ilBLOGical tidBITs

The Iranian government recently released two British embassy employees, but still has one embassy employee in custody; nevertheless, the current Iranian government blames Western influence for the civil unrest following the recent presidential election, which reformist inside Iran have refused to accept.

Shifting the blame to external sources for internal issues has been used throughout history as a way to obfuscate political maneuvers and to focus the attention of the country’s people and the world elsewhere while perceived enemies are eliminated.

Hitler used this method to shift the blame for Germany’s problems to an alleged Jewish conspiracy. Stalin used it to shift blame to counterrevolutionaries and defeatists within the Soviet Union, and even Mel Gibson used it to blame the Jewish people for his DUI arrest.

I find it interesting that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his government are blaming Western influence, especially since he has been quoted as blaming the ills of the region on the Jewish people and has denied the Holocaust as a historical fact. Perhaps the specter of Mossad agents or SAS teams using the internal chaos within Iran as cover for a regime change hits too close to home.

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”

— John F. Kennedy (1917–1963)