Not so much news as a confirmation of our suspicions. How does a man who appears to be going down in flames win the election with over 60% of the vote? We’re not talking a slim majority there. And then there’s this:

U.S. analysts find it “not credible” that challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi would have lost the balloting in his hometown or that a third candidate, Mehdi Karoubi, would have received less than 1 percent of the total vote, a senior U.S. officials told FOX News.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khameini apparently has released a statement calling the results “final” and hailing the election as a legitimization of the regime and its elections…

The dominant view among Obama administration officials is that the regime will look so bad as a result of whipping up Iranian hopes for democracy and then squelching them that the regime may feel compelled to show some conciliatory response to Obama’s gestures of engagement.

So basically the election was a charade, keeping in power the man Khameini wanted while pretending to care about democracy and free elections. The Iranian people were lead to believe that their voices count in the governing of their nation. Instead, their voices were suppressed and the election stolen. And just how badly rigged was the election?

By Saturday morning, the most often repeated exclamation in Tehran was: “It’s not possible!”…

A group of young men said they had talked to their families in the provinces, including Kurdish Kermanshah, Azeri Oroumiyeh and Ardeblil. Mohsen, 23, said, “Everyone in Tabriz [Mousavi's hometown] voted for Mousavi. The official count says a majority for Ahmadinejad. That’s not possible.” Mehdi, 27, chimed in, “Even if just Karroubi’s family in Lorestan had voted for him, he would have won more than 300,000 votes.”

More serious allegations came from officials involved in the various reformist candidates’ campaigns. Mohammad-Ali Abtahi, part of opposition figure Mehdi Karroubi’s campaign, pointed out that the government “announced a wholesale figure of 70% for Ahmadinejad last night, as opposed to breaking it down province by province as they usually do.” The first figures were announced shortly after voting closed, he added. A breakdown of how people in each city and province voted has not been released yet.

At the Mousavi headquarters, former Interior Minister Ali Akbar Mohtashamipour protested that Mousavi observers had not gained access to many of the polling centers. He also said that in Tabriz, Mousavi’s birthplace, many of the polling stations had run out of ballots only two hours after opening, even though about 59 million ballots had been printed by the government, about 13 million more than the number of eligible voters.

I’d make a crack about ACORN opening an office in Tehran, but this is far too serious for levity. Reports indicate that street violence has broken out, Mousavi himself may have been arrested, protesters are chanting anti-government rhetoric outside government buildings, police are beating protesters, former Iranian president Rafsanjani has resigned from the Expediency Council to protest the election results, and the number of tactics used to suppress the people are growing by the hour.

So, how is the Obama Administration reacting? By promising to continue pressing for negotiations with the now-illegitimate government of Iran. Craptastic.