Some of you may have heard by now that Iranian musical star Andranik Madadian and rocker Jon Bon Jovi were planning a musical team-up/shout-out to the people of Iran and the people of the world.

Andrew Sullivan has it. It won't be on iTunes or for sale anywhere else. It's a cover of the rock classic "Stand By Me," for the people of Iran and the people of the world. Savor.

from the Iranian blogsite "Where Is My Vote?": A witness to Neda Agha-Soltan's death who has spoken about it is being prosecuted. edited to add: please keep in mind that blogs, ljs, and tweets should all be taken with a grain of salt, since they are generated by folks like you and me. Though, of course, I've never been wrong. /sarcasm & edit

Here's ABC's news correspondent Jim Sciutto's twitter gleanings from Iran. The prisons are full, so they're using football stadiums.

And Sullivan reports that no one should believe the televised confessions of Mousavi supporters. He gets in a double swipe by reminding us that Dick Chaney & Co. also used "intensive interrogation."

Remember Princess Leia? "The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."

eta:

National Iranian American Council has this very interesting report:

11:51 am: Conservative cleric turns on Khamenei – Haddi Ghaffari, a former minister under Ayatollah Khomeni, gave a speech Monday directly addressing the Supreme Leader and criticizing him for his behavior since the election and for his support of Ahmadinejad. Ghaffari played a major role in the creation of Hezbollah — he is no reformist by any stretch of the imagination — and his frontal assault on Khamenei would have been extremely taboo prior to the election.
“Khamenei, your recent actions and behavior has brought shame to us clerics. Our image in the streets and bazaars has been tarnished as everyone is placing us in the same category as Ahmadinejad.”
“Khamenei, you are wrong, your actions are wrong. I believe in the velayat e fagih [the governance of the Islamic jurist, the Supreme Leader or the Faghih] more than you.”
“I’m not preaching these messages so that I could be associated with the West. I loathe the West and will fight to the last drop of my blood before I or my land succumbs to the West. On the contrary, I’m preaching these messages on the count that the respect for our profession is gone.”
“Young people are not praying anymore, whose fault is that? It is your fault Mr. Khamenei, it’s your fault for placing us in the same line as that lunatic Ahmadinejad.”
“Ahmadinejad is nobody, you should congregate with us instead of him.”

Can it be all is not well?

If this tweet, put up on Andrew Sullivan's blog is right--and we have to remember to take Twitter info with a grain of salt--Mousavi is going to be shut out not just of this election, but all future elections, by Iran's ruling council of clerics.

Thanks, all: my friend Jules called me to tell me the tweeter called Persiankiwi has been seen. BIG sigh of relief. It's bad enough, the images, and the reports, but to get attached to one particular someone and have them vanish into thin air . . . That's bad. And I'm just a shallow American, not a Persian family waiting for a son, a mother, a father, a daughter, a grandfather, an aunt, to come home.

The election has been declared again for Ahmadinejad

but

and there is a but

According to Enduring America:

Instead, part of that space was filled with the clearest demonstration (yes, “clear”, despite the hyper-caution of Al Jazeera and BBC English) that protest continues. The hundreds of arrests, media shutdown, and threat of violence could not stop thousands from gathering in front of Qoba (Ghobar) mosque in Tehran for a memorial rally. It is uncertain how many thousands showed up, filling the mosque, the square outside, and possibly surrounding roads, but a glimpse of the short video that made it out of Iran (see our Latest Video section) leaves no doubt that this wasn’t a rogue gathering of “hundreds” of dissidents.

And part of the space was filled with the refusal and even defiance of some within the Iranian establishment. Mehdi Karroubi made a wildly-acclaimed appearance at Qoba (see Latest Video). Hashemi Rafsanjani’s daughter Faezeh was there, and reports indicate that Mir Hossein Mousavi spoke to the gathering via mobile phone and loudspeaker (there was a claim, probably a bit of insurgent propaganda, that he was close to the rally but could not get there because of the size of the crowd).

Away from Qoba, Rafsanjani made his first high-profile appearance since the election. His careful game — praising the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei but also declaring the legimitacy of protest — indicated that he will support a continuing “legal” examination of the election, rather than moving against President Ahmadinejad from the inside. Others have now gone further, however. Some clerics from Qom are now expressing their dissatisfaction; one ventured to criticise Khamenei, allegedly calling the Supreme Leader a “corpse-washer”.


They ain't done yet.

Now begins the wait.

edited to add update:

From the National Iranian American Council:

4:55 pm: Intelligence Minister says some of the arrested “will not be released.”

According to BBC Persian, Gholam Hossein Mohseni-Ejeie, the minister of intelligence, just introduced a new criteria for prosecuting arrested individuals.

Ejeie divided up the arrested individuals into three groups. “Those who participated and had a hand in the decision-making process regarding the recent events will remain in custody until a decision is made…The other group consists of anti-revolutionary demonstrators who took advantage of the situation. These individuals have been arrested and will not be freed.” The third group, according to Ejeie, “is those who have been influenced by the atmosphere. This group will be released if not already released.”

In addition, Ejeie indicated that a new tribunal will be set up shortly to prosecute the arrested demonstrators.

BBC Persian reported that Karroubi, Khatami and Mousavi have already made formal requests that everyone who has been arrested be released immediately.

Here's the latest news from Iran, as gleaned from various sources by Associated Press. With the demonstrations suppressed, Mousavi promising to toe the government line, and other leaders being intimidated by the arrests of their relatives, it looks like Khameni/Ahadminejad look to be in control, for now. People are disappearing. My friend Jules has been following the tweets of a woman going by the name persiankiwi on Twitter--no one has heard from persiankiwi in three days.

Ahmadinejad sounds like a stalker, threatening Obama with remorse for speaking his opinion. And he is just the puppet for the clerics, led by Khameni.

In your windows tonight: don't forget (unless you're going to a gathering!).

Here is the situation in Iran as it seems to stand now. Some of its so-called holy men are calling for the execution of protestors as the Islamic part of the world begins its holy day.

Mousavi, head of the opposition party, has told his followers that he will seek official permits for demonstrations from now on, which definitely puts an end to any demonstration having his official approval. He said that he was told it would take him a week to get such approval (unspoken was the near certainty that it would be denied outright). And last night his website, his last vehicle to stay in touch with his followers, was hacked. Only a blank screen remains. If his supporters continue to demonstrate, they'll be doing it without his official sanction.

Andrew Sullivan still has some tweets from there. Today the demonstrators released green balloons into the air over Tehran. That should give the government's bullies something else to shoot at.

Apart from Sullivan, John Simpson of the BBC, who was only recently thrown out, and the above-linked MSNBC article, I have been looking for more news online without results. People would rather talk about the death of a sadly broken pop star than the deaths and brutalization of a population of real world heroes who have put their lives on the line for twenty days in the hope that even if they die, they will leave something better for their neighbors and families.

One of Andrew Sullivan's Twitter links gives us important tips:

Tear Gas Assault
Do not pick up/throw back tear gas canisters- will severely burn your hands.

Vinegar soaked bandana helps you breath with tear gas. Contaminates fast, have extra.

Most tear gas injuries come from PANIC/chaos,not the chemicals:Ppl lose heads.Effects intense but very short-term.

Stay calm and yell “WALK, WALK” as you walk away from tear gas/pepper spray attack- spread calm.

Do not wear contact lens- pepper spray can linger and damage your eyes.

And there's more. Follow the link--you never know when this information will become useful.

This startling link takes us to an Al Jazeera clip on YouTube. It not only gives coverage of rooftop government snipers shooting at protesters in Tehran's streets and protesters throwing rocks up at the gunmen, but it introduces YouTube News & Politics channel (unless I got it wrong and they mean CitizenTube, which is what Al Jazeera is linked to. According to their spokesman, 10% of their current N&P coverage is coming from Iran by smart people who are setting up dummy accounts to get the material past the government blocks. We have to keep our inner skeptics on standby, of course, because a lot of the material we're going to see isn't dated; some could be staged, but it is still the only information coming out of an Iran with a mainstream media blackout.

Tomorrow night Mousavi is asking for supporters the world over to light a candle to show our support. I hope you will. We can't let our support flag, for fear that Ahmadinejad will think he can get away with this.

I don't like using tweet information as information on the situation in Iran because eyewitness information is so unreliable, and people in the middle of a chaotic situation tend to blow up the numbers of enemy involved and the kind of thing they witness. Right now, though, Andrew Sullivan's daily tweet blog coming from Iran is the most up-to-date information coming from Iran in general, and the war zone that is Baharestan Square in Tehran in particular. It's now 9:48 PM in Tehran.

Wait--Andrew Sullivan has linked to England's Guardian UK blog, which is giving interviews with various people in Iran--one of the riot police, a medical student in a hospital last night--as it regularly updates. The medical student's report is truly horrifying. And Neda Agha-Soltan's family, they report, has been forced from their home. They can't bury her; they don't know where she is buried, and now they have nowhere to live.

The major news media are only saying that there is violence in Baharestan Square in Tehran, then recapping the entire situation.

Ahmadinejad and his supporters have gone mad.

I know I've been posting a lot of Andrew Sullivan's material these last couple of weeks, but that's because he's been doing more coverage of the Iranian crisis than most of our mainline news media! Here is something new and informative: an interview between Leslie Stahl and Christiane Amanpour, who is still one of the best-informed reporters out there, even if CNN has become a joke. Amanpour is half Iranian, lived in Tehran during her youth, and has interviewed the last two of the country's presidents, so she knows whereof she speaks when she says things like:

"Now, 34 million women are in Iran right now, out of a population of 70 million. Zahra Rahnavard, who is the wife of Mousavi, campaigned with her husband – a completely unusual experience. There’s never been such a thing where women campaigned with their husbands. It was a very sort of American, political sort of hand-me-down. And she ran with it. And she and her husband vowed that if they won there would be women in the Cabinet for the first time, they would lobby for reform of the law and the legal process so that women had their rights in a court of law, as well as in the rest of society."

These are our sisters on the battle lines. They have respect in Iran, as the rest of the interview points out, and they have men who respect them.

Allahu Akbar!

They continue to make my heart sing, as per this reader's mail to Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic.

The soldiers telling the women they weren't beating a man? I wish this moment could be captured and held in a giant crystal sculpture, to show what can happen, to show what did happen, to show what's possible even under a repressive regime, to show our power if we band together and hold the line, to show the enemy is human, to show that if these women can take this risk, how can we slack off?

They have taken the murder of Neda Agha-Soltan and made her name a rallying cry rather than an excuse to stay home.

My hopes and prayers continue to go to the demonstrators in Iran and their supporters all over the world. I hope that if I am ever tested, I prove as strong as your women.

This video makes me happy on a cranky day.

Enjoy!

Andrew Sullivan of the Atlantic once again lays out an argument that sums up the way I feel about the United States' position with regard to Iran.

The harruphing of these politicos who say "we should do something!" (apart from unofficially express solidarity and officially express hopes for a violence-less solution) makes me furious. It is not all about us, asshats! Some of this mess stems from what we caused. If we interfere officially, we will simply verify the Iranian view that we are bullying colonialists, and they will be right.

This is their moment, their struggle. Obama is handling things in the right way. Stop mouthing off like poxy paternalistic white men and let other countries handle their own sovereignty, dammit!

What the hell do you say about something like this?

They claim gang rape is a ritual of "male bonding." Three out of four who admitted to rape attacked for the first time in their teens. One in ten victims was a man.

I've been told before, and this really hammers it home, feminists are living in their own bubble if we think we've changed the world. As far as most of it is concerned, we haven't changed a damn thing.

Normally Roger Ebert, journalist and film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, annoys the piss out of me, but not today. Today I want to grab him by his big ol' shoulders and smooch him (gently) on his face. (Cancer of the lymph nodes.) Why?

He's done a thorough-going, covers-all-points set-down of that poxy, mud-rooting, canker blossom that calls itself Bill O'Reilly. Okay, some of it is nostalgic yearning for the broadcast media is yesteryear, but a large part of it is a very well education schoolroom session on O'Reilly's techniques and why they are the hallmarks of a common bully.

Sometimes Roger Ebert does manage to call `em precise to a pin.

Just look these over. You'll know why I posted them.







( More behind the cut )

this is what I did.

What?! It grows back!

There are more Full Cast Audio produced videos on the recording of Kristin Cashore's GRACELING. If you like the book, or if you're curious about how these audio books are made, check them out on YouTube. My bit is only commentary--the FCA gang did the actual work!

eta: I'm getting flags from a number of people who are telling me that the first link to the petition to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is broken. Do use that second link, though!

This is one of those times when a story on the big media touches on our everyday lives, however lightly. Amy Goldman Koss is the author of THE GIRLS (which was recorded by Full Cast Audio, the best novel about girl bullying I've ever read), SIDE EFFECTS, POISON IVY, and other books about contemporary life. And you all probably know I'm buddies with Bruce Coville, owner of Full Cast Audio in addition to his writer self. He, the creative director of Full Cast, Dan Bostick (also a friend), and Bruce's daughter Cara (my assistant) all had dinner with the Koss family one night, when they got to meet Amy's husband Mitch, a cameraman who was one of the first journalists who was allowed into North Korea.

That's the background. Here is the mail that is doing the rounds of Amy's friends and anyone who cares about these things:

-----------------------------------------------------------
Please forgive the mass e-mail. As most of you know, our family friend, my husband Mitch's work-partner of many years, Laura Ling, and a co-worker of theirs, Euna Lee have just been sentenced to 12 years in a labor camp in North Korea.

We are all still reeling.

Their families hope to present the petition (link below,) with as many signatures as possible (their goal is 50,000) to the Permanent Representative of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to the United Nations in New York.
The second link is to a new petition to urge President Obama and Hillary Clinton to get negotiations moving for the girls' release.

Will these petitions hasten the girls' release? Who knows? But Laura and Euna's families are desperate to try. So please sign, and pass along, if you will.

Thank you my friends,
yours,
Amy Goldman Koss

to the Permanent Representative of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to the United Nations


to President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Please sign these. Protests like this resulted in the freedom of Iranian-American reporter Roxana Saberi from jail in Iran barely a month ago, so our voices do make a difference!

cross-posted to my fanjournal

What's this? you ask. I can't believe I haven't babbled about this before, because you know who the other two featured guests are?

Sherwood Smith (the Wren books, the Court and Crown duet, and the Inda books) and Kristin Cashore (GRACELING and FIRE [October 7]).

I squeed like a Jonas Brothers fan when I found out they were coming. I did.

This is not your average conference. For one thing:
all attendees are encouraged to propose presentation topics related to women in fantasy: history, social studies, fan studies, business, specific books and series, fantasy generally, or even Sirens's 2009 focus on warrior characters and the women who write them.
But this you will have to do quickly--the deadline is June 7. (My bad--I'm still recovering from tour and a week-long siege of flu. I've only been able to leave the house for two days.)

If any of you attended the Narrates conferences--The Witching Hour and Terminus are the two I went to--then you know what kind of shindig these wonderful women put on: plenty of food for the brain and plenty of fun, lots of really intelligent attendees sharing ideas, writing, and favorite modes of entertainment, late-night talk sessions with people you wouldn't mind being stuck on a desert island with. All this, and Vail, Colorado in October!

The registration is limited to 500, so you might want to check out the Sirens site. This is the very first conference of what I hope will be many, moving all over the country and covering a variety of topics, if things go well and people show an interest. So please, if you can come, sign up--this isn't a drop-in kind of thing! The setting will be more intimate than the average science fiction convention, and we're hoping some other writers will come to make the mix even richer.

I hope I'll see some of you there!

We shouldn't blame Bill O'Reilly alone for spreading hatespeech against Dr. Tiller, satisfying though that accusation is, He has had plenty of company in the chorus crying out "death" for a man dedicated to saving the lives of those already born and helping them with terrible decisions.

The debate over the agency of the anti-choice movement and the reactions of the journalistic community is wide and varied. I've chosen to post this sample of reactions by journalists gathered by Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic online. He has also provided links to a number of partial birth stories if you're interested in the most volatile part of the debate. I'd like to remind people that partial birth abortions are the smallest part of the entire abortion issue, with most abortions being conducted in the first trimester: partial birth was always the hot-button issue the anti-choice campaigners and George Bush used to get their foot in the door of Roe v. Wade.

And while the rats scramble to cover their tracks, Dr. Tiller's fellow physicians continue to give his patients care, despite the ongoing dangers at the Kansas clinics. Remember them in your prayers, please.