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Tuesday, November 11, 2008

2008 Twilight of Ahmadinejad

Posted by Charles Mudede on Tue, Nov 11, 2008 at 12:42 PM

I wrote this almost a year ago:

Iran is not Mr. Ahmadinejad. Bush, however, makes Iran an enemy by making Mr. Ahmadinejad Iran. Remove Bush and you remove his Iran, Ahmadinejad. When Bush goes, Mr. Ahmadinejad goes with him.

This passage appeared on Time.com this week:

Ahmadinejad clearly would have preferred a McCain victory, so that he could have used the Senator's "bomb Iran" jokes and tough rhetoric to talk up the idea of an imminent U.S. threat, urging the electorate to back him as an act of defiance. Even if Obama's victory represents more of a change in style than the substance of its policy, the confluence of economic bad times and the possibility of an improved, respectful relationship with the U.S. based on dialogue — and the prospect of U.S. withdrawal from Iraq — sets the scene for an Ahmadinejad defeat. Of course, Iran's President does not make national-security decisions; that's the prerogative of the Supreme Leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei. But a change in presidential style in Tehran paralleling the stylistic change in Washington may combine to reduce the risk of escalation and confrontation.

Gone with Bush is the world he made to make sense of his positions in that world. Without Bush--meaning, the absence of what made him--Ahmadinejad makes little to no sense. He is gone with the W..