According to this article in the Wall Street Journal, the mullahs in Iran are in crack-down mode.  Over the past 6 weeks, 118 people have been executed, with nearly 150 more executions scheduled in the coming weeks — the biggest show of government force in over 20 years.

In addition to the executions, the government has made nearly half a million arrests, targeting opposition leaders , journalists, union leaders, and others not severe enough in the theocratic orthodoxy.  They have increased restrictions on information and behavior.

Theocracies are built around the idea of individual submission rather than individual liberty.  Unlike Iraq or Syria, Iranians have been agitating for more of the latter over the past several years.  Iran is nominally a democracy; however, unlike a truly democratic republic, the Supreme Council holds the real power.  Elections in Iran consist of choosing from among the government-sanctioned Muslim extremists, analogous to the current regimes in Cuba or Venezuela, and only slightly better from a self-determination standpoint than the old Soviet bloc nations.  For years, the Supreme Council has disqualified pro-reform candidates from elections; the latest events simply carry that train of thought to a new extreme, disqualifying pro-democracy agitators from living.

The latest round of government oppression was actually sparked by gasoline prices.  While Iran sits atop vast crude oil reserves, it doesn't have sufficient refining capacity and therefore must import gasoline; however, the government subsidizes the price.  With the rising cost of gasoline, the government decided to raise the price and ration its usage, setting off widespread rioting (it was reported that literally hundreds of thousands were involved in the protests).

Of course, not only is Iranian government oppressing its people, it is also fomenting violence in Iraq and seeking to develop nuclear weapons.  A nuclear Iran would then have the leverage not only of its own supply but also could effectively hold hostage the entire Middle Eastern oil production, and by proxy, the economies of Europe and the United States.  Of course, that's not even mentioning the potential for Iran to supply terrorists with nuclear weapons for use against the US.

It seems that Iran is ripe for change; it seems that government exercise of extreme despotism tightens its grip when it feels things slipping out of control.  As we did back in the days of Soviet Communism, we should be doing everything we can to support the Iranian pro-democracy dissidents, through information, funding, and any other means.