Eli Lake has a blockbuster story in the Washington Times concerning the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), which made its name as a reliable apologist for the mullahs and has consistently advocated lifting sanctions against the Iranian regime. (Some background is here and here.) NIAC, according to Lake’s report, worked hard to create a media storm over Obama Middle East adviser Dennis Ross, fearing he would advocate a tougher line against the mullahs. Moreover, it turns out NIAC hasn’t played by the rules:
Law enforcement experts who reviewed some of the documents, which were made available to The Times by the defendant in the suit, say e-mails between Mr. Parsi and Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations at the time, Javad Zarif — and an internal review of the Lobbying Disclosure Act — offer evidence that the group has operated as an undeclared lobby and may be guilty of violating tax laws, the Foreign Agents Registration Act and lobbying disclosure laws.
Neither Mr. Parsi nor anyone else at NIAC has registered as a lobbyist or filed papers with the Justice Department as a local agent of the Iranian government or Iranian companies. … Mr. Parsi defended his decision to organize NIAC as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and declare on tax forms that his group does not engage in lobbying — a status that enables donors to deduct contributions on their taxes.
Lake also exposes the NIAC claim to represent “the Iranian community” in America – or least many in it — to be, well, laughable. He explains: “The organization has between 2,500 and 3,000 members, according to Mr. Parsi, but had fewer than 500 responses to a membership survey conducted last summer, internal documents show. Yet NIAC asserts that it is the largest such group and represents the majority of the nearly 1 million Iranian Americans.” Five hundred, 1 million, whatever.
Parsi and NIAC have done their best to insulate the Iranian regime from criticism and to oppose any military or economic action against it. Parsi, you may recall, did his anti-anti-Iran routine recently at J Street’s conference. (J Street and NIAC share a common goal: prevention of sanctions against the regime. In addition, Genevieve Lynch, a NIAC board member, is on J Street’s finance committee and gave a cool $10,000 to the J Street gang.) As Jeffrey Goldberg observed, he does ”a lot of leg-work” for the mullahs in the U.S. Lake quotes famed Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf as saying, ”I think Trita Parsi does not belong to the Green Movement. I feel his lobbying has secretly been more for the Islamic Republic.”
One other note, John Limbert was a board member of NIAC before recently being named deputy assistant secretary of state for Iran. Lake notes, “Mr. Limbert declined to comment, citing his new position, but has appeared at NIAC conferences in the past and expressed admiration for the organization and for its charismatic leader, Trita Parsi.”
Lake’s bombshell piece will no doubt cause a huge stir among those both within and outside the Obama administration who’ve chosen to cozy up to NIAC, and in turn give the mullahs a helping hand.
Since I wrote this posting, Judge Michael Ponsor has issued his ruling, permitting Mass MoCA to show Büchel’s incomplete work, so long as the museum posts a disclaimer. The Boston Globe’s article by John Dyer on the ruling can be found under boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2007/09/22. One can expect further litigation.
It is often the case that a particularly vicious review, upon inspection, proves to be the escalation of another critic’s work, taken to an immoderate extreme—the bolder jackal bites first, but the second one bites deeper.
Wow. Well said, it has sobering application to things outside of this context.
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Who will actually go to look at this? Near the room where I lecture is a small University gallery. The fare is pretty much cutting edge. I have never seen ANYONE go into it to look. The same is true in museums. When was the last time you saw some one carefully examining an “installation,” watching the film clips or television monitors, and perhaps taking some time to ponder the challenges to their way of thinking that had been posed, and trying to find their way out of the “confusion” and “anger” that the artist had elicited? I have never seen this once. We have a closed circle of impresarios, money, officially sponsored artists, and reviewers and litigation. But no public. Absolutely no audience. Zero impact except when reported in the news. But the audience does look at other sorts of things, listen to music, etc.
Mr. Waldron’s whistle-blowing reminds me of those clear-eyed innocents who saw the Emperor was unclad. For one reason or other, the adults had an investment in seeing him decked out in glorious raiment. Modern art is a Ponzi scheme built on a foundation where ugliness is called beauty and various parties come together to enrich themselves, leaving the public baffled or indifferent except when it discovers its money is paying for this rubbish. Then it gets angry.