Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Must ... Break ... Lock ... Somehow



















I think there must be something about being in a mob that makes a person stupid, or stupider.

Take, for instance, those two Iranian students, or Basiji militiamen or whatever they are, who tried to force open the gate of the British Embassy in Tehran yesterday. The gate was being held shut by a length of chain wrapped around the two leafs of the gate and secured with an ordinary padlock. The two students - and I think they really are students, judging by their complete lack of mechanical aptitude - tried repeatedly to break the lock off using two little spindly sticks.

They could have popped the padlock in two seconds with bolt cutters, or cut the chain with a hacksaw, or shimmed the lock open. All quick and easy methods that require no more sophistication than a junkie burglar would possess. But, no. Instead, these regime supporters decided to poke at the brass lock with sticks. Good luck with that.

Honestly, it looked like the Dawn of Man scene in 2001 - A Space Odyssey, where the apes are trying to learn the use of tools. The biggest difference was the lack of that great Also Sprach Zarathustra sound track. That, and the fact that the apes figured it out in only two minutes and 17 seconds, whereas the Iranians had made no progress at all by the end of this three-minute video clip.



Somebody got the gate open eventually, but I doubt it was those two. I wouldn't be surprised if it was one of the regime's riot cops who did it, out of pity or impatience.

The New York Times has a lot of good coverage of yesterday's mob invasion in the Lede blog. No British diplomats were killed or injured, so in the end it was all just good clean fun.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

TSB: What about all the un-shredded documents? That could be more interesting than Wikileaks.
gwb

TSB said...

The documents I saw in the videos yesterday seemed to come from a building next to the gate, so I expect they were consular forms or public diplomacy displays, etc. They might have found something interesting in the chancery office building, but only if the Brits had been careless.

Anonymous said...

TSB: Stephen King's time travel book: 11/23/63 is really good! I'm pretty much convinced you were right that Oswald did it himself. The clincher is the almost accidental way Ruby happened to kill Oswald. Good Call! (King's wife disagrees with him. He set out to write this in 1970 and really did a lot of work.) gwb

TSB said...

I recall that Ruby was time-stamped getting a money order (or something like that) a few minutes before he shot Oswald, so that certainly looks spontaneous.

Another key point is that Oswald got his job at the Texas Book Depository a few weeks before the White House even decided to visit Texas in November.

Opportunity and impluse seems to be the rule in both shootings.

Anonymous said...

Yes..and King shows what Oswald was really like... a 23 yo jerk who was such a twit nobody could believe he could even hold a job.. yet driven to be a famous commie!
His mom was a case and a half! And the FBI + DPD are portrayed to my liking... corrupt + corrupt/lazy/stupid. Got any favorite King books? I like this guy! gwb

Anonymous said...

TSB: It really "bothered" DiFi, but the 5th,6th amendments were trashed today. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D)Oregon spelled out how it would have worked for this attorney who was declared the mastermind of the
Madrid Train bombing. No atty, no public trial, no access to evidence against him. All based on one partial fingerprint! gwb
http://forejustice.org/wc/mayfield/jd/brandon_mayfield_jd_issue25.htm

Anonymous said...

TSB: The law now is that you can be detained for even voicing support for the enemies of our
"coalition partners". (term not defined of course) Is Barhain a coalition partner? They torture doctors for helping the wounded etc. gwb

Anonymous said...

TSB: Here's that guy that was kidnapped in Pakistan the day before he was headed home to Virginia. I guess he's drinkin green tea with #2 til the war's over. gwb
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/al-qaeda-leader-zawahiri-us-hostage/story?id=15066701#.Ttf5qoR0r8A