Rent-A-Mob Update

clipped from www.nypost.com Thursdays's events in Iran dealt a serious political blow to a beleaguered re gime unable to either accommodate its opponents or crush them by force. It was billed as the biggest show in the history of the Islamic Republic, and the celebrations marking the 31st anniversary of the seizure of power by the mullahs were planned like a military operation with the code name Simorgh (a mythical Persian bird) under the direct control of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard. What Iranians saw on live TV, however, was a chaotic gathering of tens of thousands of rent-a-mob elements -- along with guardsmen, all with standard and easily recognizable beards, and members of the Baseej professional street fighters. "What is the point of an exercise that shows how divided our nation is today?" asks a member of the Islamic Majlis, Iran's ersatz parliament. "Unless a political solution is found to bring the two camps together again, we should forget about anniversaries and demonstrations."