 |
| Dissent Crushed in Iran | |
With between 10,000 and 50,000 dead Iranians buried in rubble caused by of
an act of God, looters from neighboring towns are helping themselves to other
people's property. Foreign aid teams have rushed to the scene to administer water, food,
blankets and heaters. Not bad for a country which just two years ago was an
'Axis of Evil' which Dubya seemed keen to dismantle in daddy's unfinished 'New
World Order'. God seems to have done at least some of the work for him, and every
politician knows that one man's suffering is another man's opportunity, so it's
be nice to Iran week for a new Coalition of the Willing. Saving the lives of a few Iranians might seem a pretty pointless exercise,
but it's all part of the master plan. Dubya's stick and carrot approach to foreign policy is having mixed
results: Iraq needed the stick; Libya salivated for a while and took the
carrot; North Korea is going to need a big stick; and Iran may have been
waiting for an excuse to take the carrot. Couples brought together by suffering can have their passion fueled by
mutual grief. Maybe the same thing can work for entire nations? Iran has backed down over nuclear weapons stance - a good start, but the
rhetoric has been pretty hard. Even since the aid was promised, both parties
are following the petulant 'I'm not apologizing until he does' line,
but it looks like a few secret trysts between suitably sensitive diplomats
might consummate the subtle overtures and thaw relations. It's good to see a international politics maturing. The paradigm of the
primary school bully has been replaced by the behavior of petulant hormonal
teenagers. Death and taxes may be inevitable, but it seems equally difficult to escape
the embarrasments caused by our children and our governments.
| 
