When New York transit workers recently went on strike, leaving thousands of commuters without a means of getting to work, they met with plenty of grumbling but nothing more.

When New York transit workers recently went on strike, leaving thousands of commuters without a means of getting to work, they met with plenty of grumbling but nothing more. In a liberal democracy, after all, you can't call out the riot police to break up picket lines. How much simpler things are in Iran. When bus drivers there staged their own strike, many were arrested, along with leaders of their syndicate, some of the leaders' wives, and a handful of student activists who wished to join the drivers' demonstrations. Some of those who were arrested have since been released; others remain jailed. The State Department has condemned the regime's actions, as has AFL-CIO president John Sweeney--with whom, if only this once, we wholeheartedly agree.