{"id":9251,"date":"2011-02-11T12:58:43","date_gmt":"2011-02-11T20:58:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=9251"},"modified":"2011-02-11T12:58:43","modified_gmt":"2011-02-11T20:58:43","slug":"friday-iran-talking-points-25","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2011\/02\/11\/friday-iran-talking-points-25\/","title":{"rendered":"Friday Iran Talking Points"},"content":{"rendered":"

from LobeLog<\/a>: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for February 11th, 2011:<\/em><\/p>\n

The Weekly Standard<\/a><\/em>: Stephen Schwartz writes on \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Conspiracy Industry\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and observes that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153conspiracy theories have long flourished in the lands of Islam.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Schwartz offers a rundown of recent anti-Semitic television programming in Iran, warning, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153all of this might seem like nothing more than typical, daily insanity in Iran.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

The Washington Post<\/a><\/em>: Charles Krauthammer<\/a> writes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Of course, yesterday it was just George W. Bush, Tony Blair and a band of neocons with unusual hypnotic powers who dared challenge the received wisdom of Arab exceptionalism \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the notion that Arabs, as opposed to East Asians, Latin Americans, Europeans and Africans, were uniquely allergic to democracy.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Krauthammer goes on to identify the new totalitarianism as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Islamism\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and argues, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153as in Soviet days, the threat is both internal and external. Iran, a mini-version of the old Soviet Union, has its own allies and satellites \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Syria, Lebanon and Gaza \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and its own Comintern, with agents operating throughout the region to extend Islamist influence and undermine pro-Western secular states.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He concludes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We are, unwillingly again, parties to a long twilight struggle, this time with Islamism \u00e2\u20ac\u201c most notably Iran, its proxies and its potential allies, Sunni and Shiite.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

The Washington Post<\/a><\/em>: Michael Gerson<\/a> asks, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Do Egypt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s protests mean American decline?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He warns, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The emergence of a Sunni version of Iran in Egypt would be a major blow,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a reason shahs are sometimes followed by mullahs \u00e2\u20ac\u201c because religious extremism is the opiate of a humiliated people.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

National Review Online<\/a><\/em>: The Foundation For Defense of Democracies<\/a>\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Benjamin Weinthal blogs, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The failure of the West to energetically confront Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bellicose policies might very well be revealed in the post-Mubarak era.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He argues, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s understanding of a new Egyptian political system mirrors the fiercely anti-democratic goals of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Weinthal segues the jubilation over Hosni Mubarak\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s resignation into a call for tighter sanctions on Iran, writing, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153If the West, particularly the Obama administration, is serious about the business of democracy-promotion in Egypt and in the Muslim world, then an accelerated round of hard-hitting sanctions ought to be implemented against Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s energy sector\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 Crude-oil sanctions targeting Iran serve the twin goals of advancing democracy in Egypt and perhaps contributing to the demise of the Iranian regime.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He concludes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In short, democratic change in Egypt is arguably contingent on blocking the spread of revolutionary Iranian Islam in the Middle East.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from LobeLog: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for February 11th, 2011: The Weekly Standard: Stephen Schwartz writes on \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Conspiracy Industry\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and observes that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153conspiracy theories have long flourished in the lands of Islam.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Schwartz offers a rundown of recent anti-Semitic television programming in Iran, warning, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153all of this might seem like nothing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-9251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9251"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9251\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9252,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9251\/revisions\/9252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9251"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}