14 August 2009 (23 Mordad 1388) United States testing technology in China and Iran to bypass web censorship

Good, good. The thing about repressive regimes like the one attempting to keep a hold on Iran at the moment is that they thrive in the shadows and do everything they can to try to hide their tracks while maintaining a manufactured positive image of themselves as much as possible, but the more access to unfiltered information the people have the less this image of theirs can be maintained.

I'm not sure if this current effort has anything to do with the VOICE Act recently passed in the Senate, but it's based on pretty much the same concept. As a country that would like to see Ahmadinejad replaced with the person Iranians actually voted for you really don't have to be that openly opposed to a government like that in Iran, just keep them at a certain distance for the moment and provide regular people in the country with the tools to do what they need to do and find out what they deserve to know.

In other news from today, a sociology professor believes that the Basij and plain-clothes officers are beginning to suffer from feelings of isolation after all this time serving a role opposed to the majority of the people. The professor in the article is unnamed, but it's certainly very possible that this is true. There are a lot of reports and interviews about people working these jobs simply for the money, and like any other job done for money alone the stress and frustration can get quite fierce over time, which often drives people to wonder if it's really worth it to continue.