Sounds like fun, wish I were there

I'm still mourning my decision not to go to Iran.

My decision seems easier to accept when I read about "bloody ethnic unrest" in Southwest Iran... it's far from anywhere we had been planning to go, but still.

I especially enjoyed reading about recent events in Iran on this ridiculously right-wing website (check out the Amazon links in the right-hand column: Natan Sharansky...Michael Novak...or—hey—DVD on Reagan's courageous War against Evil, anyone?)

ANYWAY, what struck me most about the reports posted here was how much the Bush administration apparently has in common with the government of Iran--I think Bush should really re-examine his priorities, because Iran could be a really great ally for him. Let's look at the facts:

1. Both have shut down Al-Jazeera stations which they claimed were stirring up Arab anger (well, to be more precise, Bush bombed the Al-Jazeera station in Kabul, but let's not split hairs).
   
2. Both have sent the army to fire on unarmed demonstrators.
   
3. Both accuse domestic troublemakers of being in league with foreign enemies.
   
4. Both create ecological problems for their neighbors.
   
5. Both threaten their enemies with nuclear power.
   
6. Both make a hobby of killing Iraqis, and seem to be none too fond of Arabs in general.
   
7. Both try to use control over oil to manipulate others.
   
8. Both believe they have a special relationship with God.
   

See? Natural allies. Someone should tell the president... I'm sure if he knew he would change his policy immediately.

That ridiculously right-wing site has a link to another ridiculously right-wing site, which alleges that 400 members of al-Qaeda are hiding out in Iran, supported by the government. Yeah. That's about as likely as them hiding out in the US supported by the government. By which I mean to say, that stranger things have happened...

...but it would definitely be pretty strange for Iran to support al-Qaeda. First, because al-Qaeda is a hard-core Sunni organization that considers Shi'ites (=Iran) to be deluded heretics; second, because Iranians were vocally angry about the persecution & slaughter of the Hazari—the Persian-speaking Shia group in Afghanistan, i.e., "cousins" of Iranians—by al-Qaeda's erstwhile ally, the Taliban.

Ooh, I could do this all night. But I promised myself I would finish one thing tonight. Gotta get back to work. (Besides, if I keep babbling on about politics I'll bore my 1.3 readers into abandoning me! Can't have that!)