IT'S THE ECONOMY, MAHMOUD:

Iranian President's Setbacks Embolden His Domestic Critics: Establishment Rivals Fault Populism, Foreign Policy; Nuclear Deadline Looms (BILL SPINDLE, January 30, 2007, Wall Street Journal)

Many of Tehran's elite politicians and even clerics have long harbored concerns about Mr. Ahmadinejad, who ascended to the country's top political post from outside the traditional ruling circles. But the immense popularity he generated among Iran's poor and working-class voters kept many of his critics from speaking out or openly moving against his policies. [...]

a round of elections late last year -- for local municipal and village leaders as well as an important national consultative body -- has undermined Mr. Ahmadinejad's political momentum and unleashed a flood of public criticism and moves to clip his wings. Candidates whom Mr. Ahmadinejad supported fared poorly in the elections, while key adversaries re-established themselves as fixtures of the political scene.

In Tehran's city council, from which Mr. Ahmadinejad launched his campaign for president two years ago, his supporters went from a majority to a handful of seats. Meanwhile, Hashemi Rafsanjani, whom Mr. Ahmadinejad defeated in the presidential election two years ago, dominated the voting for seats on the Assembly of Experts, the body charged with choosing a new Supreme Leader when the 67-year-old Mr. Khamenei steps down or dies.

Since those public votes, a drumbeat of criticism against Mr. Ahmadinejad's administration has emerged from within Iran's Parliament and among some senior regime officials. The president even found himself confronted by a crowd of jeering students during an appearance at a Tehran university campus, with a video of the incident distributed on the Internet3.

"The elections opened a space and legitimized criticism of him," said Nasser Hadian, a political-science professor at the University of Tehran. "There are going to be more attempts to contain him."

The poor showing by candidates associated with Mr. Ahmadinejad in local elections -- and the relatively better performance of reform candidates opposed to him -- resulted from the sort of strong turnout that generally favors reformers. The country's conservatives also failed to rally behind a single slate of candidates, as they did during the earlier presidential election. But high on many voters' minds is Iran's increasingly muddled economy.