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Tag Archives: iran

“Stand by your Ayatollah ♫”

TEHRAN – Iran’s supreme leader, spurning what he described as several personal overtures from President Obama, warned Tuesday that negotiating with the United States would be “naive and perverted” and that Iranian politicians should not be “deceived” into starting such talks.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 70, said Obama has approached him several times through oral and written [...]

Obama cruel to the kind, kind to the cruel.

In just the past 72 or so hours President Barack Obama has both become the first president to ever refuse to meet the Dalai Lama, and denied funding to the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center. Both are policies based in appeasement, and the president’s track record on that is quite disturbing.
Beyond the historic snub, it’s [...]

Elected by whom?

In the words of Michael Goldfarb, the Obama Administration officially “certified” the Iranian “election.” Nice.
“He’s the elected leader,” says Obama press secretary Gibbs. Elected? Really? Who elected Ahmadinejad? Does a council of 12 unelected religious clerics with absolute omnipotence over all legislative and judicial ability make an election? Every time the Obama administration attempts to [...]

Iranian rule.

Here’s Francis Fukuyama on the political architecture of Iran. Basically, imagine if the Bill of Rights had included an Amendment 10b that stated, “an unelected council of religious clerics lead by a supreme leader may at will define, qualify or overrule all these previous amendments.”
Political scientists categorize the Islamic Republic of Iran as an “electoral [...]

Wanted: Presidential backbone.

Here’s Bret Stephens:
In other words, Mr. Obama seems to have thought that a considerable part of America’s Iran problem was simply an America problem, to be addressed by various forms of conciliation: Mr. Obama’s New Year’s greetings to “the Islamic Republic of Iran”; the disavowal of regime change as a U.S. objective; the offer of [...]

W.W.R.D. with Iran.

There are some interesting comparisons between Iran’s latest revolutionary movement and Poland’s Solidarity movement in the 1980s. Western assistance came both vocally and covert — via American companies providing Western intelligence agencies with printing presses and other equipment and utilities to assist the organization of the Polish protesters. The movement was already there and in [...]

‘Why not us?’

The following is from a Washington Post article titled, “Arab Activists Watch Iran And Wonder: ‘Why Not Us?’”
Across the Arab world, Iran’s massive opposition protests have triggered a wave of soul-searching and conflicting emotions. Many question why their own reform movements are unable to rally people to rise up against unpopular authoritarian regimes. In Egypt, [...]

Fate smiles on the mullahs.

Seriously, a grander diversion from the Iranian quasi-revolution than Michael Jackson’s death couldn’t have been masterminded by a decade worth of planning by Hezbollah.

“You should stop this. You should help us.”

Here’s Michael Goldfarb:
The left wanted Obama to keep his mouth shut for fear of undermining the protesters by allowing the regime to portray them as U.S. pawns. Well, at what point does Obama risk alienating a future generation of Iranians by sitting on the sidelines as they get butchered in the streets?

But then, do liberals [...]

‘Don’t leave us alone.’

Americans, European Union, international community, this government is not definitely — is definitely not elected by the majority of Iranians. So it’s illegal. Do not recognize it. Stop trading with them. Impose much more sanctions against them. My message…to the international community, especially I’m addressing President Obama directly – how can a government that doesn’t [...]