So, the election in Iran is over. Actually, it was over before the ballots were even counted. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s was “declared the easy victor over ex-prime minister Mirhossein Mousavi,” according to this article.
Obama’s historical stance (if you can actually count his short time in the Senate as “history”) on Iran has been aggressive diplomacy (which I believe may be the fancy phrase for “let’s just sit back and see what happens while watching democracy get trampled on in Iran”). So far, the administration hasn’t really said much about this whole fixed-election thing. And, in what appears to be Bizarro World news, the press is saying that Joey McMensaBiden said the following “right” response: “Washington wants more information about the election before casting judgment and the path of engagement is still open.”
I don’t know if that was right or just not a complete gaffe like we usually hear come out of his piehole. Either way, though, I’m not in agreement with the fact that we should just lay low on this one. I agree with John McCain, who urged the administration to “speak out strongly.”
I think we need to speak out FOR THE PEOPLE. Make sure that we make it a point to support the actual people who are under the thumb of this, well, looming dictatorship. Diplomacy or no diplomacy – we are America. We stand for democracy. Since when did it become a bad thing to actually say that out loud?
Because when all is said and done, I think it’s pretty darn simple. Ahmadinejad can lie about an election, and then in the same breath he will portray himself as Mr. Nice Guy while he’s building nuclear weapons for “peaceful purposes.”
Um, I’m going to have to call monkey poo on that one.
My favorite sentiment of all of this article, though, came from Reagan, weirdly enough. Former Bush administration official Elliott Abrams was talking about how we should indeed be supporting democracy and the Iranian PEOPLE, as he went on to say,
“In the longer run, I think we take a lesson from Ronald Reagan who both engaged with the Soviets and said publicly that they would end up on the ash-heap of history.”
And, that my friends, was cajones. NOT kowtowing to a leader who obviously has a problem with telling the truth – and doing it all diplomatic-like with an aggressive puppy such as this:
