Pat Dollard

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With tomorrow being E-Day, I thought I would make Dollard Nation Smile. Nothing better then seeing Iranians beat the out of each other. Figured it might take the edge off.

UPDATE:

November 4, 2008

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) – Iran’s parliament impeached a Cabinet minister on Tuesday after he admitted having a fake degree from Oxford University, in a vote widely seen as a defeat for hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The dismissal of Interior Minister Ali Kordan was the first high-profile confrontation between the new parliament and Ahmadinejad. It was seen a vote of no-confidence in the president and a sign that the leader’s popularity is tumbling, even with his conservative allies.

The interior minister in Iran is a powerful position in charge of holding elections and local administrations throughout the country.

During Kordan’s confirmation debate, numerous lawmakers argued he was unqualified, some claiming that his Oxford degree was a fake. Kordan was approved Aug. 5 by a relatively slim margin of around 160 of the 269 lawmakers present, a reflection of the concerns.

Kordan initially argued that his degree was real. The Interior Ministry put out a certificate, with an Oxford seal and dated June 2000, meant to prove its authenticity. It was riddled with spelling and grammar mistakes.

Oxford denied it had ever awarded an honorary doctorate of law to the minister, who then admitted the degree was fake.

Ahmadinejad defended Kordan, dismissing degrees in general as “torn paper” not necessary for serving the people.

The president was already under attack from both reformers and conservatives, who brought him to power but now complain he spends too much time on fiery anti-U.S. rhetoric rather than managing the country.

Middle-class Iranians, who have seen their standard of living fall, often speak scornfully of his economic naivete. In July, he predicted oil prices would never fall below $100 per barrel.

Oil prices, however, have plunged during the global financial crisis and hovered Tuesday around $63 a barrel. Tehran’s stock index last week plunged about 12 percent to its lowest close in years. And inflation is estimated at 27 percent or more.

Of the 247 lawmakers who attended Tuesday’s open session, 188 voted against Kordan—including many hard-liners. Forty-five parliament members voted in favor of Kordan and 14 abstained.

Sunday, Ahmadinejad called the impeachment proceedings illegal. And in an apparent protest, the president refused to attend Tuesday’s hearing.

The parliament speaker, Ali Larijani, a conservative rival to the president, rejected Ahmadinejad’s assertion.

“It is very clear that the impeachment is legal,” Larijani told the chamber.

During the hearing, Kordan defended himself, saying his impeachment was a conspiracy by foreign enemies, including the U.S. and Israel.

He told lawmaker that since he became a minister, “there’s been heavy media propaganda against me abroad.”

But parliament members rejected his defense, saying it was irrelevant to the issue over his fake degree.

Conservative lawmaker Bijan Nobaveh said the no-confidence vote should be seen as defending the country’s credibility.

“The impeachment is the restoration of prestige in the Islamic system,” Nobaveh said. “The interior minister’s acts decreased trust of the people in the system.”

Legislators also were offended last week after a government official tried to pay legislators not to vote for Kordan’s impeachment. The attempt promoted one hard-line lawmaker to slap the official, Mohammad Abbasi, in the face.

The scandal forced Ahmadinejad to dismiss Abbasi, but some lawmakers have suggested that the payment would not have been attempted without orders from higher up.

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WaPo

November 4, 2008

TEHRAN, Nov. 3 — A move to impeach an Iranian minister, slated for Tuesday, has flared into a full-blown political scandal after an attempt to bribe lawmakers over the matter led to a fistfight between supporters of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who, in turn, says parliament is out to sabotage his cabinet ahead of elections in June.

Speaking on state television Monday, the president called the impeachment bid “not legal” and “unfair.” Ahmadinejad is firmly backing Interior Minister Ali Kordan, who has been accused of dishonesty for falsely claiming to hold an honorary law degree from Oxford University. Kordan says Oxford’s representative in Tehran lied to him.

An impeachment of Kordan would push Ahmadinejad close to having to submit his entire cabinet for review by parliament, which is led by one of his chief political opponents. Iran’s constitution requires that step if more than half the cabinet ministers are replaced, and Ahmadinejad has replaced nine of 21.

The dispute over Kordan’s fake degree triggered a fistfight last week when the director of the presidential liaison office in parliament, Mohammad Abbasi, handed out checks for $5,000 to lawmakers who signed a letter stating that they would not vote for the impeachment.

When lawmaker Ali Asghar Zarei confronted Abbasi, a fight broke out in which the presidential liaison was injured. Zarei is regarded as one of Ahmadinejad’s most loyal supporters in parliament.

“Collecting these signatures was against morality,” Zarei said later, according to the semiofficial Fars News Agency. “I confronted him to prevent violations and wrongdoings that are contrary to the policy of the government.”

On Sunday, Ahmadinejad fired Abbasi, and the speaker of Iran’s parliament, Ali Larijani, banned him permanently from the parliament building. Ahmadinejad said on state television that his aide had acted “emotionally.”

“The bribing is even worse than the whole affair of Kordan’s fake degree,” lawmaker Ali Akbar Owlia wrote Sunday in the Tehran newspaper Ettemaad.

The public disputes over Kordan’s impeachment highlighted the rift developing here between supporters and former supporters of Ahmadinejad as the campaign for the June 12 presidential elections starts shaping up.

“The impeachment of Ali Kordan will be the splitting point between the government and its supporters in parliament,” the Web site Aftabnews, which is critical of the president, said Monday.

More than half of parliament’s 290 members must vote in favor of impeachment for the interior minister to be removed.