Iran Dusts Off Vintage Agitprop

CNN carries the latest complaints from Iran: Foreign media supporting ‘hooligans’

TEHRAN, Iran (CNN) — Iran on Wednesday accused international journalists in the country of being the “mouthpiece” of “hooligans” who have created unrest at post-election rallies in Tehran.

“Hundreds” of international reporters were allowed into Iran to cover last week’s election as “a sign of the total transparency in the trends of the elections and the effective performance of the system of religious democracy,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

“But certain countries have rushed to judgment and have supported the illegal gatherings and the disturbances that a number of opportunists had created,” the ministry said.

“They have turned themselves into the mouthpiece for these hooligans, and have damaged and targeted the radiant face of the Islamic republic.”

This is what happens when their fearless leader hangs around with KGB officers. “Hooligans”?

As usual they decide to attack the “Great Satan”: Iran blames U.S. for bitter post-election dispute. I understand that the State Department did ask Twitter if they would consider rescheduling some routine maintenance on their system to avoid shutting down during the current troubles.

Twitter decided that, despite the “hardship” of seeing their hits going through the troposphere and getting gazillions in free advertising on the worldwide media, they would reschedule. I know that was a “heart-wrenching decision”, especially for accounts receivable watching the ad meters zooming off the scale.

This has probably done the company more good than their “Twits Tweet Tour” featuring Republicans politicians displaying their lack of a clue.

On a technical note, CNN had this article: Briton’s software a surprise weapon in Iran cyberwar.

While I appreciate the guy’s attitude, DDOS attacks are wrong. They interfere with free speech. You don’t really support free speech unless you are willing to give it to people you don’t agree with, or even have good reason to hate. DDOS attacks are what repressive regimes do, not what people who believe in democracy and human rights do.

These attacks also reduce the bandwidth available for reporting what is going on inside Iran, so they injure both sides. When something like these protests happen, we need all of the bandwidth we can get.