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Mujahedin Khalq as an Opposition Group
The Islamic Republic of Iran at 41 and the MEK
written by Nejat Society
Iran's Islamic Revolution remains as bellwether, even though attempts to emulate it have not yet succeeded.
— Journalist Eric Walberg
In number theory, 41 is a prime number meaning it is not divisible by any number except itself and one. Similarly, the Islamic Revolution in Iran so far has been unique in its success and indivisible unity of purpose, despite numerous attempts at sabotage by external and internal actors. At this prime age of 41, Iran is fully capable of charting an assertive leadership path to recapture the spirit and reaffirm the original goals of the Islamic Revolution of 1979, among which is the propagation of Islam to bring about social change for the welfare of all humanity.2
It is no minor accomplishment for the Islamic Republic of Iran to have maintained an independent geopolitical course for a period of forty one years in spite of the overwhelming diplomatic, economic and military pressure employed by the United States to force Tehran to cave in to the diktats of the Washington regime. Even before the erstwhile shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, had fled the country on January 17, 1979, U.S. air force general Robert E. "Dutch" Huyser had arrived on January 3 on a mission to test the waters for a rerun of the August 1953 coup, which had originally placed the U.S.-backed dictator in power in the first place.3
With the victory of the Islamic Revolution on February 11, 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini (r) went on to found an Islamic Republic, whose constitution (Article 154) explicitly states that Iran "is concerned with the welfare of humanity as a whole and takes independence, liberty and sovereignty of justice and righteousness as the right of people in the world over." Imam Khomeini was very clear in his view that "Islam is revealed for mankind," and, therefore, the revolution must be exported.3 This concept, which raised fears of popular uprisings toppling the U.S.-abetted tyrants in the region and beyond, put the nascent Islamic Republic on a collision course with the Washington regime. Among the despotic leaders shaken by Iran's Islamic Revolution was the U.S.-supported Iraqi dictator, Saddam, who denounced Imam Khomeini and called upon Iranian Arabs to revolt.4
If external threats to the newly established Islamic Republic weren't enough, others arose internally. Massoumeh Ebtekar, who witnessed the revolution firsthand and is currently Vice President of Iran for Women and Family Affairs, recalled that "we were sure that foreign elements were actively involved in attempts to weaken and undermine the young republic." To avert the suspected foreign plot to overthrow the Iranian government, a group of students, including now Vice President Ebtekar, decided to act, and on November 4, 1979 occupied the U.S. embassy in Tehran and detained the staff.5 U.S. president Jimmy Carter responded ten days later by freezing US $12 billion's worth of Iran's assets in the U.S., and later banned all trade with and travel to Iran.6 Also affected were Iranian assets in U.S. banks in Britain, much of which were in Bank of America's London branch.7 The following year on April 7, the U.S. cut diplomatic relations with Iran, and has never reinstated them.8 If Carter had not allowed the deposed shah entry to the U.S., the embassy takeover most likely would not have occurred.9
Another internal threat, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MeK), was openly unhappy over the constitution, which, according to them, did not address their demands. After a humiliating defeat in the March and May 1980 parliamentary elections (no MeK candidates were elected),10 the MeK became increasingly belligerent over their lack of position in the new government, directing their frustration ever more violently towards members of the Islamic Republic Party (IRP), which had won a decisive victory in the elections.
Despite the electoral defeat, the MeK openly backed Iran's first president, Abolhassan Bani Sadr, however, following his removal from office for incompetency in June 1981, the MeK declared an armed struggle against the standing government. On June 28, 1981 and again on August 30, the MeK carried out terror bombing attacks against the IRP and government leaders. In 1986, the MeK moved its operations to Iraq and aligned itself with Saddam, who backed the terrorist group until being ousted by the U.S. invasion in 2003. To date, the Washington regime views the MeK as a viable means by which to overthrow the legitimate government of Iran.11
Following the student takeover of the U.S. embassy, which was later shown to be a nerve center for CIA espionage in the region,12 U.S. president Carter ordered a desperate mission on April 24, 1980 to invade Iran and free the hostages despite negotiations for their release still being in progress.13 The so-called hostage crisis and the U.S. president's failed interventionist response provided a perpetual pretext for Washington's vehemently vindictive view against reestablishing any level of diplomatic relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran. The 444-day crisis, according to sworn testimony by Israeli intelligence agent Ari Ben-Menashe, was a joint effort by the CIA and Mossad to delay the release of the 52 hostages and thereby ensure an electoral victory for Ronald Reagan in the 1980 U.S. presidential race.14
In the midst of the post-revolutionary struggle to establish a fully functioning Islamic government, Iraqi dictator Saddam, with U.S. blessing, attacked the fledgling Islamic Republic on September 22, 1980, imposing a costly 8-year-long war that consumed some 60 to 70 percent of Iran's national budget, not to mention the suffering of the Iranian people and their sacrifices in defense of Iran and Islam.15 The economic impact of the war on Iran itself was enormous with estimated direct costs in the range of US $600 billion and total cost of US $1 trillion.16 In the course of this U.S.-supported war, chemical agents were used extensively for the first time since the First World War, resulting in the deaths of some 4,700 Iranians in a single attack. The U.S. also provided Saddam with biological agents such as anthrax and E. coli.17
Howard Teicher, director of political-military affairs for the U.S. National Security Council from 1982 to 1987, in an affidavit stated, "CIA Director [William] Casey personally spearheaded the effort to ensure that Iraq had sufficient military weapons, ammunition and vehicles to avoid losing the Iran-Iraq war." Teicher also testified that U.S. president Reagan had sent a secret message to Saddam advising him that "Iraq should step up its air war and bombing of Iran." Teicher's sworn testimony provides strong evidence that the U.S. intent was for Saddam to bomb Iranian cities, thereby unavoidably targeting civilians.18
Saddam followed Reagan's advice to the letter by launching eleven SCUD B missiles at Tehran on February 29, 1988. Over the next two weeks, more than 100 of Saddam's missiles rained down upon the cities of Tehran, Qom and Isfahan along with bombing raids conducted against a total of 37 Iranian cities. Earlier in October 1987 and again in April 1988, the U.S. as part of its overt but undeclared war against the Islamic Republic, attacked Iranian ships and oil platforms under expanded rules of engagement.19 As a result of Washington's designation of the Persian Gulf as essentially a free-fire zone for Iranian targets, the commander of the USS Vincennes, William C. Rogers, fired two missiles (after twenty-three failed attempts)20 at what he claimed was a military target but in fact was Iran Air Flight 655 carrying 290 civilian passengers from Bandar Abbas to Dubai. For downing the civilian airliner and killing all on board, Rogers was awarded the Legion of Merit "for exceptionally meritorious service" for this appalling atrocity.21
Yet in spite of the near universal support given by the U.S. and its western minions to Saddam, the people of Iran rose up to defend their newly liberated land in what were termed "human wave attacks" in the western press. Giving their lives selflessly in the cause of defending Islam and Iran, these martyrs, whose numbers reached to half a million,22 struck fear in the black heart of Saddam and presented a conundrum to the materialistic west. Ayatollah Mohammad-Taqi Rahbar explains that martyrdom, while clearly understood in the Islamic world, "is incomprehensible and even pointless in materialist and atheistic cultures."23
The incomprehensibility to most westerners of the spiritual basis of Iran's Islamic Revolution leads to some interesting "anti-explanations." Professor of Sociology at the University of North Carolina Charles Kurzman wrote, "After the Iranian Revolution, those who had considered the upheaval unthinkable became preoccupied with understanding how they could have been so mistaken." After pointing out the shortcomings of the various political, economic, cultural and other explanations, Kurzman notes, "The more I learned about the Iranian Revolution, the more theoretical anomalies I discovered." Yet this author acknowledges that 55 percent of educated, middle-class Iranians and 71 percent of others he interviewed spoke of Islam as being involved in their decision to participate in the revolution.24
Apparently, for secular-leaning western scholars, Islam cannot be accepted as the basis for an explanation of a successful revolution. For example, even Iranian expatriate scholar Ervand Abrahamian blames the Islamic Revolution on "overwhelming pressures" in Iranian society due to the shah, who "was sitting on such a volcano, having alienated almost every sector of society."25 Downplaying the role of Islam in Iran's revolution, Iranian expatriate scholar Asef Bayat insists that there was a "strong secular tendency," which peaked in the 1970s. Bayat incredulously claims, "In Iran, an Islamic movement was in the making when it was interrupted by the Islamic revolution."26 Other scholars date the origin of the Islamic movement in Iran to the tobacco crisis of 1890-1891, while Farhang Rejaee, a professor at the Carleton Centre for the Study of Islam in Ottawa, Canada, points to the assassination of Nasr al-Din Shah in 1896.27
The current Islamic movement in Iran had begun on the 15th of Khordad, 1342 (June 5, 1963), predating the Islamic Revolution by some 15 years. In a June 1979 speech marking the anniversary of the 15th of Khordad uprising, Imam Khomeini specifically referred to the Islamic movement and its creation in the mosque network. "Who are they that wish to divert our Islamic movement from Islam?" asked the Imam. "It was the mosques that created this revolution," he emphasized, adding. "It was the mosques that brought this [Islamic] movement into being."28 Likewise refuting the theories of the western and westernized scholars, Ayatollah Mohammad-Taqi Rahbar explains, "The secret of success of the Islamic Revolution of Iran also is naught but this: valuing the high ideals of Islam and of the Islamic humanities." As to the failure of other revolutions, he blames "want of a sufficient depth in its spiritual dimension." Finally, he affirms, "The revolutionary experience of Iran should indeed become a model for others to emulate."29
By basing economics and social change on the solid foundation of Islam, Iran has achieved greater progress in many areas, such as reducing poverty, improving health care, eliminating illiteracy, increasing access to education and expanding opportunities for women, than had been the case during the shah's regime. As a result, despite the unending U.S. hostility against Iran through ruthless imposed wars, covert and overt aggressions, punitive economic sanctions and continuous diplomatic isolation, the Islamic Republic has managed to amass an impressive list of accomplishments. U.S. economic sanctions have had the effect of causing Iran to seek self-sufficiency in a number of areas, including weaponry and other military hardware, food production, steel, paper and paper products, cement, heavy industrial machinery, pharmaceuticals and telecommunications equipment. In particular, the domestic production of armaments has helped to ensure the country's independence and security, as has the highly developed military strategy of the "fast boat swarm" for naval defense in the Persian Gulf.30
Moreover, in the field of health care, Iran has made laudable strides, increasing life expectancy from 56 years in the 1970s to over 70, and reducing the infant mortality rate from 104 per 1,000 births to 25.31 The Islamic Republic has created, and continuously expanded, a system of hospitals and health clinics, concentrating on areas impacted by economic hardship. The results have been sufficiently impressive for some universities and NGOs in the U.S. state of Mississippi to introduce Iranian-style health care into the impoverished areas of the Mississippi Delta region.32 Rural areas also benefitted from the revolution in other ways besides access to health care. By 2002, rural literacy had risen to 70 percent, each village had an average of two college graduates, and 99 percent of rural households had electricity. In 1976 only ten percent of the rural work force was employed in the industrial, construction and service sectors, whereas 51 percent was employed therein by 1996.33 Land was redistributed among peasants, who formed numerous cooperatives, which assisted in raising prices for agricultural products. Even the poorest of Iranians were able to have at least some level of access to modern consumer goods.31
"The biggest advances in the educational, professional and social standing of women in Iran's history have come since the revolution," wrote scholars Hillary Mann and Flynt Leverett.34 After the victory of the Islamic Revolution, female literacy rates skyrocketed from 36 percent in 1976 to 74 percent in 1996, with urban women toping 82 percent.33 Women were provided with the same educational opportunities as men, and were employed in both the public and private sectors. Not only were women allowed to drive (unlike other "Islamic" countries), but also participated in political, commercial and civil activities, as well as in the security sector. Health care in the Islamic Republic included women's clinics, where progressive family planning and other services were available.35
"This united gathering which took place in Iran, and this great change which happened, must be taken as an example to be followed and never forgotten," said Imam Khomeini (r) on 7th of Esfand 1359 (26 February 1981).36 Despite that to date, no other Muslim-majority nation has yet to emulate successfully the revolutionary path taken by the valiant people of Iran, the paradigm remains as does the potential for Iran's leadership to bring about a united Islamic Ummah.
Eric Walberg, Islamic Resistance to Imperialism (Atlanta: Clarity Press, 2015), 277. [↩]
Farhang Rajaee, "Iranian Ideology and Worldview: The Cultural Export of Revolution," in The Iranian Revolution: Its Global Impact, ed. John L. Esposito (Miami: Florida International University Press, 1990), 66-67. [↩]
Amin Saikal, Iran Rising: The Survival and Future of the Islamic Republic (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019), 59-61. [↩] [↩]
John Esposito, "The Iranian Revolution: A Ten-Year Perspective," in The Iranian Revolution: Its Global Impact, ed. John L. Esposito (Miami: Florida International University Press, 1990), 31, 33. [↩]
Michael Axworthy, Revolutionary Iran: A History of the Islamic Republic (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 166-168. [↩]
Seyed Hossein Mousavian, Iran and the United States (New York: Bloomsbury, 2014), 36, 65. [↩]
Michael Axworthy, ibid., 176. [↩]
Gary Sick, All Fall Down: America's Tragic Encounter with Iran (New York: Random House, 1985), 288-289. [↩]
Dan Kovalik, The Plot to Attack Iran (New York: Skyhorse Publishing, 2018), 101. [↩]
Seyed Hossein Mousavian, ibid., 78, 81-82. [↩]
Eric Walberg, ibid., 62. [↩]
Amin Saikal, ibid., 80. [↩]
Dan Kovalik, ibid., 80. [↩]
Amin Saikal, ibid., 82-84. [↩]
Tawfiq Alsaif, Islamic Democracy and its Limits: The Iranian Experience Since 1979 (London: Saqi, 2007), 74. [↩]
Dan Kovalik, ibid., 127. [↩]
Seyed Hossein Mousavian, ibid., 100. [↩]
Gary Sick, "Trial and Error: Reflections on the Iran-Iraq War," in Iran's Revolution: The Search for Consensus, ed. R.K. Ramazani (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1990), 116-118. [↩]
Seyed Hossein Mousavian, ibid., 101-102. [↩]
Ayatollah Mohammad-Taqi Rahbar, Spiritual Dimensions of the Islamic Revolution of Iran, trans. Blake Archer Williams (Lion of Najaf Publishers, 2017), 84. [↩]
Charles Kurzman, The Unthinkable Revolution in Iran (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005), 4-8, 184. [↩]
Ervand Abrahamian, A History of Modern Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 155. [↩]
Asef Bayat, Making Islam Democratic (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007), 31-32. [↩]
Farhang Rejaee, Islam and Modernism: The Changing Discourse in Iran (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2007), 19-20. [↩]
Said Amir Arjomand, The Turban for the Crown: The Islamic Revolution in Iran (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 137. [↩]
Ayatollah Mohammad-Taqi Rahbar, ibid., 98. [↩]
Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett, Going to Tehran (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2013), 42, 80, 188-189. [↩]
Eric Walberg, ibid., 237. [↩] [↩]
Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett, ibid., 191. [↩]
Asef Bayat, ibid., 103. [↩] [↩]
Imam Khomeini, Fundamentals of the Islamic Revolution, trans. M.J. Khalili and S. Manafi Anari (Tehran: Institute for the Compilation and Publication of Imam Khomeini's Works, 2009), 168. [↩]
by Yuram Abdullah Weiler, Dissident Voice
Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force
The Manufactured Story about Iran's Nuclear Program
Israel used Mojahedin Khalq, MKO, MEK, Rajavi cult
As Iran and the world powers resume nuclear talks in Vienna with the hope of reaching a comprehensive agreement over Iran's nuclear program by mid-July, the Israelis and their lobbyists in Wa shington are intensifying their efforts to scuttle the talks. In addition to all the efforts in the US Congress to impose additional sanctions on Iran, thus bringing the talks to a premature end, there are indications that Israel and her friends are continuing with various acts of sabotage against Iranian nuclear facilities.
In 2010, the so-called Stuxnet virus temporarily disrupted the operation of thousands of Iranian centrifuges. At least five Iranian nuclear scientists have been assassinated. Iran has also said that it has discovered tiny timed explosives planted on centrifuges but has disabled them before they could go off. On Monday 17 March 2014, Iran said that an alleged attempt to sabotage one of its nuclear facilities had involved foreign intelligence agencies that had tampered with imported pumps. However, in addition to all those acts of sabotage, there seems to be an intensive effort to manufacture a crisis by means of false intelligence.
Prior to the devastating Iraq war that destroyed the country and killed upwards of half a million people, not to say anything of thousands of Coalition forces who were killed and the two trillion dollars that was spent, a number of neocons bent on the invasion of Iraq manufactured various false reports in order to mislead the public and pave the way for the war.
On September 8, 2002, Michael R. Gordon and Judith Miller published a story in the New York Times that openly alleged that Saddam Hussein had intensified his quest for a nuclear bomb. They wrote: "In the last 14 months, Iraq has sought to buy thousands of specially designed aluminum tubes, which American officials believe were intended as components of centrifuges to enrich uranium… Bush administration officials say the quest for thousands of high-strength aluminum tubes is one of several signs that Mr. Hussein is seeking to revamp and accelerate Iraq's nuclear weapons program."
The unsuspecting public was misled by that false intelligence and the result was one of the longest and most disastrous wars in US history.
How the manufactured crisis was manufactured
In his latest groundbreaking book, entitled A Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of Iran Nuclear Scare , the historian and investigative journalist Gareth Porter catalogs a long list of false reports manufactured by Israeli intelligence agencies in order to mislead the public and pave the way for a war against Iran.1
MC-cover-final-684x1024In this book Porter shows how Israeli agents have fabricated many stories in order to accuse Iran of trying to manufacture nuclear weapons. He also shows how the IAEA has been manipulated to put out reports suggesting that Iran had a covert weapons program. One instance of the false intelligence is the story of how some documents allegedly stolen from an Iranian nuclear weapons research program became a primary driving force in building a consensus about an Iranian covert program.
Porter shows how John Bolton cooperated with the Israelis to ensure that "the IAEA would not be able to allow Iran to get by without being accused of having a nuclear program, and he didn't believe that would be possible unless some special moves were made."2
Around the same time, in the absence of any proof that Iran was trying to get nuclear weapons, the Israelis decided to create a file of documents, which would be attributed to a covert nuclear weapons program. They got the terrorist group the Mojahedin-e Khalq to make the public case on behalf of Israel about the existence of a covert military program in Iran.
A major revelation in the book concerns the account provided by a former senior official in Germany's Foreign Ministry, Karsten Voigt , who was in charge of German-U.S. relation from 1997-2013 and who had warned his U.S. colleagues that the information about Iran's nuclear program had come from a member of the Mojahedin-e Khalq and was unreliable.
The German Intelligence Service, the BND, had warned the Americans during the run-up to the Iraq war that a source used by American officials, now known as Curveball, whose false stories about mobile bioweapons lab had been used by Colin Powell in his UN speech could not be relied upon. However, it seems that the aim of the policy-makers is not to ascertain the truth, but to make use of any material that backs their policies.
As we saw during the run-up to the Iraq war such false assumptions could be very dangerous and could justify an illegal war. The same thing seems to be happening again. As Jim Lobe pointed out in an important article, "Top Israel Lobby Group Loses Battle on Iran, but War Not over," frenzied efforts to demonize Iran and prevent the success of the talks are still continuing.3
Prominent neoconservative writers Bret Stephens and Reuel Marc Gerecht called for a much tougher approach to talks with Iran over its nuclear program in a debate hosted by the McCain Institute on March 11.4 In an article written in 2002, Reuel Marc Gerecht had argued that an invasion of Iraq would "probably" cause regime change in Iran. 5 As that did not happen, he is at it again, trying to bring the regime change by other means. Meanwhile, State Department Assures Israel that war is likely if Iran talks fail and that attacking Iran is "alternative" to diplomacy.6
However, faulty intelligence has enabled some US analysts to claim that Iran has a large-scale nuclear weapons program. However, none of these assumptions have been based on facts. Porter writes: "US and Israeli policies have been driven by political and bureaucratic interests, not by a rational, objective assessment of available indicators of the motives and intentions of Iranian leaders".
Nevertheless, the same faulty intelligence has enabled the West to take Iran's file out of the IAEA and into the U.N. Security Council and to impose unprecedented sanctions on Iran that have gravely affected Iranian economy and the lives of millions of Iranians.
A recent example: The Iranian ship with missiles heading from Iran to Gaza
It is clear that despite some setbacks the Israelis still continue to demonize Iran by any means possible. On the eve of Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Washington early in March 2014 to meet with President Obama and speak at the annual AIPAC conference, suddenly a story grabbed the headlines of most Israeli and US newspapers about the Israeli Special Forces seizing an Iranian ship with missiles heading from Iran to Gaza.
Haaretz reported: "Israeli naval forces on Wednesday intercepted an Iranian arms vessel carrying medium-range missiles in the Red Sea, about some 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) from the Israeli coast. The shipment was headed for the Gaza Strip via Sudan." The report helpfully added: "Israel is hoping the incident will help prove to the P5+1 that Iran is still deceiving the West, despite the friendly tone characterizing the recent talks in Vienna over the Islamic Republic's nuclear program."
According to the Israelis, the weaponry actually originated in Syria from where it was flown to Tehran. It was then put on board the Klos-C ship at the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas. From there it went to Um Qasr in Iraq, before heading back out of the Persian Gulf and round to the Red Sea where it was intercepted. 7
The Israelis say that it was due to dock in Port Sudan, from where the weapons would have moved overland through the Sinai Peninsula and ultimately into the Gaza Strip.
The fact that many parts of the story do not add up does not seem to bother anyone as long as it provides a backdrop to Netanyahu's appearance in Washington.
Why in the midst of a war would Syria send some of her most sophisticated weapons to Tehran to be then sent to Iraq before heading back to the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea to go through the Sinai Peninsula that is in the midst of intense insurgency activities, to then be sent to the Gaza Strip through the tunnels that have been destroyed by the new Egyptian regime?
And why it is acceptable for Israel to intercept the ship heading for Sudan in international waters? These are some of the questions that need to be answered.
It seems that those who concocted this story did not even know that since the start of the Syrian crisis Iran has broken with Hamas, which has clearly sided with the rebels. At a time when the Iranian government is getting close to the West and is on the verge of make-or-break talks with the West, why would Iranian leaders jeopardize the success of the talks by trying to smuggle weapons to Hamas, with which they have hostile relations?
As Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif's Twitter account noted, the weapons' shipment was seized just in time "for the AIPAC conference". He added: "An amazing coincidence! Or the same unsuccessful lies."
The post 9/11 Karine A story
Shortly after 9/11 when the then reformist government of President Mohammad Khatami expressed condolences to "the great American nation" and collaborated with the Americans in Afghanistan and a new chapter of more friendly relations was about to open up between Iran and America, we had a similar incident, the so-called Karine A affair. In that incident too, commandos from Israel's Navy seals unit allegedly swooped on the Karine A in international waters in the Red Sea, overpowering the crew of the ship and seizing the weapons that they claimed were intended for the Palestinian Authority headed by Yasser Arafat, with whom Iran did not have very warm relations
Ariel Sharon stood on the dock at Israel's Red Sea Port of Eilat displaying the alleged weapons that had been seized. The illegal seizure of the ship in international waters achieved Sharon's two main aims. It blew up the faint hopes of peace with the Palestinians, and at the same time it put an end to any rapprochement between Iran and the United States.
No excuse when it comes to Iran
If in the case of Iraq Western leaders could claim that they were not sure whether Iraq was pursuing nuclear weapons or not – although the "Dodgy Dossier" and fabricated intelligence by the Office of Special Plans created by Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith suggests otherwise – in the case of Iran they do not even have that excuse.
At least since 2003 when an Iranian negotiating team led by Hassan Rouhani and the European Troika (Great Britain, France and Germany) reached an agreement on Iran's nuclear program and Iran signed the Additional Protocol and even suspended enrichment for over two years, and certainly since 2007 when the NIE said with "high degree of confidence" that Iran did not have an ongoing nuclear weapons program, the world has known that all the hype about Iran's nuclear weapons was only aimed at manufacturing a false crisis.
It is in the light of all these previous experiences that Gareth Porter's A Manufactured Crisis is of such great significance, because it shows once and for all with meticulous documentation the nature of the lies concocted by Israel against Iran.
Questions we must ask
The question is why the information provided by the book is not at the top of the news in the Western press?
Why is the case against Iran not reviewed in the light of these revelations and why has a final deal not been reached?
What are the negotiators waiting for and what else do they need to have in order to be convinced of the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program?
Why is the public so quiet about all these lies and distortions, and why do they not speak out against a manufactured crisis that could affect us all?
Why are Israeli officials who have been guilty of such willful distortion of truth not brought to book and condemned by the international community?
Are we not colluding with all these lies and disinformation by remaining silent?
The Soviet dissident author Yevgeny Yevtushenko said: "When the truth is replaced by silence, the silence itself is a lie." It is time for all of us to speak out and put an end to all these lies.
•Gareth Porter, Manufactured Crisis (Just World Books, 2014) For a review of the book see: "A Manufactured Crisis", by Peter Jenkins, Lobe Log, January 29, 2014. [↩]
•See "Manufacturing a Narrative for War – Gareth Porter on Reality Assets Itself", The Real News Network, March 17, 2014. [↩]
•Jim Lobe, "Top Israel Lobby Group Loses Battle on Iran, But War Not Over", antiwar.com, January 23, 2014. [↩]
•See "Iran Nuclear Deal: Breakthrough or Failure"; Also see: Derek Davison, "Give Peace (Talks) a Chance?" Lobe Log, March 12, 2014 [↩]
•See: Reuel Marc Gerecht ,"Regime Change in Iran? Applying George W. Bush's 'liberation theology' to the mullahs", The Weekly Standard, August 5, 2002 [↩]
•See Jason Ditz, "State Department Assures Israel: War Likely if Iran Talks Fail. Attacking Iran Is 'Alternative' to Diplomacy", antiwar.com, February 01, 2014 [↩]
•See: Israel Halts 'Weapons Shipment from Iran', BBC [↩]
Dr Farhang Jahanpour is a former professor and dean of the Faculty of Languages at the University of Isfahan, Iran, and a former Senior Fulbright Research Scholar at Harvard. He is Associate Fellow at the Faculty of Oriental Studies and tutor in Middle Eastern Studies at the Department of Continuing Education at the University of Oxford Read other articles by Farhang, or visit Farhang's website.
Farhang Jahanpour
Beyond Double Standards–and Hypocrisy
Double standards have always been with us, but I wonder if they haven't reached new heights, along with hypocrisy, in the age of the "war on terrorism," "humanitarian intervention," and the proclaimed "responsibility to protect" (R2P), to be implemented by global interventionists who have institutionalized torture (or made it one de facto legitimate policy option), "extraordinary renditions" to torture regimes, the intensive use of drone bombings, including "double-tap" actions, and who have declared the entire earth a U.S. "free fire zone"?
These same drone organizers and apologists also speak almost daily about "our values" as they terrorize and kill, but see themselves as defending human rights and democracy and engaging in "self defense." George W. Bush attacked Iraq in alleged (but completely contrived) fear of Saddam Hussein's "weapons of mass destruction," but as soon as it became inescapably evident that this was a fraud, and that many thousands had already been killed based on this lie, Bush was allowed to be striving for freedom and democracy in Iraq, but for unknown reasons neglecting Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, and shrinking it in the homeland!
But his opening war-gambit-lie was salable to the New York Times and its colleagues, and to the intellectuals and pundits with influence. For example, on October 9, 2002, the saintly Elie Wiesel said on the Oprah Winfrey Show that "Anything is better than war. I am not for war. But we have to disarm that assassin"—namely Saddam Hussein, who, according to Bush, Cheney and Judith Miller, and hence Wiesel and Winfrey, possessed these WMD. Thus "War is the Only Option," in the title of Wiesel's subsequent commentary in The Observer (December. 22, 2002). It helps being a saint to be able to get away with such a blatant contradiction based on a lie.
After the WMD gambit was exhausted we had the gang quickly accepting the new "democracy promotion" objective in Iraq, because Bush said that was so, and was "risking all" in pressing on with it, as asserted by Michael Ignatieff in his New York Times classic, "Who Are the American People to Think That Freedom is Theirs to Spread" (October. 7, 2005). George Packer, writing in the New Yorker back in 2004, agreed with Ignatieff that "it's clear that, however clumsy and selective the execution, Bush wants democratization to be his legacy. So when his critics, here and abroad, claim that his rhetoric merely provides cynical cover for an American power grab, they misjudge his sincerity and tend to sound like defenders of the status quo." ("Invasion versus Persuasion, " New Yorker, December 20, 2004.). So Packer, like Ignatieff, knows that Bush was sincere, but he is not a defender of the status quo and does suggest that we should "hold him to his own talk."
The "terrorism" double standard has long been institutionalized, with establishment spokespersons internalizing the propaganda rule that we and the Israelis only "retaliate" to the terrorism of enemies and targets. The establishment pundits have been able to swallow a lot, and play dumb on a large scale, to stay with this usage. Thus Luis Posada Carriles, a member in high-standing of the Cuban refugee terror network, guilty of numerous terrorist acts, including the bombing of a Cuban airliner in 1976 with 73 resultant deaths, walks the streets of Miami today and is beyond extradition, whereas the United States is working hard to get Julian Assange extradited to this country for prosecution for whistleblowing on U.S. diplomacy and terrorist-war criminal acts. (His most notorious disclosure was of a U.S. helicopter team in Iraq remorselessly killing civilians and journalists on the ground, a revelation that clearly threatened U.S. national security.)
It should also be noted that while killer Posada is free, the Cuban Five infiltrators of Cuban terrorist groups in Florida who were seized in the United States in 1998 while trying to gain information on terrorist plots against Cuba, and shared some of this information with the FBI, have been imprisoned since 1998, their counter-terrorism efforts transformed into espionage.
These manifestations of a gross double standard, hypocrisy, and serious injustice, are ignored by the mainstream media and don't interfere with the rule that the United States is fighting a "war on terror."
The most recent display of the terrorism double standard is the State Department's September 2012 removal of the Iranian opposition group, the Mujahedin e-Khalq (MEK), from its list of designated terrorist organizations. The MEK worked earlier on behalf of Saddam Hussein and sometimes killed Americans, and reportedly has collaborated with the Israelis in assassinating Iranian scientists, but with the escalated U.S.-Israel low-level warfare against Iran, MEK can be moved into a new, more positive "freedom fighter" category. This has other amusing features. For one thing, MEK has very large amounts of money that it has spent in organizing protests and lobbying in Europe and the United States, the funding suspected to come from the freedom-loving Saudis and other governments hostile to Iran. Even while on the terrorist list, MEK was able to organize, propagandize and lobby in the United States and elsewhere in the West. It has also paid large sums to U.S. notables like Howard Dean, Tom Ridge, Rudy Giuliani, Newt Gingrich and Ed Rendell to write and speak on their behalf. No prosecutions are in prospect for "material aid" to terrorists in this case.
One of the wonders of the war on terror is its massive use of airpower, increasingly drone warfare, and the U.S.'s ability to get this accepted in the West as a response to terror and not a case of terrorism itself. This has, of course, been accompanied by complementary apologetics: notably, that military targets are carefully chosen so that any "innocent" civilian deaths are not deliberate but unintended "collateral damage." But if civilian deaths are predictable even if the specific victims are not known, the killings are deliberate and war crimes. Furthermore, the claims of care in targeting, and concern, and denials that civilian killings are sometimes quite acceptable, are false, but are taken as true by patriotic pundits and intellectuals (see my "Tragic Errors In U.S. Military Policy: Targeting the civilian population," Z Magazine, September, 2002).
The long U.S. use of depleted uranium and cluster bombs is testimony to an anti-civilian bias in military operations, as is the long tradition of "we don't make body counts." The Iraq war of 2003 was begun with a "shock and awe" bombing program that was openly designed to terrorize the leaders and population and encourage surrender. The same was true of the 1999 escalation of the bombing of Serbia and increased orientation to attacking civilian facilities. But no matter: The United States does not terrorize, by patriotic and power definition.
It is also notable that studies which focus intensively on terrorism from the air are ignored or downplayed by the mainstream media. The fine book by Beau Grosscup on Strategic Terror: The Politics and Ethnics of Aerial Bombardment (Zed Books, 2006) was not reviewed in any mainstream source in the United States. The mainstream may be preoccupied with "terrorism," but writings on the subject have to stay within the party-line orbit to get a hearing,
A real problem has been presented to the media by the September 2012 report produced jointly by a Stanford Law School and New York University School of Law team entitled Living Under Drones, and based on over 130 interviews carried out in Pakistan. The authors claim that the vast majority of victims of the drone war attacks are civilians, not "militants"—only 2 percent of those killed were identified as known "militants." The Stanford-NYU authors explicitly deny the official claims of precise surgical strikes by the drones: "This narrative is false." They also report that an important feature of the drone war is the regular use of a second missile strike shortly after the first strike—the combination euphemistically labelled a "double tap"—killing many local onlookers and rescue workers coming to the aid of the first-strike's victims. These secondary strikes "have discouraged average civilians from coming to one another's rescue, and even inhibited the provision of emergency medical assistance from humanitarian workers." The Director of the charitable organization Reprieve is quoted in the report as saying:
An entire region is being terrorized by the constant threat of death from the skies…. Their way of life is collapsing… kids are too terrified to go to school, adults are afraid to attend weddings, funerals, business meeting or anything that involves gathering in groups.
This sounds like a really dirty war OF terrorism, but while this is suggested in the London Independent (Jerome Taylor, "Outrage at CIA's deadly 'double tap' drone strikes," September 25, 2012), the New York Times had not yet mentioned the existence of the Living Under Drones document at the time of writing (September 30, 2012). This is not news fit-to-print rapidly and with prominence, as happens when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asserts that the government of Bashir Al-Assad would have "blood on its hands" if it "refuses to allow this life-saving aid [that Clinton promises] to reach civilians" (Steven Lee Myers, "Nations Rebuke Leader of Syria as Assault Rages," NYT, February 25, 2012. p 1; see also the long NYT article of March 3, 2012 on "Syria Blocks Red Cross From Taking Aid to Devastated Rebel Enclave in Homs").
This brings us to some other double standard marvels. Iran is under steady attack and threat because of its alleged non-cooperation with the West and its UN instrument, the International Atomic Energy Agency, in their efforts to get Iran to terminate its nuclear program. Meanwhile, the United States can refuse to carry out its NPT promise to work toward the elimination of nuclear weapons, and Israel can build up a sizeable nuclear weapons arsenal with Western collusion outside of any IAEA jurisdiction, and both can threaten Iran on a daily basis, in a double standard that would be hard to surpass.
Similarly, Israel can ethnically cleanse Palestinians on a systematic basis for decades without any penalty from the "international community" which, in fact, gives consistent support to this immoral and illegal process. Only when a U.S. and Western target is accused of ethnic cleansing, as with Serbia in the 1990s, do the Western moralists, officials and their UN agents get aroused and move into action.
The hegemony of the double standard, and its partner, hypocrisy, flows from concentrated power, and their joint success in this modern age that, according to Steven Pinker, is one of the "Long Peace," "recivilization" and the rise of our "better angels" after an unfortunate period like the 1960s. It is a marvelous illustration of the human capacity for self-deception.
• First published in Z Magazine, November 2012
Edward S. Herman is an economist and media analyst with a specialty in corporate and regulatory issues as well as political economy and the media.
by Edward S. Herman
MEK Camp Ashraf
The Continuing Story of Camp Ashraf
According to multiple news sources and Iranian exiles with contacts in the People's Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) camp in Iraq known as Camp Ashraf, the camp was attacked by Iraqi forces on July 28 and 28, 2009.
At least eleven camp residents were killed. Also, according to these same sources, the attack was witnessed by US forces who sat by and did nothing, despite pleas from wounded Iranians. It is believed that the reason for the attack was a promise made by the al-Maliki government in Baghdad to Tehran that they would close the camp down. Iraqi officials have denied this, saying simply that they wished to establish a police post there. Meanwhile, the camp residents have asked for US protection.
The PMOI and the National Council of Resistance in Iran (NCRI) are the modern day representatives of an Iranian resistance group that goes back to the days of the Shah. Their beginnings are in the student movement that rose up against the Shah and US imperialism, ultimately throwing the Shah out of the country. The group itself has undergone several ideological changes since its inception and is currently best typified as a secular organization opposed to the social conservatism of the theocratic government in Tehran. To go beyond this general description requires considerably more space than is available here.
Unfortunately for the PMOI, it was categorized as a terrorist organization by the Bill Clinton administration. It continues to carry this designation in the US, although the designation was removed by the European Union earlier in 2009. On top of this label, which has certainly isolated the NCRI and PMOI from potential support among certain elements of the US power structure, the PMOI and NCRI have found their friendliest allies in the US amongst the pro-Zionist wing of the neoconservative movement. Although one can conceive of this support as simply a cynical move by the neocons to gain Iranian intelligence available to the NCRI in their never-ending drumbeat towards an attack on Iran, the other side of the coin is that the NCRI and PMOI have curried this favor. This fact alone has made it next to impossible for the members of these groups to get any positive press or support from the US left and antiwar movement. Indeed, this coziness was enough to convince this writer to view these organizations with considerable caution, despite professing guarded support for them in the past. After all, in the US, it does matter who one shares their political bed with.
This attack and its aftermath is not about the PMOI's all too apparent coziness with elements of the neoconservative establishment in the United States. It is about a human rights violation by Washington's client government in Iraq. This is also not the recent elections in Iran and whether or not they were fair. It is about a group of dissidents who appear to be somewhat isolated from their natural constituency while also being surrounded by well-armed US and Iraqi military with instructions to keep them penned where they are.
It is wrong that the members of the PMOI were attacked by forces of the Maliki government in Baghdad on July 28 and 29, 2009 while US forces looked on. It is the right thing to expose this action and to ask that it not be repeated. The attack exists as a human rights violation in a country that is a vast ocean of human rights violations, many of them the result of the US invasion. It should be condemned. Yet, for some reason, the PMOI is asking one of the greatest human rights violators in Iraq and elsewhere around the world–the US government–to protect them.
Ron Jacobs is the author of The Way The Wind Blew: A History of the Weather Underground. His most recent novel Short Order Frame Up is published by Mainstay Press. He can be reached at: rjacobs3625@charter.net. Read other articles by Ron, or visit Ron's website.
Andres Kargar replies to the article:
While I agree that the Iraqi attack on Mujahedin was a violation of the human rights of the residents of the camp, I should also state a few other facts that are missing from this article.
Firstly, the decision of the leadership of the Mujahedin to remain in Iraq was made in order to continue their activities to destabilize the Islamic Republic regime in Iran.
Today, the political orientation of the Mujahedin Organization is no longer what it used to be when they employed a mix of religion and Marxism to struggle against the dictatorial regime of the Shah. They have remained in Iraq to serve the interests of Israel and the United States. Prior to that, they were serving as the propaganda tool of Iraq's Saddam Hussein against Iran. That was the mistake that eroded any degree of support they might have enjoyed among Iranians.
Many of the residents of camp Ashraf are there against their will. There are many teams of husbands and wives in that camp who have been kept totally separated from one another, since men and women there live in totally separate quarters.
Eager to disband the threat of Mujahedin, the Iranian regime has offered asylum to those members who desert their posts and turn themselves in. Some who have managed to get away have sought and been granted asylum in Iran.
And finally, many (but perhaps not the majority) of those in Camp Ashraf are also citizens of the United States or one of the European countries. If they wanted to and were allowed, they could be repatriated to those countries.
by Ron Jacobs
Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group
What Kind of Alternative?
The Iranian Mojahedin: What Kind of Alternative? The People's Mojahedin of Iran has of late been receiving increasing coverage by the Western and especially the US mainstream press, who quote them copiously, ala Ahmed Chalabi, as "opposition sources." Since any aggressive move to be made against Iran by the US will likely include this opposition grouping in some form or shape, some of us leftist opposition members feel obliged to present a dissuasive picture of this organization to our good friends in the US left, so as to prevent the good folks from taking the People's Mojahedin of Iran, in their current incarnation, as any friend of the Peoples of Iran.
The Mojahedin Khalq of Iran was originally created as a revolutionary urban guerrilla organization during the rule of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's corrupt and incompetent dictatorship, initially as a study group in 1965, and later as a guerrilla organization in 1968. From their inception they formed an alternative to Fada'iyan Khalq, a contemporary Marxist revolutionary organization, as well as to the older Jebhe-ye Melli (National Front; a nationalist liberal party), the Ayatollahs, and the Tudeh Party (the oldest communist party in Iran; a Stalinist bunch at their cleverest). In subsequent years, Mojahedin's supporters came mainly from the educated urban lower classes whose politico-cultural inclinations were more religious than secular, and their class aspirations petty bourgeois; forward-looking and progressive in some areas, not so certain in others, and reactionary and backward looking in yet others.
Fast forward now to the interval immediately after the overthrow of the Shah. The period between the installation of Khomeini's regime in 1979 and the first wave of crackdowns of 1981 was a historical period filled with excitement as well as with opportunities. Organizations that had previously worked underground could now emerge and breathe relatively freely, and start to grow in the open, make mistakes, learn, and do so with and among the people. The revolutionary organizations, in their historical fight to be heard and be allowed to advocate freely, found the new open atmosphere to their advantage.
The openness, created by the revolutionary surge of the people and not "given" by some magnanimous state, was filled with the creative energies of millions of activists of all political stripes. The openness was also a two-edged sword since the security forces and fanatic goons were just as actively taking down names and addresses, following leftists, feminists, communists, minority activists, as well as the supporters and members of the Mojahedin. This, so that when they had organized themselves enough, they could sweep out the opposition as effectively as possible.
So, when the Mojahedin, in true Blanquist fashion, in June 1981 assumed that they could carry the revolution further all by themselves by calling for a general uprising for which they had done zero preparation, while making a pact with President Bani-sadr's supposed "social democratic" faction already in power, all they accomplished was to take their first decisive step away from the people by jumping the gun, by not preparing enough, by hastening the crackdown, when they should have instead stayed with the people, educated and been educated better by others, organized more, worked more patiently, created better underground infrastructure and a better counter-intelligence gathering system before making a move that could not have been corrected midcourse.
In short, by refusing to do the hard, long and complicated work, the Mojahedin leadership exhibited extremely poor political judgment, fatal immaturity, and an instinctive distrust for the people. On top of that, they left their cadres and supporters wide open for brutal repression that they should have expected and should have been prepared for. The "uprising" in tatters, the Mojahedin leadership joined President Bani-sadr on his airplane and flew to Paris to conduct together the upcoming soon (just around the corner, see it?) revolution, for which everybody is still waiting.
The great leader, Rajavi, also inaugurated a new protocol of literally marrying his new allies; in this case, since Bani-sadr was physiologically a male, his daughter (at the time a minor) would have to do.
It should of course be pointed out that the Mojahedin have been commendable and tireless in their diplomatic overtures, mostly toward European Parliamentarians and US Congressional staffers, Representatives or Senators who would hold audience with them (before the Mojahedin joined the US State Department's list of terrorist organizations).
On other fronts, we can be sure they have underground cells in Iran, something very handy when, for example, it has come to providing Uncle Sam with information that the CIA was missing, thereby filling the intelligence gaps regarding the "nuclear issue" in Iran, so that if/when the time comes that intelligence can be used to bomb Iranian cities, much like the "intelligence" Chalabi provided led to the bombings of Iraqi cities and civilians; with no lives left un-bombed.
And, of course, there is that part of the organization's fighting capability that renders them the "biggest and best-organized" opposition grouping (which can then be presented to the American people as the badge of their righteousness): Mojahedin's armed forces, currently and for the past twenty years, stationed in Iraqi Kurdistan. These armed capabilities, including tank squadrons, are mostly rusted; much like their fighters who are by now mostly graying men and women. Hardly a guerrilla organization anymore, their fighting capabilities isolated, demoralized, paranoid, trapped and at the mercy of various dictators: Saddam Hussein, then Paul Bremer, and then Allawi/Pentagon. Take your pick which one's worse.
As for their political maneuverings, the Mojahedin, starting with their collusion with Bani-sadr, have made one political blunder after another. Let us not pass too quickly over Bani-sadr. In polite society he has come to be remembered as a liberal in casual as well as academic conversations; a man with social democratic visions. Due to his lack of political foresight, he did not serve long enough for history to be left with any evidence of his "social democratic" policies.
His government was a strong believer in the "territorial integrity doctrine," according to which national minorities should keep quiet about such basic human rights as speaking their own languages in their schools, since this would naturally lead to cessations and the eventual disintegration of the country. Why the latter would "naturally" follow from the former is a mystery to democratic-minded people, minority or not.
This was the political figure that the Mojahedin, supposedly respectful of national minority rights, decided to go to bed with, with disastrous results.
Mojahedin's move to ally themselves with Bani-sadr was a very decisive one. Political organizations, revolutionary or not, make choices based on their vision of the kind of power they would like to exercise. You either trust in the transformative powers of your ideas and go to the people, or else you are in too much of a hurry to get to power and join hands with people up above. Ever since their marriage with, and later divorce from, Bani-sadr (and his daughter), Mojahedin's political strategizing has consisted in collusion with the people up above.
It is in fact very revealing that a certain Mr. Mohaddessin, in a self-promoting book about the history of The National Council of Resistance of Iran (the book is titled Enemies of the Ayatollahs), as pointed out by Ron Jacobs (Counterpunch, April 9-10, 2004), would make overtures to that sniveling joke of an ideologue Daniel Pipes. Now, do you think our Mr. Mohaddessin is unaware of the intricacies of rank and etiquette observed among the US organic intellectuals at the service of the US's national security apparatus?
The Mojahedin have been in the halls of the US Congress lobbying this way or that, since the late 1970s. So, we are not dealing with naïve neophytes who do not know their lobbyists and ideologues from assorted other shysters. Should we not wonder then why the Mojahedin are so intent on having connections to the Imperial halls of government? What kind of organization would so consistently try to secure a leg in the doors of the houses of power in the foremost Imperial powerhouses, and still call itself progressive and revolutionary, and insist that it is looking out for the good of the Iranian people? Are they unaware of the US's historical interventions in Iran? Have they so easily forgotten that the Shah, whom they fought against courageously in the 1970s, was installed by the very people frequenting those same halls?
But the most important aspect of the Mojahedin that should keep our attention focused has to do with their ideological make-up. They are in fact a variation on a theme demonstrated by the regime that currently suffocates Iran. Those familiar with Mojahedin's old newspapers remember well that in Payam-e Mojahed (their political organ) in the period of 1977-1979, they repeatedly quoted ayatollah Khomeini in approving tones and gave him glowing editorials. In fact, the organization's original philosophical mentor, Ali Shari'ati, whose outlook was a mixture of Franz Fanon's and political Islam, was the "progressive" flip side of Khomeini's reactionary coin.
An Alternative for Whom?
By 1984, it became obvious to Mojahedin's leadership that the Islamic Republic regime would not pack its bags, run and crumble on Mojahedin's signal. So, they had to do some real calculating since the "thinking" behind their previous maneuverings had not borne any fruits, being based exclusively on the inevitable downfall of Iran's regime through a spontaneous uprising of the people, on Mojahedin's prompting, just like that.
In view of the repeated failures of the revolution to materialize, the Mojahedin realized an "ideological revolution" was necessary to solidify the internal resolve of the organization. Subsequently, cooperation with other organizations and groups became increasingly unnecessary except for some showcases. The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), initially comprising organizations and individuals exhibiting the same haste and blindness of political foresight and mesmerized by the prospects that the "inevitable" downfall held for them, eventually emptied out and was left with Mojahedin as the main warm bodies, along with a few small organizations, mostly civic organizations created by the Mojahedin themselves (for an excellent account of this, see Ervand Abrahamian's The Iranian Mojahedin).
The "ideological revolution" for most of us secular leftists, as well as for the general population, was a source of astonishment mixed with great amusement. In a series of moves, topped by an odd divorce/marriage episode among the dear leaders, the leadership managed to transform the organization into an almost cult-like, militarized social organism.
The divorce/marriage episode was of the most bizarre, to put it generously, since it brought out a strange-looking medieval aspect manifest in Mojahedin's new face. To most of us staring in disbelief, it looked like the leadership had decided to commit something so outrageous that only the truly dedicated would remain in their ranks, and all others would duly ship out (which is exactly what happened).
For the marriage that would bring in a new era, the dear leader Rajavi had his eyes on his best friend's wife. Maryam Azadanlu, the younger sister of a veteran member, and the wife of Mehdi Abrishamchi (an old veteran and one of the more charismatic leaders of the organization), was a political asset of huge value due to her political militancy and credentials, and her nostalgic associations were deemed important enough to give cohesion to the newly transformed ideological atmosphere, so she was promoted to the role of "co-leader". This promotion of a woman to the rank of "co-leader" was to prove to the world the organization's great respect for women. However, because "To have remained co-leaders, without being married would have been mere bourgeois formalism," [1] there had to be a divorce so that there could be a marriage between the co-leaders. Some may ask, as we did: What-on-earth kind of logic dictates that a woman has to divorce her husband and marry a leader in order to have a leadership role?!
And Iranian women are supposed to be impressed by that!
I tremble at the thought of such organizations in power . As should any secular progressive, any socialist, any leftist, feminist, anarchist, human rights activist, or democrat, as do most ordinary Iranian citizens. The stuff of liberation the Iranian Mojahedin does not make.
The Mojahedin, should they fail to prefigure themselves into some calculation of Uncle Sam's, are for the most part politically obsolete as an alternative. And should they find in America a suitable patron, they will then be the very opposite of progressive. Lacking the US patronage, at best they have to compete on very stiff terms with most other oppositional groupings, no matter how small and no matter how disorganized, when it comes to vying for legitimacy among the Iranian public. They have very little public support inside Iran, and are in fact reviled by most ordinary people because of the patronage bestowed on them by Saddam, the invader of Iran. Being political creatures with a thick skin, however, the Mojahedin leadership has to ignore their own impotence and instead resign to repeating habitually to all that they are the "biggest and best-organized" opposition, and can provide a "safe" alternative to the regime in Iran. Safe for whom, we wonder!
Which way not out?
Others may, but we cannot afford to forget that Khomeini and his "liberal" cohorts too (including Bani-sadr, who did them wondrous service), while still in Paris, and before Khomeini's flight home, knew of the necessity for international public consumption to talk approvingly of democracy. Some of us remember the headlines very vividly to this day: Even Communists Will Be Free!
The most elementary tasks and fundamental duties of any Middle Eastern leftist, at this point in our history, revolve around creating a more effective secular language and practice with which to engage the ongoing political struggles, in an effort to rebuild a secular and progressive alternative. The way forward can only be in that direction. Any form of a religious regime or a puppet government imposed by imperialists is only a step back, a dead end.
Since the Mojahedin depend increasingly on imperial backing, it is only natural for the people to mistrust them instinctively. Deals can be made, coups can be arranged for sure, but a true social transformation requires enlightened inspiration, and the Mojahedin's doctrines and their active role as Uncle Sam's snitch simply do not inspire confidence among Iranians of all political persuasions.
[1] Abrahamian, quoting Mojahedin's Proclamation of Introduction of New Leadership (1985), in The Iranian Mojahedin (Yale University Press, 1989), p. 251.
Rosa Faiz
Rajavi did not allow him to call his sick mother
The mother of Taymaz Vahedi ask for the release of her son from the MEK
Mostafa Beheshti's testimony on sexual harassment in the MEK
Farhad Saadat has been never allowed to contact his family
Video message to a brother taken as hostage in the MEK
© 2003 - 2022 NEJAT Society . All Rights Reserved. NejatNGO.org


text:
How I was the first person to tweet the first image of the Zika virus in the United States
On Sunday, the first tweets from the first day of the first public outbreak of Zika virus were sent by the first U.S. Twitter user.
In the first tweet, a man in Texas called out his Twitter handle, @mikehugh.
That tweet came at 11:37 p.m. local time (7:37 a.m., ET).
At 11:38 p.o.m, that same man tweeted the hashtag #MikeHugh to express his shock and disbelief at the viral outbreak, and then he tweeted out a series of other tweets to express frustration and frustration over the crisis, and also a photo of a man with a mask, presumably the man in the mask.
The Twitter user, who asked to be identified only as @MikeHugh, then added a photo with the hashtag, #MileHigh.
That Twitter user was tweeting from a Dallas apartment complex.
His Twitter handle was @hughmike, a reference to the movie Mile High on the Hill.
He posted a photo on Twitter of himself wearing the mask he had been wearing the day before, and posted another tweet about the crisis on Saturday.
On Monday, he was tweeting again, this time with a photo he had taken that day with his wife and their two young children, and a hashtag that read #MilesHigh.
By the time @haughworried at 7:40 p.s.m (5:40 a.u.m.), his Twitter account had more than 1.7 million followers.
@haughey The first tweet came just before 11:43 p.t.
(6:43 a.v.t.) on Monday.
@MileHugh had tweeted out the hashtag for several hours, with the first two tweets being the first and last tweets of the day.
@Hughmikes tweets were followed by more tweets from @houghworries and @huggys tweets.
@Mike Hugh tweeted at 11 p.c.
(10 p.i.s.) and was followed by a number of tweets from people asking for help, including @Huggys family, @Haughmikes children, @hutchy, @Mikey_G, @Mike_Hugh.
The hashtag #mikey_hugh came next.
That morning, HUGH tweeted that he had just been told that a man from Florida had been diagnosed with the Zika strain.
HUGH: I was just told that he has a fever and will be out of the hospital for two weeks.
@mickhughhue This tweet was followed shortly thereafter by a tweet from @michael_hughes son, who had just left his hospital room and was tweeting about how he was feeling OK.
@michele_huggins, mom of @mikethenhuggens son, said she was not sure if she had ever seen him this happy.
HUGGINS: He has been going to the hospital every day for the past few days.
@MichaelHuggins @Mike_Huggens @michelahughes @mickehuggers @HUGHHUGGINES: He is still getting through the flu.
@MicheleHugginas family told me that @mikes wife was sick for a while, so @milehugh was at the hospital.
HUTCH: She is still recovering.
The tweet was accompanied by another tweet from Michael Huggins daughter, who was tweeting in a different tweet, saying that her mom was still in the hospital, and that she had a little boy who was at a birthday party.
HOGGINS (to her daughter): He is doing great.
HUFF: That tweet was retweeted by Michael HUGGs son, @Michaelhuggs, who said his mother was doing great and that he would be home soon.
Huggin's tweets were accompanied by a photo from the hospital where his mother had been hospitalized, and another tweet to a family member, who is also a patient at the University of Texas Medical Branch, about how good she was doing and how she was going to be OK.
He later added another tweet, to another family member: My mom is in ICU.
I think she is doing well.
HUFGH: She has been to the emergency room.
HUHAG: She's doing great, I am going to keep a close eye on her.
HAG: I know she will be OK and we will all be praying for her.
@daveyhutchys tweets came after the first official tweets from Texas.
@D_Hutchys, the father of @davidhutchins son, sent out his own tweet that morning.
HUKES: My husband just called me at 7 pm
Big data: data warehouses can save you a lot of time
Facebook's missing data data

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


John Lennon once said "Life is what happens while you are making other plans" And its true. We seem to get so caught up in our own little plans and schemes that we forget that life is happening all around us, right now.
Now don't get me wrong, anticipation is a beautiful thing. It can give us a heightened sense of excitement. Think back to what it was like being a kid waiting for Christmas morning. The anticipation that built up once December hit was incredible.
The waiting that I am talking about is the kind where you think your life will be all sorted by the time you reach ( fill in the magical number) age. Or the "I'll be happy when...."; the kids start school, finish school, leave home, when I weigh ( fill in the other magical number), when the house is renovated, we get a new car and on and on the list goes.
And our life slips by while we wait for everything to be just right.
Goldilocks had it all right in front of her: the ready made porridge, the cozy beds but she still managed to find fault with everything before settling on the perfect bowl of porridge and the perfect bed. And we are the same. Life is laid before us, in all it's glory and we choose to wait for the right time, for things to be perfect, or for some other ephemeral thing.
I've been gulity of it myself. When I was younger I thought that things would look and be a certain way by the time I was thirty ( they weren't). I thought life would change radically when we moved house ( it didn't) but most damaging of all has been what I have denied myself in the process.
For years I didn't go swimming because I thought I was too fat and hideous to wear a bathing suit and then one day I changed my mind. I bought a bathing suit and went swimming. The Earth did not stop. In fact people barely even noticed. The day that I first ventured into a public swimming pool no-one even batted an eye. You see the thing is everybody is only wondering what people are thinking of them so they don't have time to worry about you too.
I know I'm not the only one. We all seem to have this crazy idea that we have to be perfect and yet a lot of the things that we love about life were accidents or mistakes. Failure happens and you survive and often, your life is richer for the mistakes that you made. Your grow and stretch and realize that mistake wasn't a tragedy after all.
The movie "The Bucket List" got a lot of people taking action.
If you haven't seen it go rent it our and watch it. Two old guys decide to do things that they have always wanted to do because they are both dying. The sad thing is we all are dying we just don't know when. I guess this was brought home to me earlier this year with the two deaths in my family. My brother was diagnosed with cancer in 2012 and so he took up floristry, something he had always been interested in. Sadly he passed away in February this year but at least he got to try something he had always wanted to.
There is a Grumpy Cat meme that I love that says: There are two things I hate... change..... and the way things are. Which sums it up nicely, none of us likes change but a lot of us aren't happy with the way our life is either so we need to take action - even if it is one small step in the direction you want to go. Start. Now.
(1) Brainstorm ideas of everything you have ever wanted to do.
Get it all down on paper and then take a look at it and cross off anything that isn't what you really want to do. Sometimes the things that we thought we wanted were just what we thought we should want and not what we actually want.
This is the old fake it til you make it trick. My husband and I play a game where we talk about things as if they have already happened and we are enjoying them now. It helps shift your focus from what is happening at present so that you are a great er vibratory match for what it is you are trying to create.
As Einstein says "You cannot solve a problem from the same consciousness that created it. You must learn to see the world anew.
If you have created a vision board hopefully you have written some affirmations on there as well. Affirmations are always written in the present tense and some times this feels like we are lying to ourselves. Or our inner voice is going "I don't think so" One way around this is to state it this way "I am in the process of.... losing weight, becoming a millionaire, winning lotto"or whatever else you are wanting to create . This shifts the focus to the reality - you are a work in progress.
Ahh my old favorite. Give thanks for what you already have. Want a new, slimmer body? Love the one you already have because you cannot change anything from a position of hate. Want a flash car? Be grateful that the one you have already works fine and gets you where you need to go. I'm sure you get the idea.


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Alcohol and Drug Addiction Treatment in Calgary
If you think you or someone you love may be experiencing an addiction or are seeking treatment in Calgary for an alcohol use disorder or drug use disorder, we can help. The following page provides some general information about alcohol and drug use disorders to help you get started, but please feel free to contact us for further information at the phone number above if you have questions or would like to book an appointment.
There are many misconceptions about what an addiction is. First, let me say a few things about what it is not. Common misconceptions about addiction can be found in the type of statements that people say to make the case that they are not addicted. These include: "I don't consume alcohol or use illicit drugs every day." "I can--and do--stop using for periods of time." "I don't use or drink alone." "My drinking or using patterns are no different from that of my friends." "I'm not hiding it. I only drink on social occasions."
In my experience as an addictions counsellor, I have heard all of these statements used at one point or another to rationalize drinking or using patterns that are, in fact, problematic. Addiction is not defined by how frequently one uses, how much one uses at a time, how much one uses overall, when one uses, or who one uses with. More correctly, none of these factors, by themselves, are indicators of an addiction, although all of them are, in fact, taken into consideration when looking at the big picture.
So, then, what is an addiction? One definition of addiction, is as follows:
A Definition of Addiction
A long-term pattern of repeated use of a substance in such a manner as to cause or exacerbate harmful consequences in any domain of one's life - physical, emotional, relational, legal, spiritual, financial -- and, despite the accumulating negative consequences of using the substance, the person continues to use it.
As you can see, this definition starts to get at the heart of addiction -- repeated use of a substance despite evident and repeated negative consequences.
First, there is an element of repetition. In other words, there has to be a pattern of use that leads to harm. If you go overboard on how much you drink once or twice a year and do something while drinking that you regret later, that, by itself, does not mean you are addicted. But if you've been drinking heavily, or binging, every month, or every two weeks, or weekly, or at some other regular interval for at least the past twelve months, and on many of those occasions you feel guilty about it afterward, or there is damage to your relationship from it, or you end up doing something you regret, then that might be a red flag.
Second, there is an element of harm involved. You and your spouse might fight more destructively when you're drinking, for example. You might experience blackouts. You might miss important obligations because you were drinking or hungover. You might become more aggressive with others. Other harmful consequences include giving up important recreational activities with your family, breaking the trust of one's spouse or partner, not taking care of one's body, feeling guilty and ashamed about one's drinking or using, experiencing legal problems, underperforming at work, or feeling awful, depressed, irritable or anxious the next day.
Third, despite the consequences, you continue to drink or use. Think about it this way. If a person drank socially, and on occasion they consumed too much alcohol and encountered some trouble because of it, they would say, "I'm not doing that again," and they would change something about their behavior so as to prevent further negative consequences of their drinking. And they would most likely be successful.
But someone who is addicted cannot do this, or cannot do this consistently, even when they try. Sooner or later, despite their efforts to control or prevent the harm, they end up consuming too much of the substance again. This happens again and again. Not necessarily every day, and not necessarily every time, but regularly and repeatedly, it happens enough that the harm continues to pile up over time.
Next: Part 2 of 3: How Can I Know if My Alcohol or Drug Use is a Problem?
Or Click Here to Expand All Three Parts of This Article on One Webpage
Being Sober: A Step-by-Step Guide to Getting To, Getting Through, and Living in Recovery
by Harry Haroutunian
An excellent resource on understanding treatment of substance addiction. I especially like the chapter on the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. In this chapter, the author describes each Step in detail, including the principles and potential pitfalls of each step, as well as his own simplified version of the meaning of each step. Dr. Haroutunian rewords Step One, for example, "We admitted we were powerless over alcohol -- that our lives had become unmanageable" to "There is a power that wants to kill me." Step Two, "Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity," becomes "There is a Power that wants me to live." Includes a chapter on the high functioning addict, what to expect in recovery, a discussion on abstinence vs. harm reduction, a discussion of the distinction between spirituality and religiosity, a description of AA meetings, and more. A very good introduction to the world of addiction recovery.
In Canada? Click here to order from Amazon.ca instead
Beyond the Influence: Understanding and Defeating Alcoholism
by Katherine Ketcham and William F. Asbury
Much of what this book is about could be described by the phrase found on the back cover: "Alcoholism is a disease. It's time we started treating it like one." In the first half of this book, the authors describe the science behind the neurobiology of alcohol addiction, how alcohol affects the brain and the body, along with a comprehensive description of the early, middle and late phases of alcoholism. The second half of the book includes chapters on inpatient treatment, relapse prevention, counselling for co-morbid issues, spirituality and nutrition. It's a bit dated now, but its still very informative and one I would recommend. The author, Katherine Ketchum is also author of Under the Influence, considered a classic in the field.
The following links lead to online resources that may help further:
Official site of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services Inc..
What its Like to Attend Your First Meeting
Here is an excellent online article that addresses one of the most common psychological barriers to attending AA: anxiety about attending your first meeting. This article, produced by professionals at Futures Palm Beach, can help you feel better prepared with an understanding of what to expect at your first and subsequent meeting(s) and helps to dispel some of the common myths about attending AA.
Alcohol Help Center 2.0
An online support group providing help to those who are seeking to quit or cut down on their drinking. One helpful resource on this site is an online questionnaire you can use to evaluate your drinking. This is the same one used by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (see below). I prefer the final report format on this site, however, as it provides a little more information. An excellent resource with which to evaluate your drinking.
Alcohol Help Center 2.0 Links and Resources
Check Your Drinking Assessment Online Questionnaire
Blood Alcohol Calculator
An excellent educational resource, information rich, written in a strong academic style, outlining what addiction is, including the characteristics, neurobiology and genetic components of addiction. The American Society of Addiction Medicine and its Canadian counterpart the Canadian Society of Addiction Medicine both offer comprehensive online information (see the "Research and Treatment" menu of the navigation bar at asam.org) to both addiction professionals and the public.
Canada's leading addiction and mental health teaching hospital.
CAMH Articles and Resources
Information about Drug and Alcohol Addiction
Evaluate Your Drinking
Information about Alcohol, Other Drugs, and Driving
Low-Risk Drinking Guidelines
Dealing with Drinking: How to Quit or Cut Down
This is another excellent site filled with articles, resources, and information on addiction. It is also a good site to find out about treatment centers available near you.
The Recovery Village provides comprehensive alcohol and drug rehab programs. Their website, here, is a wealth of information on alcohol and drug addiction and treatment, inpatient and outpatient programs, co-occurring disorders, and so much more.
To Book an Appointment
Just call us (403) 255-8577 or use our easy online scheduler here.
If you have any questions or would like to contact us by email, you can complete a brief confidential contact form here. Once you submit the contact form, a Cobb & Associates intake staff member will respond as soon as possible.
Cobb & Associates Inc. is located in southwest Calgary (near Macleod Trail and Heritage Dr. SE). Please click here for our full address and a map to our location. We are currently accepting new clients and warmly welcome self-referrals and referrals from physicians and other professionals.
We appreciate your interest in our services and hope this information has been helpful to you. Please do not hesitate to call if you have any questions.
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These brief 3-minute videos featuring Diane Gibson, of Cobb & Associates Inc. aired on Monday March 17, 2014 and Monday September 22, 2014 on Global Morning News. Click below to see what Diane has to say on the topic of step-parenting and bonding with a step-child.
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* Correction: The second video mistakenly introduces Diane Gibson as a Registered Psychologist when, in fact, Diane is a Registered Provisional Psychologist.
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Stephan Auer-Stüger (* 28. Februar 1979 in Gmunden, Oberösterreich) ist ein österreichischer Politiker der Sozialdemokratischen Partei Österreichs (SPÖ). Seit 27. Februar 2019 ist er Abgeordneter zum Wiener Landtag und Mitglied des Wiener Gemeinderates.

Leben
Stephan Auer-Stüger besuchte die Handelsakademie in Bad Ischl, wo er 1998 maturierte. Anschließend studierte er Politikwissenschaften an der Universität Wien, das Studium schloss er 2004 als Magister ab.

Seine politische Karriere begann er 2001 in der SPÖ im fünften Wiener Gemeindebezirk Margareten, wo er von 2003 bis 2009 Vorsitzender der Jungen Generation war. Ab 2007 gehörte er dort als Bezirksrat der Bezirksvertretung an. Von 2004 bis 2007 war er Bezirksgeschäftsführer der SPÖ Margareten. Anschließend war er in der Geschäftsgruppe Finanzen, Wirtschaft und Internationales der Stadt Wien tätig, zunächst als Politischer Referent, von 2011 bis Mai 2018 als Büroleiter. Seit Jänner 2019 ist er Fachreferent im Österreichischen Städtebund.

Mit 27. Februar 2019 folgte er Sandra Frauenberger, die ihr Mandat zurücklegte, in der 20. Wahlperiode als Abgeordneter zum Wiener Landtag und Gemeinderat nach, wo er Mitglied des Stadtrechnungshofausschusses und Schriftführer ist. 2019 wurde Auer-Stüger zudem bei der Bezirkskonferenz der SPÖ-Margareten zum SPÖ-Bezirksvorsitzenden gewählt. Im September 2021 folgte ihm Elke Hanel-Torsch in dieser Funktion nach.

Im November 2021 wurde er auf der Bundeskonferenz des Sozialdemokratischen GemeindevertreterInnenverbands Österreich (GVV) neben Bettina Lancaster zum Stellvertreter des Vorsitzenden Andreas Kollross gewählt.

Weblinks
 Stephan Auer-Stüger auf der Website der Stadt Wien
 Stephan Auer-Stüger auf meineabgeordneten.at
 Stephan Auer-Stüger auf der Website der SPÖ Wien

Einzelnachweise

Landtagsabgeordneter (Wien)
Absolvent der Universität Wien
Person (Oberösterreich)
Politiker (21. Jahrhundert)
SPÖ-Mitglied
Österreicher
Geboren 1979
Mann

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


A vegan Baileys pop up shop has opened in Soho Square, London, for this afternoon only. Baileys Almande have opened The Vegan Treat Shop, which opens at 1pm until 7pm. The best bit – this event is free. Guests will receive a free ticket which allows them to taste one of the desserts, which comes with a glass of Baileys Almande over ice.
Baileys Almande, which is vegan and gluten-free, and is lower in calories at only 67 calories per serving, which is around half the number in a normal measure of Baileys. All of the desserts that will be on offer in the café are vegan, including classic desserts made vegan and are made using Baileys Almande. Desserts on offer are a sticky toffee pudding, Eton Mess and more.
Baileys Almande was first launched in 2016, however it has only become mainstream in the UK this month, at only £20 for a 70cl bottle. Baileys Almande is made from sweet almond oil, almond essence, cane sugar, vanilla and purified water.


Even for avowed diesel geeks, an oil-burning cargo van carrying your household probably doesn't sound like the ideal road trip vehicle. Moving across the U.S. is a task, not an adventure. But our man Sam Smith made his Transit-powered Michigan-to-Seattle move into a journey we can all envy.
Yes, while the big, boxy vehicle Sam hustled across the nation only had a meager 185 horsepower, he somehow managed to turn this cardboard box slog into the kind of road trip we enthusiasts live for. It's one of Sam's unique skills, and it's why we keep putting up with him and the trail of old BMW parts he sheds like dog hair wherever he goes.
You can read the whole thing over at Road & Track. If you've ever stared out your office window at an empty stretch of highway and dreamed of just getting up and going, you owe it to yourself to read this.
Robert Sorokanich is the New York-based automotive news reporter for both Road & Track and CAR and DRIVER. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.


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Journal of Economic and Social Measurement - Volume 36, issue 4
The Journal of Economic and Social Measurement (JESM) is a quarterly journal that is concerned with the investigation of all aspects of production, distribution and use of economic and other societal statistical data, and with the use of computers in that context. JESM publishes articles that consider the statistical methodology of economic and social science measurements. It is concerned with the methods and problems of data distribution, including the design and implementation of data base systems and, more generally, computer software and hardware for distributing and accessing statistical data files. Its focus on computer software also includes the valuation of algorithms and their implementation, assessing the degree to which particular algorithms may yield more or less accurate computed results. It addresses the technical and even legal problems of the collection and use of data, legislation and administrative actions affecting government produced or distributed data files, and similar topics.
The journal serves as a forum for the exchange of information and views between data producers and users. In addition, it considers the various uses to which statistical data may be put, particularly to the degree that these uses illustrate or affect the properties of the data. The data considered in JESM are usually economic or social, as mentioned, but this is not a requirement; the editorial policies of JESM do not place a priori restrictions upon the data that might be considered within individual articles. Furthermore, there are no limitations concerning the source of the data.
Tax audit impact on voluntary compliance
Authors: Niu, Yongzhi
Abstract: This study examines the impact of the New York State tax audit on voluntary compliance in one segment of the New York State economy, Food Services and Drinking Places (NAICS 722). It takes a new and different approach from previous …studies in the literature. Both the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and Time Series Cross Section (TSCS) autoregressive modeling methods are applied. The results of both methods suggest that after an audit, a firm reports a higher sales growth rate. The TSCS approach shows that in the year of the audit, a typical firm reports a sales growth rate which is 2.63 percentage points higher than a firm that was not audited. This percentage is found to decline by a rate of 1/3 each year thereafter. These findings suggest that the audit productivity reported in many research papers, where only the direct audit collections are considered, may be underestimated. Show more
Keywords: Tax, audit, impact, voluntary compliance, difference-in-differences, sales tax
DOI: 10.3233/JEM-2011-0346
Citation: Journal of Economic and Social Measurement, vol. 36, no. 4, pp. 237-251, 2011
Bayesian model averaging in R
Authors: Amini, Shahram M. | Parmeter, Christopher F.
Abstract: Bayesian model averaging has increasingly witnessed applications across an array of empirical contexts. However, the dearth of available statistical software which allows one to engage in a model averaging exercise is limited. It is common for consumers of these methods …to develop their own code, which has obvious appeal. However, canned statistical software can ameliorate one's own analysis if they are not intimately familiar with the nuances of computer coding. Moreover, many researchers would prefer user ready software to mitigate the inevitable time costs that arise when hard coding an econometric estimator. To that end, this paper describes the relative merits and attractiveness of several competing packages in the statistical environment R to implement a Bayesian model averaging exercise. Show more
Keywords: Model averaging, Zellner's g prior
Asset and reporting policies in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
Authors: Danielson, Caroline | Klerman, Jacob Alex | Andrews, Margaret | Krimm, Daniel
Abstract: Over the past decade and a half legislative and regulatory changes at the federal level have given US states additional authority to design their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs (SNAP). This devolution of policymaking authority has led to considerable ambiguity at …the national level about the policies that states have put in place. Drawing on a new survey of state SNAP administrators, this paper characterizes two key areas of policy devolution: the treatment of household assets in eligibility determinations and participants' paperwork burden. We find asset and reporting policy changes to be widespread, and the states that have made changes most often adopt the most expansive policy change allowed. We also demonstrate that more accurate policy data sharpens the inferences we make about the effects of several of these policies on participation in SNAP. Show more
Keywords: Nutrition assistance, state policies, social safety net
The effects of recall length and reporting aids on household reporting of health care events in the medical expenditure panel survey
Authors: Zuvekas, Samuel H.
Abstract: We examined the effects of length of recall period and written records on the accuracy of household reports of health care use of Medicare beneficiaries in the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS), a widely used nationally-representative federal survey. Our sample …contained 1,375 Medicare beneficiaries with 5 complete rounds of MEPS interviews during 2001–2003 who were matched to their Medicare claims records. Household respondents systematically underreported any emergency department use per round (mean of 0.07 vs. 0.09 in the claims, p< 0.001) and number of ambulatory visits per 90 days (2.3 vs. 2.7, p < 0.001). In logistic regressions, recall periods less than 2 months and, to a lesser extent, 3 to 4 months were associated with lower odds of underreporting visits and higher overall accuracy. Calendars and bills, insurance statements, and other records of health care events kept by some MEPS respondents also were associated with lower odds of underreporting. Show more
Keywords: Self-reported utilization, concordance, survey validity
Contributors to Articles in Volume 36
Article Type: Other
Contents of Volume 36