The Iran debate, specifically the 'what's the deal with Rouhani' debate took an interesting twist. I said early on that reactions to Rouhani's election clearly demarcated foreign policy camps between the progressive/idealist liberal worldview and the realist/skeptical conservative one - and since the Syrian debacle and the rise of the Putin/Iran tag team you've seen a lot of left wing opinions urging Obama to seize the moment, declaring that Rouhani's outreach deserves to be taken seriously, that Khamenei has had an ironical 'road to Damascus' awakening viz his nukes etc etc - with of course conservatives countering with a bitter 'c'mon, please' - I predicted early on that a certain foreign policy camp will be vindicated by who get's Rouhani right. And so the interesting twist: Iranian Revolutionary Guard makes public statement warning politicians as talks heat up against, in essence, being suckered in by America and selling short the Islamic state's interests to the devil. Predictably, liberals see this as proof that Rouhani is indeed breaking new ground and it's ruffling the old guard's feathers - while skeptics like me howl 'c'mon, please - what better way to sell illusion of Rouhani being serious than to make it look like the old guard doesn't trust him?'. And so it goes - I firmly believe Iran will not stop until it has a bomb or is just one small step short of having one - and I firmly believe all the theatrics currently in play are being orchestrated in concert with Putin - I don't believe for one second that the IRGC would dare make a public statement like they did without it first being approved by the Ayatollah, the person Rouhani takes his orders from - and I don't believe for a second Putin played his Syria gambit without first running it by the IRGC and Khamenei. Persians invented chess - these are all just layered moves on a board.
But someone's gonna be proven right here - and if it's the liberals, well, I'm just gonna stop talking.
