There's no two ways about it: The last year of foreign policy had more drama than a Scorsese epic and enough thrills to put Avatar to shame. From the fearsome battle in the Afghan hills to the U.S.-China love-hate relationship, and from the serious al Qaeda threats in Yemen to the hard-to-take-seriously pirates off the Somali coast, 2009 was arguably a much more interesting year for global politics than for movies. So with Oscar nominations due tomorrow, we're taking nominations for our own FP Oscars.

Who would you pick for the best actor of the year? Is President Barack Obama holding his own in an unfriendly world, or does the ubiquitous Brazilian President Lula deserve an Oscar? Is Muammar Qaddafi's persona just too good to be true, or do you prefer the smooth, suave diplomacy (and wacky domestic antics) of France's Nicolas Sarzoky?

You tell us what scandals, dramas, tragicomedies, and personal stories are your picks for the history books in 2009. Listed below are the categories and a few sample entries. Send your own nominations to Joshua.Keating@foreignpolicy.com or paste them in the comments below. May the best news win!

Best picture: What one story encapsulates the year?

Best drama: Spies, dissidents, treachery, and truth. Were the adrenaline-pumping protests following the Iran elections the most dramatic event? Or perhaps it was the long, drawn-out U.S. decision to send more troops to Afghanistan. If you have a humanitarian bent, the crises in Haiti, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan might come a heart-wrenching first.

Best comedy: If it isn't a tragedy, the dysfunction of the U.S. Congress is certainly good for a laugh. Then again, how about the Copenhagen Climate conference that ended in a collective shrug? Or the British MPs who used their expense accounts to buy fancy rugs and re-dig their backyard swimming pools?

Best romantic comedy: Gordon Brown requested meeting after meeting with the U.S. president; Obama just didn't have time. Brown gave him a romantic antique biography of Churchill, and Obama gave him a DVD box set. Let's just say the special relationship isn't all it used to be. But then again, there are other comedies in Europe these days ... Berlusconi anyone?

Best romantic drama: Unclear whether this should be a drama or a comedy, but the Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladamir Putin certainly have a relationship worth noting -- as their press photographer has shown time and time again...

Best action: A U.S. ship is seized in the Gulf of Aden and devious pirates take the Maersk Alabama captive on the high seas, demanding a ransom for their deed. But lo and behold! A brave captain sacrifices his freedom to save his crew. And the U.S. whacks three pirates in the end, bringing everyone home safely! Phew!

Best special effects: Hmm, how about that missile launch in North Korea? It hit right on target: the Pacific Ocean.

Best director: Nicolas Sarkozy is a whirling dervish of diplomatic activity.

Best actor: Very few world leaders can also claim their own daily television shows -- and surprisingly humorous ones at that. "Alo Presidente" hasn't exactly skyrocketed Hugo Chavez to fame (his coup attempt back in the 1990s did that), but man has this guy mastered media in the Drudge Era.

Best actress: On a more serious note, few women leaders have been more powerful this year in asserting political freedom than Burma's Aung San Suu Kyi. Or does Hillary Clinton have your vote? As one FP staffer put it, "she's the queen of 'the show must go on.'"

Best supporting actress: Is Carla Bruni the perfect companion for a perfectionist French president?

Best supporting actor: Let's be honest: One man whose entire year has been a story about other people's interests is the ousted president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya. For all his posturing and pontificating, he was never running the show.

Best costume: Libya's Muammar Qaddafi designs his own clothes.

Worst costume: Libya's Muammar Qaddafi designs his own clothes. You decide.

Lifetime achievement award: Fidel? Kim Jong Il? Mubarak? Most of the longest-lasting players on the world stage aren't particularly savory characters. Got someone better?

We'll post a full list of nominees based on your e-mails and comments on Monday, Feb. 8 and give you a chance to vote. The final winners will be announced at the end of the month. 

We promise to keep the musical numbers short.

The White House has posted the text of the statements U.S. President Barack Obama gave on the attempted terrorist attack on Northwest Flight 253 and the brutal Ashura crackdown on protesters in Iran.

 Choice quotes: 

the American people should remain vigilant, but also be confident. Those plotting against us seek not only to undermine our security, but also the open society and the values that we cherish as Americans. This incident, like several that have preceded it, demonstrates that an alert and courageous citizenry are far more resilient than an isolated extremist.

As a nation, we will do everything in our power to protect our country. As Americans, we will never give in to fear or division. We will be guided by our hopes, our unity, and our deeply held values. That's who we are as Americans; that's what our brave men and women in uniform are standing up for as they spend the holidays in harm's way. And we will continue to do everything that we can to keep America safe in the new year and beyond.

 And:

We call for the immediate release of all who have been unjustly detained within Iran. We will continue to bear witness to the extraordinary events that are taking place there. And I'm confident that history will be on the side of those who seek justice.

The White House included translations of the Iran portion into Arabic and Persian. 

JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images

In January, the U.S. military will hold its first simulation of an attack from a long-range Iranian missile on the United States, as opposed to a North Korean one:

It also would be more difficult testing the U.S. Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system against a missile that would be faster and more direct as it races toward the United States than a simulated strike from North Korea.

"Previously, we have been testing the GMD system against a North Korean-type scenario," O'Reilly said.

"This next test ... is more of a head-on shot like you would use defending against an Iranian shot into the United States. So that's the first time that we're now testing in a different scenario."

His comments came the same day that diplomats disclosed concerns among intelligence agencies that Iran tested a key atomic bomb component as recently as 2007. The finding, if proven true, would clash with Iran's assertion that its nuclear work is for civilian use.

The test would fire an interceptor missile from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California at a simulated incoming missile, launched from the Marshall Islands in the Pacific Ocean. An aide to O'Reilly estimated the cost at about $150 million.

Iran's long-range Shahab-3 missile has a maximum range of about 1,200 miles. Long enough to hit Israel or even Greece, but well-short of hitting the United States.

ALI SHAIGAN/AFP/Getty Images

In a talk given this afternoon at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, retired Gen.  John Abizaid outlined his view of U.S. involvement in the Middle East. He argued that it is foolish to approach issues on a country-by-country basis, complaining that "we look at Iraq through a soda straw. We look at Afghanistan through a soda straw." Instead, says Abizaid, the United States must develop a regional strategy that accounts for the roles of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran.

For the same reason, he suggested, the debate over whether or not to send more troops to Afghanistan has been over-simplified; the discussion should be broadened to include the relative demands of Iraq, Afghanistan and the region at large.

Abizaid also emphasized the ideological nature of the conflict, and the need for soft power to address the root causes of radicalism. He noted that Baitullah Mehsud, the top Taliban leader, is referred to as "the commander of the faithful."

"While we may chuckle at that title," Abizaid said, "the people fighting for him do not." When asked whether there should be a shift to a counter-terrorism approach in Afghanistan that relies more upon targeted strikes than nation-building, Abizaid responded that such a plan is impractical. Stabilization in Afghanistan and Iraq is a precondition for effective counter terrorist operations, he argued, because it provides the infrastructure needed to develop the "superb, superb intelligence" needed.

The theme of the talk was that instability anywhere in the region is a serious threat to surrounding countries. With our "ground forces spread thin" and "our 24-7 forces totally engaged," the United States must more fully incorporate diplomatic, political and economic plans to get a handle on the region. A number of questions were directed to the resources required for such a broad regional approach, and towards the end of the talk, the retired general was asked if the situation would be better in Afghanistan had the United States not invaded Iraq.

"All's I know is that we did what we did, and we are where we are," he answered.

News today that the G-20 has officially replaced the G-8 as "the world's premier economic forum," in the words of South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, was quickly -- and dramatically -- overshadowed by the revelation that Iran has a second, covert uranium enrichment facility.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, speaking to reporters here in Pittsburgh, said that "we must have answers from Iran" about its nuclear program by the Oct. 1 meeting of the P5+1, the permanent five members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany. Any decisions about what to do vis-a-vis Iran would not be made before that meeting, he said.

"It's the third time they've been caught red-handed," Brown said. "There has been serial deception over many years."

The prime minister wouldn't get into specifics about what sorts of penalities Iran might face should it fail to comply, but indicated that if sanctions are needed, they will "clearly be of a banking nature" and would "involve energy" and new restrictions on technologies that could be used for nuclear purposes.

"I think the IAEA will see that there is a breach of regulations," Brown said. According to the evidence he'd seen, "this could not have been for a civil nuclear facility," because the "level of production was not sufficient for a civil nuclear facility but could have been intended for a nuclear facility."

On the G-20, Brown made a more sweeping statement than either Korea's Lee or Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who earlier insisted that "we are not replacing the G-8 with the G-20."

"The old systems of economic cooperation are over," Brown said. Canada is due to host both the G-8 and the G-20 next year, in cooperation with South Korea, and Harper said that the G-8 would become more of a forum for discussing development issues, security issues, and, "for lack of a better word, geopolitics."

Brown said that the G-20 today would be issuing a "very strong view on remuneration," a somewhat peripheral issue that has nonetheless dominated discussions surrounding the summit, on the insistence of French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

"We cannot be soft on these issues," Brown said some passion. "We have got to be tough … we will not condone the old system of bonuses … there is no return to the bad old days."

Brown also announced that G-20 leaders had agreed that it would be "premature" to remove the fiscal and monetary stimulus measures put in place over the past year, saying that "millions of jobs" would be at stake if countries acted too quickly.

Nevertheless, he said, "The action that we took at the London Summit [in April] has worked."

After acquiring a massive following on the Iranian black market though Internet downloads and illegal DVDs, the U.S. sci-fi drama Lost has been approved for official distribution in the Islamic Republic. The Guardian reports:

Other long-running US dramas – including 24, Prison Break and Desperate Housewives – have been widely distributed on Iran's black market, but none has been given official approval.

Granting distribution and broadcasting rights to Lost would mark a policy reversal after officials previously criticised the series and warned media outlets against publicising it.

Mohammad Hossein Saffar-Harandi, recently sacked as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's culture and Islamic guidance minister, lambasted it for displaying "Zionist concepts". However, others insisted the programme was suitable for an Iranian audience because it has "eastern" themes.

"The atmosphere of this story, due to our classic literature, is familiar to Iranian and eastern viewers," Saeed Ghotbizadeh, a TV and cinema critic, told the Tehran-e Emrooz newspaper. "Eastern viewers can understand it better and would naturally like it.

Granted I gave up on watching Lost after about the first season but the themes seemed pretty western to me -- lots of Christian redemption vignettes and characters not-so-subtly named after enlightenment philosophers. Guess I missed something.

The officially distributed Iranian version of the show will be edited to "exclude "un-Islamic" scenes such as those featuring scantily clad women or male-female physical contact" -- so the authorities' decision might be less about exposing Iranian viewers to Lost's exploration of spirituality than preventing them from seeing Evangeline Lilly in a bikini. Somehow I think the bootleggers are going to stay in business.   

As a side note, I would love to hear an Iranian viewer's take on 24.

The increasingly friendly relationship between Iran and Venezuela is hardly a secret. Just yesterday, Venezuela announced that it will begin exporting 20,000 barrels of gasoline per day to the Islamic Republic. This followed a meeting on Saturday between Presidents Ahmadinejad and Chavez during which the two leaders promised to stand together to defeat imperialist foes.

Legendary New York District Attorney Robert Morganthau explained his concerns about the link in a talk at the Brookings Institution today, sponsored by the the American Interest magazine and Global Financial Integrity. According to Morganthau, some of the most dangerous aspects of the relationship take place far from the cameras, in the shadowy world of illicit finance:

The ostensible reason the the Iranian owned Banco International de Desarrollo (BID) was opened in Caracas was to expand economic ties with Venezuela. Our sources and experiences lead me to suspet an ulterior motive. A foothold into the Venezuelan banking system is a perfect "sanctions-busting" method -- the main motivator for Iran in its banking relationship with Venezuela. Despite being designated by OFAC we believe that BID has several correspondent banking relationships with both Venezuelan banks and banks in Panama, anation with a long-standing reputation as a money laundering safe-haven.

This scheme is known as "nesting." Nested accounts occur when a foreign financial institution gains access to the U.S.  financial system by operating through a U.S. correspondent account belonging to another foreign financial institution. For example, BID who is prohibited from establishing a relationship with a U.S. bank could instead establish a relationship with a Venezuelan or Panamanian bank that has a relationship with a U.S. bank.  If the U.S. bank is unaware that its foreign correspondent financial institution customer is providing such access to a sanctioned third-party foreign financial institution, this third-party financial institution can effectively gain anonymous access to the U.S. financial system. [...]

There is little reason to doubt Venezuela's support for Ahmadinejad's most important agenda, the development of a nuclear program and long-range missiles, and the destabilization of the region. For Iran, the lifeblood of their nuclear and weapons programs is the ability to use the international banking system and to make payments for banned missile and nuclear materials. The opening of Venezuela's banks to the Iranians guarantees the continued development of nuclear technology and long-range missiles. 

Morganthau's office recently prosecuted British bank Lloyds for helping Iran move money through the U.S. financial system by stripping identifying information from wire transfers. He believes the cozy Chavez-Ahmadinejad relationship will only make such operations easier for the Iranians. 

Morganthau stopped short of announcing specific prosecutions, but from the sound of it, some new revelations may be forthcoming. 

Photo by David Shankbone. Used under Creative Commons license.  

One of the big stories over the next few days, and, indeed, for the rest of this month, is going to be the (largely) Western drive to bring Iran's nuclear program to heel. Along with the war in Afghanistan, this issue could come to define Barack Obama's presidency, especially if Iran does weaponize or if the United States or Israel decides to attack Iran's nuclear facilities.

Last week, the IAEA teed up a fresh round of debate by circulating a new report outlining Iran's technical progress since June 5 and its compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and various U.N. resolutions. You can read it here, though don't ask me to explain it all...

Commenting on the report, nuke wonk Jeffrey Lewis says, "Iran is not slowing its nuclear program, ok?" He then goes on to analyze Iran's recent expansion of centrifuges, which are grouped in "cascades" to enrich uranium.

"I continue to believe that Iran will install between 3-5 cascades a month for the next five years, barring some external intervention, until Natanz houses its complete set of 54,000 centrifuges," he adds.

The big news making headlines in Israel is the report's mention of "possible military dimensions" to Iran's nuclear program, a murky subject the agency wants Tehran to clarify. This is important because to be in compliance with the NPT, Iran has to prove that its nuclear activities are peaceful. Israel's Foreign Ministry is hammering the IAEA for allegedly withholding information on the militarization issue, which presumably means that Israel has supplied the IAEA with intelligence that the agency didn't discuss in the report.

(It also sounds like the IAEA is trying to get member states to let the agency share some of the documents they've given it directly with Iran, so that the Islamic Republic can respond to whatever it is being accused of.)

Asked Friday about the report, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said, "As the IAEA's report makes clear, the recent limited and overdue steps Iran has taken fall well short of Iran's obligations and do not constitute the full and comprehensive cooperation required of Iran."

"Absent Iranian compliance with its international nuclear obligations and full transparency with the IAEA," he continued, "the international community cannot have confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of the Iran's nuclear program."

On Wednesday, the P5+1, the permanent five members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany, are going to meet to talk over the report and figure out what to do next. Then, IAEA member countries will hold their annual meeting in Vienna, where Iran will top the agenda. Meanwhile, Obama has said that unless Iran takes him up on his offer of talks ahead of the U.N. General Assembly's opening session next month, he'll push for new sanctions that his secretary of state has said should be "crippling."

Then what? Stay tuned.

Photo by the Office of the Presidency of the Islamic Republic of Iran via Getty Images

A close aide to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad suggested that Mohammad Ali Abtahi, a reformist critic of the president, appeared so gaunt during his televised confession this month because he himself had decided to take off some weight.

"It's natural that when someone has become fat, in prison he understands that his fatness harmed his body and spirit," said Ali Akbar Javanfekr (left)."So maybe Mr. Abtahi took advantage of this opportunity to lose weight."

Not that I claim to really understand the forces at play in Iranian politics, but the "let-them-eat-cake" arrogance displayed by Ahmadinejad and his supporters (comparing opposition supporters to soccer fans, for instance) is confusing. Having dragged the Islamic Republic into the worst crisis of legitimacy in its history, does Ahmadinejad really have reason to feel cocky?

Given the apparent degree of frustration with Ahmadinejad among members of the clerical elite, do the Ahmadinejad loyalists really gain by mocking a prominent cleric, even a reformist one, like this?

AFP/Getty Images

Iran watchers are anxiously anticipating Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani's upcoming prayer service at Tehran University. Some expect, or hope, the former Iranian president will come out strongly in support of opposition candidate Mir Hossain Mousavi, who has said he will attend along with former President Mohammad Khatami.

Kayhan, the mouthpiece for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has warned Rafsanjani to "avoid supporting the hooligans" -- meaning the opposition. We'll see what happens, but I'm skeptical that Rafsanjani will say anything too daring. After all, the man couldn't bring himself to stick his neck out when people were taking to the streets of Tehran in the tens of thousands. Why should he do so now, when it looks like the protestors, brave as they are, have been beaten into submission?

One interpretation of the former president's motives, a version of which Geneive Abdo explains here, is that this is all about Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. He's only out for No. 1, and is using the reformers to get a leg up on Khamenei. Or, he's simply in a fight for survival -- Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has all but accused him of gross corruption and is clearly out to get him and his family -- and is hedging his bets. Either way, it's clear he's no reformist himself.

But this could be a defining moment for Rafsanjani. As Carnegie Endowment analyst Karim Sadjadpour puts it, "This Friday is probably the most important speech of his career. He's nearly 75 years old, and his legacy has always been important to him. If he complains about personal slights and electoral improprieties but submits to the will of the Leader 'for the sake of the 'glorious revolution', history will remember him not only as a crook but also a coward. I've learned to have low expectations of the courage and integrity of Iranian officials, and hope that I'll be pleasantly surprised."

One other interesting aspect of Rafsanjani's speech will be how the crowd behaves. Mousavi supporters are planning to turn out in large numbers, but so are Ahmadinejad's people -- and it could get ugly. These are not very nice people.

UPDATE: It's not completely clear from this Reuters account just how assertive Rafsanjani was, but it does look like he called for called for those arrested to be released, called the current situation a "crisis," and said that many Iranians had doubts about the election's validity.

"Today, we are living bitter conditions due to what happened after the announcement of the election result," he said. "All of us have suffered. We need unity more than anytime else."

The LA Times' Barzou Daraghi says that Rafsanjani criticized the Guardian Council, the 12-member body that supervised the elections. But the bottom line seems to be this: "Rafsanjani's long-awaited sermon neither poured water on the ongoing fire of protests or added fuel to the dispute within the ruling establishment and Iranian society over the election results." Developing...

An interesting report on EurasiaNet.org, written without a byline, alleges that former Iranian President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is making headway in his attempt to mount a clerical challenge to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei:

A source familiar with the thinking of decision-makers in state agencies that have strong ties to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said there is a sense among hardliners that a shoe is about to drop. Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani -- Iran’s savviest political operator and an arch-enemy of Ayatollah Khamenei’s -- has kept out of the public spotlight since the rigged June 12 presidential election triggered the political crisis. The widespread belief is that Rafsanjani has been in the holy city of Qom, working to assemble a religious and political coalition to topple the supreme leader and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

"There is great apprehension among people in the supreme leader’s [camp] about what Rafsanjani may pull," said a source in Tehran who is familiar with hardliner thinking. "They [the supreme leader and his supporters] are much more concerned about Rafsanjani than the mass movement on the streets." [...]

A reformist website, Rooyeh, reported that Rafsanjani already had the support of nearly a majority of the Assembly of Experts, a body that constitutionally has the power to remove Ayatollah Khamenei. The report also indicated that Rafsanjani’s lobbying efforts were continuing to bring more clerics over to his side. Rafsanjani’s aim, the website added, is the establishment of a leadership council, comprising of three or more top religious leaders, to replace the institution of supreme leader. Shortly after it posted the report on Rafsanjani’s efforts to establish a new collective leadership, government officials pulled the plug on Rooyeh.

The article, if the sourcing is solid, builds on analysis by FP contributor Geneive Abdo, who writes:

Given the tools at Khamenei's disposal, it should be no surprise that during this past week there have been few clerics either permitted or bold enough to express their views on the present crisis. Nevertheless, some are likely working behind the scenes against Ahmadinejad. Clerics such as [dissident Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali] Montazeri oppose the president not only for his repressive policies used against the Iranian people, but because he believes in ideas that theologians view as heretical -- such as the return of the hidden imam who will come to Earth after a world war in which Islam is victorious.

We'll have to see what happens on the street tomorrow and over the next few days, but I would be very surprised if Rafsanjani does pull the trigger at this point. The protests have died down, especially outside Tehran, and the organizers are being rounded up. As Steve Walt says, the security forces show little to no sign of breaking with the regime. Even Mohsen Rezai, one of the losing candidates and a former commander of the Revolutionary Guards, is reportedly withdrawing his complaints about fraud. And keep in mind that most Iranians aren't getting their news from the Internet and Twitter -- they're watching state television that is doing its best to discredit Mousavi and his supporters. And there are signs that the regime is laying the groundwork now for Mousavi's arrest.

So it strikes me as highly unlikely that Rafsanjani would make his move now, with all the momentum seemingly with the regime. He's nothing if not a canny political operator. Moreover, it's worth pointing out that plenty of clerics have opposed the concept of a supreme leader and velayat-e-faqih for a long time now, with little discernable consequence for Khamenei.

One interesting historical footnote. During the Iran-Iraq war, Mousavi and Montazeri were considered among the hardest of the hardliners, and Rafsanjani and Khamenei were considered pragmatists and allies. Now, Mousavi, Montazeri, and Rafsanjani are all seemingly on one side, with Khamenei on the other. But at least for the time being, it seems the supreme leader has the upper hand.

 Another anonymous dispatch from Tehran:

 22 June, 2009

There are two main areas in Tehran that are full of good bookstores:
the area around Tehran University and Enqelab Square and the Karimkhan Bridge – just down the street from Haft-e Tir Square. Enqelab has been the site of the biggest demonstrations and most violent protests since the elections; Haft-e Tir has also seen its share of action. The huge street battles that took place on Saturday that you saw on the news happened around Enqelab. At any rate, today I decided to speed up my book buying because if the situation keeps deteriorating here I won’t stick around; I headed down to Enqelab.

To say that there was an eerie calm on the street would be an understatement. People walked by the stores and carried out their daily business under the gaze of a massive security presence. Every block on Azadi Street had dozens of baton-wielding police officers standing alongside the road, some twiddling their thumbs, others
staring you down, others staring off into space. The side streets
around Azadi were full of Basiji militiamen wearing helmets and
holding batons. Inside the stores business had obviously slowed down and there was a clear reluctance by some to talk about what’s going on. Perhaps they thought I was a journalist:

“Anything going on here today?”

“No.”

“Yesterday?”

“No.”

"It was pretty bad a couple days ago, though, huh?”

“Yeah. You were here?”

“No. I saw pictures.”

“It was bad.”

And that was it; nothing more from this man. I thanked him and left. The few other places that I stopped by weren’t much better.  One man told me that he was planning on closing at 1:00pm today, like he had the past two days.

“It was chaos a couple days ago,” he said.

“Is there going to be something today?”

“Yeah, now at Firdousi Square and they just announced Haft-e Tir.”

One of the random emails that I’ve been receiving in the past four or five days said that everyday there will be a protest at Enqelab at 5:00pm. Perhaps that’s why the police presence was so heavy. I don’t know who sends these emails and who else receives them.

Perhaps one of you is sending them? They come from cryptic email addresses with names like “Free Iran”, “Payandeh Iran” (Iran Forever), “A Friend”. They contain announcements that apparently come from Mousavi or Karroubi, information about where demonstrations are being held, how to access the web via proxies and filter breakers (none of which work anymore, by the way), how to treat gunshot wounds, why you should bring cigarettes with you to protests as a means to fight the effects of tear gas and other things. Where and who these come from remains a mystery to me.

It was nearly 5:00 when I left and still no signs of anything on the
street. There were so many police and militia men standing around that one would have to be rather stupid to stage a protest there.

Leaving Enqelab I got into a shared taxi going towards the Sayyed
Khandan Bridge, where I get another one to go further north where I’m staying. The taxi took off making its way through streets that started crowding up just before rush hour. Near the Karimkhan Bridge traffic came to a total standstill. I asked the driver what was going on, he didn’t know. The other passengers were just as clueless or were acting they didn’t know like I was. The helicopter circling above our heads made it impossible to think that it was simply bad traffic or a car accident. As we inched forward, I, like many of the other passengers in the taxis around us, got out and started walking towards the square. Hopefully there I could catch another taxi and go up to Sayyed Khandan. I was maybe a half mile away from the Square when I used a pedestrian bridge to cross the street and hopefully get a glance at what was going on further ahead. You could see that people had gathered, but that was it. You needed to get closer if you wanted to see what was happening.

It was at that moment when I heard men chanting…screaming “Ma’ sha’ Allah! Hizbollah! Ma’ sha’ Allah! Hizbollah!” (What God wants! The party of God!). I turned around and saw maybe 40 men wearing
camouflage vests, helmets and carrying batons heading towards Haft-e Tir, ostensibly coming from the direction of Enqelab or Valiasr
Squares.

I hurried down the steps and made my way forward, gaining another few blocks when people starting screaming and running back towards my direction. I asked what happened and in response received “Run! Go! Run, Run! They’re beating people!” I looked at the street and saw a young man trying to flee from two older, much bigger men who had grabbed him by the neck and were screaming at him to stop moving. The young man kept trying to run away but the other two wouldn’t give. It was now apparent that they were plainclothes police or part of some other security apparatus. They were both wearing earpieces and had revolvers at their side. One started kicking the man, who by now had his shirt ripped off. He kicked him in his stomach and he keeled over. The crowds kept running back, there was more screaming. I ducked into a bookstore and the owners shut the door and pulled down the metal gate down. Students were walking back, all dressed in black and telling others standing on the sidewalk and the street to go to the university. They were going to take their mourning there; this was one day after a young woman was killed.

About a half an hour later I left the store and made my way to Haft-e
Tir Square. The traffic and slowly started to make its way down the street and taxis were picking people up. I hopped into one heading in my direction and looked at the massive security presence at the
square. There were dozens of Basij in the square itself, and probably
hundreds on the streets. Trucks full of men in camouflage, all with
batons standing around the square, some stopping cars. The riot police in full body armor and armed where stationed along the other side of the street. The woman in the back of the taxi asked if the driver or I had seen what just happened. Did they beat people? Did you see the man being pounded by the police? Did the basijis start beating people? Will there be a strike tomorrow? The woman was talking and taking pictures on her phone at the same time.

I looked back at her, “Be careful with that! They’ll kill us all if
they see you.”

I turned my head around and saw that our car had been stopped. There was a Basiji in front of us screamed at us to stop taking pictures. He opened the front passenger door where I was sitting and started screaming at me, “What are you taking pictures of! Get out of the car! What’s in your bag!?! Get out!” I remained seated. A second later someone else had opened the back door and screamed the same questions at the passengers seated in the back. “It was the woman! That woman!” one of them said. They pulled her out of the car. I still didn’t get up. The man who had opened my door looked the other way for a split second and I pulled by camera out of my bag and tossed it under the seat. I didn’t take any pictures, but I didn’t want to deal with questions and I don’t think that my excuse of being an American student studying in Iran was going to fly over so well with these people. They pulled the woman over to the sidewalk and the driver sped off. “Oh God! She’s going to be stuck there until night…God knows what they’re going to do to her.”

That's all for now. There was a call for a strike today, but I don't
think it happened, though I have no idea since the media here would
never talk about it and most other news outlets have been scrambled or blocked. Apparently there is also a protest planned for tomorrow in front of the Guardian Council's building. Again - I don't know if it's true. I don't even know who told me as it came from one of those emails. The sense that I get from people about what is going on now and where, when and how this will all end can generally be summed with the sentence "I don't know."

Call me a cynic, but I somehow doubt most of the experts and pundits on the other side of the Atlantic have a much better sense of what's going to happen.

Trust The Nation's "Deadline Poet" Calvin Trillin to find it:

The Private Thoughts of a TV Anchor as He Observes the Iranian Election

A president like Moussavi
Would fill me to the brim with glee:
For anchors not completely lame,
It's easy to pronounce his name.
But this was not to be. Oh, God--
I'm stuck with Ahmadinejad. 

Drew Dernavich at The New Yorker's Cartoon Lounge also has fun with Newsweek's new cover, which obscures part of the magazine's title with the cover photo.

In a surprising capitulation to Iranian tyranny, Newsweek (who recently redesigned the interior of the magazine) boldly and officially renamed their magazine NewsAyatollahs, starting with the cover of the June 29th issue.

With crafty image editing, Dernavich decides to rename several magazines in a similar fashion and to create his own. The images are a must see. My favorite is Ayatollahs Illustrated.

I'm beginning to think that the real Obama effect is the process by which any issue, international or domestic, comes to be discussed primarily in terms of how it relates to the president.

I'm glad Obama publicly stated his support for the protesters in Iran today. It was the right thing to do. But I don't really anticipate either action significantly changing the dynamic of the situation in Iran. It's not as if the demonstrators were waiting for Obama to tell them they are "on the right side of history.” And the Iranian government obviously doesn't really care much about winning Obama's approval.

When Fox News's Major Garett asked Obama "What took you so long?", I had to wonder what he (or John McCain) thinks would have transpired differently if Obama had made a similarly strong-worded statement a week ago. 

I haven't yet seen any indication that the Iranian opposition really wants Obama to say more. Mousavi's international spokesman may have criticized Obama in an interview with FP last week for comparing Mousavi to Ahmadinejad, but he never said that more vigorous support would be welcome, despite how some others have characterized the statement.

The heads of a number of states, including France, Germany, and Canada, have already publicly questioned the elections results and voiced support for the protesters, but I haven't seen any examples of opposition leaders or protesters mentioning this support. 

On the other hand, the argument of Obama's defenders that stronger support would imperil the protesters seems a little unconvincing as well. Iran's leaders have never lacked for pretexts under which to blame foreign meddling for internal dissent. The government was blaming the U.S. for interfering in this election before Obama had said a word. I'm not sure I understand why they're any more or less likely to crack down or make concessions based on what the U.S. president says. 

The fact of the matter is that the United States doesn't have a whole lot of diplomatic leverage or ability to influence what's going on in Iraq right now. The Obama administration still has to face the question of whether the likely fraudulence of Ahmadinejad's victory should change the approach to nuclear negotiations, but that seems like a question that can be addressed down the road. This latest round of the engagement vs. confrontation debate is becoming becomign increasingly tiresome and less pertinent to events outside the beltway. 

(For the record, inviting Iranian diplomats to a White House Fourth of July party is a terrible idea. The White House might not be able to talk the regime out of abusing their own people, but that doesn't mean they should have them over for barbecue.)