I am sure the authorities will not let the protests go on forever. They are going to act at some point.

Yes, we all think this, I think. In fact, some of the foreign press crew think that patience will snap when all of them as well as visiting officials from Europe in town up and leave.

What is definitely not a rumor is that military troops have been brought to Yerevan, “just in case”. My friend’s son is stationed on a base near Sevan, but he has already been in Yerevan with his unit for several days now.

Lots of rumors, I know, but on the other hand I am sure the authorities will not let the protests go on forever. They are going to act at some point.

I can’t remember if I touched upon this subject on my blog, I think I did, but the majority of people in this country arguably do not want change. If they did, hundreds of thousands would be showing up at his rallies instead of 40,000 as you estimate. I was at Liberty Square Saturday night and it looked like a refugee camp, wtih drunks lying on the ground and hecklers mocking Nikol Pashinian, Levon’s mascot. If people were in fact dissatisfied with the election results they would have occupied the Central Election Commission, no matter how many police were out there, they would have entered and demanded new elections. But Armenians do not because they are afraid of having their heads cracked. I do not blame them, peaceful demonstrations should ideally always be preferred over violence to enact change. But I do not know of any cases of peaceful revolutions having been made in history. Perhaps I am wrong, but if you want change, you have to be prepared to meet physical resistance and violent encounters. It doesn’t happen by munching thousands of sunflower seeds and singing along to Harout Pamboukjian songs in between soulless speeches that do nothing but feed the egotistical megalomania of these so-called opposition leaders but fill high hopes in naive people’s hearts.

Levon is not the answer to the Armenian nation’s woes–it is ultimately the people who must lead themselves. This guy let the people down in the 1990s and he could easily do it again. His campaign platform was not convincing to me as a viable plan that could be carried out. Again, he had his chance in the 1990s and he didn’t succeed–war or not, he could have sowed the seeds for democracy but he didn’t. Rather, he fostered the criminal clan society that Armenians are dealing with today on a daily basis. I cannot blame Armenian society because there are really no potential leaders, it is obvious to me and many others with whom I have spoken.

Society has to enact that change, Levon or no Levon, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon. Wednesday morning the day after the elections it was business as usual, there were no unrests in Central Yerevan, everything was smooth sailing with kids running to class and people off to work. Tuesday night was calm and quiet. If Levon and his cronies were so serious about reaching their goals, the people would have taken to the streets Tuesday night at 11:00 when the preliminary results were out with Serge winning 52 percent of the vote. But it didn’t happen because the leadership is not there. Because Levon cannot do it; instead he’s having a grand ball filling peoples’ heads and hearts with hope and promise, when he has no intention to deliver. If he did he would have already enacted the change but he is clearly hesitant to go all the way. Levon’s having a good time, there’s no doubt about that. Let’s see when he gets bored.

Considering that the unofficial estimate population of Armenia is supposedly 2.5 million, 40,000 people attending Levon’s rally–if that is a safe estimate–is indeed minuscule. These rallies are not convincing that change is about to happen, on the contrary they are arguably becoming nuisances because this movement’s leaders are clearly misguided and they don’t know how to move forward to the next level. If they did, they would have already reached that plateau and prepare to rise to the next.