکار عمومی را از مسیر اصلی مقاله منحرف کرده و بر اساس داده های جدید ، نتایج دلخواه خویش و صد البته عجیب و غریبی بگیرند. در نوشته حاضر به این موضوع می‌پردازم. >>>

Bidding for Biden

By the time you read this article, you might have already heard who the actual VP is on the Senator Obama’s ticket. And I'll bet a dollar to a doughnut tonight that there is a good chance that my phone will ring early morning on Wednesday, like two million other phones to say that Joe Biden is the presumptive Democratic nominee for the Vice Presidency of the United States of America. As an American with Iranian ethnicity, who like many others has followed the US’s foreign policy toward Iran in the past decades I can say Joe is the best choice. This judgment is not only based on the fact that Senator Biden has foreign policy experience as the chair of the Senate’s Foreign Affairs Committee, but also because of his unmatched actions and interest in opening up with Iran>>>

Vahid’s Story

I pour two cups of tea, and bring out the cookies my sister brought me from Iran. My friend is not himself today. He moves too fast and talks even faster. It’s as though his mind is on fire. He rattles off thoughts and sentiments and questions, barely waiting for me to get a word in edgewise. He says: "You know, everything in this world is upside down and out of order! I love someone and she doesn't care for me. Why can't it be that I love someone who loves me, too? I'm so sick of feeling rejected all the time. I know she doesn't want to be with me, that she doesn't care for me, but I keep pushing forward, trying harder and harder, and feeling more and more unwanted every time>>>

Sharing the pain

No matter the questions of the puzzled observer and the clever expert, there are never any proper answers. Forget the possibility of even half-baked ones. The mind of the suicide bomber already blessed for her spiritual martyrdom, is unworkable for a psychological penetration, mute to ramblings and secretive to disclosures. The intimidating icy personality disguised behind its feminine veil, shuns any attempt at recalling the basic laws of compassion and the resurrection bearing any normal perspective of humanity that would have long faded away, by the time the hour of the ghastly act dawns>>>

خودمان را گول نزنیم

شواهد موید این نکته است که صدای آمریکا اصولا برای حرفه ای کار کردن خلق نشده است. منظور دولت آمریکا از راه اندازی این رادیو بیش از آنکه خدمت به فرهنگ رسانه ای و خلق یک کار با کیفیت باشد، استفاده از آن به عنوان یک ابزار پروپگاند بوده و هست. بنابراین اینکه صدای آمریکا نه تنها در فضای رسانه ای فارسی بلکه اصولا در دنیا نتوانسته است اعتبار رسانه ای کسب کند بیش از آنکه از ضعف این رسانه باشد از ماهیت متفاوت این رسانه ناشی می شود. از این نظر می توان صدای آمریکا را با رادیو بی بی سی زمان جنگ جهانی دوم مقایسه کرد...رادیو اروپای آزاد نیز یک رادیو حرفه ای نبوده و نیست. از همین رو نیز باید بین رسانه هایی که صرفا کاربرد تبلیغاتی دارند با رسانه های خبری حرفه ای مرزبندی قائل شد>>>

Diaries & Jallad

Where were you on Aug 19, 1953?

On the occasion of 28 Mordad (Aug 19, 1953), I thought that by translating and summarizing parts of these recollections, some of which are quite fascinating and moving, we might see the past from different perspectives. In many ways, while Iran is being targeted on all fronts, whether right or wrong, the events of Aug 1953 are still with us in the most haunting way. Writers, scholars and people in general, Iranians and Americans alike, continue to be mesmerized with what really took place on those days when a nation’s destiny was changed overnight, trying to analyze these events and to find answers to the many questions they raise. Above all, more than that of any other Iranian political figure of modern times, Mossadegh’s legacy lives on>>>

The Iranian jigsaw puzzle

Although all serious analysts agree that there are a variety of possible options to deal with Iran, they usually accord the primacy of some type of alternative over the others, treating the rest as background. Logically, we need a policy that brings together options that by themselves are insufficient conditions. That is, “X,” “Y,” and “Z” may be necessary conditions but will not be sufficient condition unless they occur simultaneously or in a particular sequence. In dealing with Iran, three options appear to be necessary and sufficient: (1) economic cooperation; (2) diplomacy; and (3) security. The United States must be prepared to take the lead and synthesizes these three options into a smart diplomacy>>>