On Iran, I think it should be understood that Ali Khamenei narrowed the field of presidential candidates so all those who had a chance had to bow to him. Rouhani is going to do whatever Khamenei tells him to do. And it wasn't too long ago that Iran did have a revolution, and I think there were things that could have been done to keep it alive. I respect that you are from there, but I know plenty of others from there who would disagree with you who believe that Obama should have given the people against the Ayatollah more support. It seems to me that for Iran to be friendlier to the USA there will have to be an Ayatollah friendlier to the USA, and I just don't see that happening.
Yes, he did. It's not like I could run for presidency. Rouhani was certainly the lesser of the evils available to us. I know many Iranians would disagree with me when it comes to Obama's approach to Iran, but coincidentally most of them live outside Iran. They are looking for a complete change of government through revolution and wouldn't settle for less. But then I don't see them coming here to fight it and putting themselves in danger. They want us to do it, and you have to understand, even traffic police here doesn't have a gun. This is not a militant country. The last revolution only was won because Shah didn't want to rule where most of the middle class didn't want him. He saw the peaceful demonstrations and realized that's the end of his era and just left the country. These Ayatollahs aren't Shah to do such graceful things. they answered people's demonstrations with bullets and arrests. My posts from four years ago is here, you could refer to them. Back then I didn't think Obama should have supported the green movement, because first of all the leaders of that movement were the same as someone like Rouhani, part of this regime anyway, so he had to be cautious and second of all, even if he were to say he is supporting them, the regime could kill them based on being agents loyal to the West. He did the right thing. If that movement could go on and win the next election, it was because regime couldn't eliminate all of them with labeling them American sympathizers.
I live here and I see how things are, people aren't after another chaotic revolution with no clear outcome that follows a power vacuum. We're not ready to die for another power hungry dictator that could be the outcome of another chaos. This is a republic already. We have elections. We've a constitution that would support freedom of speech and assemblies. Sure it needs a couple of amendments to take the absolute power of Supreme leader out of it, but the base is there. The only thing we need to accomplish is to get the filtering of the Guardian Council for the candidates of each election out of it, and that would take a long and steady reform. Rouhani is a step in the right direction.
"Fire cannot kill a dragon." -Daenerys Targaryen, Game of Thrones
