Riot! The unbeatable high!

On Sunday, a major metropolitan area was locked down. Excited civilians chanted, yelled, burned and fought with police. The sticky-sweet odor of tear gas drifted on the summer breeze, mingling with the choking odor of smoke from scattered bonfires in the streets of the city. Innocent people nervously scurried away from the chanting crowds, fearful for their safety should the threat of violence in the air flash into the real thing. Nervous cops lined their barricades, and out of control crowds worked themselves up into a fevered mass of white hot emotion. Riot was in the air.


Believe it or not, this scene was repeated in not one but two cities yesterday. In Tehran the issue was fair and free elections. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was reelected in a sweeping landslide, opposition leaders claim that the vote was rigged. While I'm certainly not naive enough to believe that any of the candidates would have substantially changed Iran's basic intransigence in international affairs (the real "power behind the throne" is the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and he's dedicated to a nuclear Iran and the destruction of Israel), I am encouraged that the citizens of Iran are willing to go to the mat for their perceived right to vote in a fair election. From such tiny acorns, great forests of freedom can eventually grow. Iran has, in it's people, it's history and it's resources, the ability to be a first world nation. The only thing keeping it from that status is the unfortunate policies of it's ruling council.

In Los Angeles, people rioted because the Lakers won the NBA title.

Tehran:

Photo credit: Tehran Live

Los Angeles:

Photo credit: L.A. Times

I've never been ashamed of my country compared to Iran before. It's an odd feeling.