Obama, Iran and Richard Nixon

Destitute is no longer what it once was I guess!


My "destitute" country rebuilt Lebanon after Israel wrecked it. It is generously helping rebuild Afghanistan and Iraq. It is pledging to rebuild Gaza. It is helping numerous countries in Africa. It is investing and helping various countries in Latin America: Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua. The leaders of these countries, whenever they travel to Iran, almost without exception, refer to Iran as a "model" for other developing countries to follow.

Anyway, as someone who comes from a background that would ordinarily better fit the adjectives you have used for Iran, I am curious about your sentiments? It seems you have had some bad encounters with Iranians. Maybe you worked for one and he didn't treat you well?

Here are the views of another Latino, one who unlike you, represents other Latinos. And who recently traveled to Iran and made these comments before the Ecuadorian parlaiment.

 

As for Iran's "future", I am much more optimistic than what the report prepared by the US intelligence community entitled "Global Trends 2025" would indicate. Indeed, if I were preparing that report, its emphasis and conclusions would be quite different. Still here is their view of "emerging powers":

http://www.acus.org/publication/global-trends-2025-transformed-world

Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World

 

I understand now. The "half Persian" part of your wife's background may not have been as welcoming of the "other half". And apparently that has not sit well with you.

Otherwise, what on earth would allow you to try to want to tell me about how things are in Iran? I live in Iran. I have lived in the US. I don't need you to tell me about Iran, but the reverse. Iran is certainly nothing like you want to paint about here.

Go deal with your personal issues and don't drag them here.

 

The reverse. A good sign of someone being insecure is that they try to put down others. That is the root cause the racism you must have faced as well. The reason why the most pernicious kind of racism is often from the less educated classes in various societies. Or, at least, the more insecure ones.

When I lived in the US, I was a lawyer. I could easily melt into the rest of the population, much easier than you will be able to, and claim America's riches and things for myself. Indeed, I largely took that route for many years and was quite good at it too. But ultimately, in my heart, I knew I prefered to be Iranian than anything else.

For people who want to close their eyes and ears, who don't know any better, or have a chip on their shoulder, Iran is exactly as you describe it. For anyone who has actually visited this country, Iran is simply nothing like you prefer to paint it to be. The country is doing alright and then some, despite all the efforts to sanction, isolate, and weaken it. It is relatively prosperous and quite advanced. It doesn't need your advice on how to handle its issues either.

 

That you have a problem is clear. No objective person with any knowledge of Iran would ever use the adjectives you have used to describe the country. No objective person without a chip on his shoulder about Iran would ever make the kind of snide remarks that you make about a tragedy like the Bam earthquake.

You claim the source of the problem is not in the treatment you have received from the Iranian part of your wife's family. Lets accept that at face value. In that case, may be you suffer from what I alluded to earlier: the need to feel better about yourself, by putting others down? Or maybe you are just as immature as many other posters on bigsoccer; picking up resentment from past arguments with some Iranians and applying them against the entire country?

It does seem that the profession has indeed sunk very low. But the point in my statement still stands, even if it went all over your head.

You wanted to pretend that I have taken Iran's cause here to make myself feel "better and stronger". I was reminding you that as someone who lived in the US, as a lawyer, in a community like southern California with a well assimilated Iranian population, if I suffered from your ailment, I could have done what you do: pretend to be an American and brag about America and put down other countries and people.

 

I don't hate the West; I hate what it does in relation to this region. And I am sure neither Shaster nor umarfm hate the West. However, those who hail from other civilizations, don't have to become 'westerners' and carry its biases to have a right to speak their mind. Even though, some of the strongest critics of the West can be found from those Westerners who can't stand the hypocricy and double standards. The kind of hypocricy and double standards that negate a part of the tradition they have been taught about the value of human beings, regardless of race, religion, or national origin.

Iran doesn't need any "last chances". The US should approach Iran to talk to it only when it comes to table to exchange ideas and tries to look for a "win-win" solution. Anything else is a waste of time.

 

These comments by Obama are slightly more hopeful, although he will need to add much to them, in both emphasis as well as in substance, while subtracting a good deal from what he has said both in the past as well as in this interview.

Ultimately, Iran and the US do have much to talk and resolve between them, but the US should disabuse itself of the notion that it can talk to Iran in any manner that even hints that there are some "sticks" behind the discussion. And the only "carrots" Iran is interested in are those that come from its own potential and promise, content merely if the US stands out of its way.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20090127/pl_politico/18016