Here's a news headline from last weekend:
MCCAIN RIPS OBAMA ON IRAN
The sub-headline:
McCain Faults Obama for Cautious Response to Disputed Outcome of Iran's Election
The first line of the article:
John McCain says he's disappointed in President for Obama for asserting that it was "not productive, given the history of U.S.-Iranian relations, to be seen as meddling."
That was McCain "ripping" Obama? What a letdown. Is this what online media must resort to: violent wording to lure people in? It's sad, especially when the people in question are politicians whose idea of "ripping" "slamming" or "blasting" someone is to call them a flip-flopper.
But honestly, what in the hell does John McCain want? What would he be doing differently had he won the election? Would he be "talking tougher" or threatening economic/military action? Would McCain have personally gone to Tehran to lead the protests?
This is a serious question, folks, and I'm hoping for an answer: what does the conservative right expect Obama to do right now? Call up Ahmadinejad and scream at him? Send the blue angels on a super-speed fly-by to moon the Ayatollah? Or is this just another partisan bitch-and-moan party which Republicans will parlay into fundraising opportunities and attack ads come election time?
Look, I agree: something shady is going on in Iran. Absolutely. You could write a whole essay just on why this election is bogus. Something is definitely up. And now, shit is going down in Iran. Protests are happening-- big ones. Protesters are being beaten. Riot police are being attacked. Journalists are being arrested.
So what can Barack Obama do about it?
He could ramp up the rhetoric and use stronger language when discussing Iran-- that seems to be what Republicans are pushing for. But that is only going to do so much and could easily backfire. There's a strong argument to be made that what the Iranian people need right now is for world leaders to stand behind them without opening their mouths too widely. There is also historical precedent supporting this move.
Repressive regimes like Iran's survive because the government turns any situation around to reflect badly on outsiders. They do this with everything: Iran's economy tanks and it's the West's fault. Oil prices plummet and it's the West's fault. Ahmadenijad's canary gets sick and somehow it's the West's fault. According to the leaders of Iran the West is behind every bad thing that happens in the country and they need the Iranian people to believe this because if there's one thing that many Middle Easterners fear more than their own corrupt leaders, it's a Western invasion. And given the situation in Iraq and the West's long history of fucking over the Middle East (google: British Mandate or Mohammad Mosaddeq), it's not hard to see why some people might think the U.S. is a threat.
The quickest and easiest way for Ahmadinejad to turn this situation around is to take any potentially threatening statements the West makes and turn them into propaganda which will instill enough fear in the populace to quiet the protests. If Iran's leaders can make Iranians believe that the West is out to get them, they'll return home and it's game over for a potential revolution. Supreme Leader Khameni, in his weekly sermon, accused Britain and the U.S. of being behind the protests and trying to destabilize Iran. Were George W. Bush still in power and making threats and scrambling the fighter jets, this would be much easier for many Iranians to believe. But (partially) because Obama has made a strong effort to not take an aggressive stance, and rather to steadfastly but calmly (not reactionarily) support freedom-loving Iranians, Khameni's claims are falling on deaf ears (at least according to people really qualified to make such calls).
I agree that this is the beginning of the end for Iran's current leaders. They won't disappear now, but the cracks have shown. The infallible Supreme Leader has bowed to public pressure, if only to order a fake recount. Iran's leaders have shown fear when protesters, not by the thousands but by the hundreds of thousands, took to the streets not for hours but for days. For the first time since the 1979 Revolution, leaders within Iran are in open disagreement. The events of the past two weeks will cause the legitimacy of the Iranian government to evaporate for millions of Iranians, many of whom were not of voting age for this election but will be next time.
But perhaps most important to me, and most damning for loud-mouthed conservatives, history is kind of on Obama's side here.
The President is doing nothing more than George H.W. Bush did when the USSR started to crack. To call down the thunder and tell the Russian people to rise up would have meant a (more) violent crackdown by the Soviet military, causing even greater death. It also would have supplied proof to many Russians that the West was trying to destabilize their biggest competitor. Rather, Bush played it close to the vest, showed his support in small but symbolic ways, and let those people pull the wall down themselves.
And just to be clear: there is a world of difference between us pulling the wall down for them and letting them pull it down themselves.
Of course, these situations are different in many ways. But there is a clear connection between the breakup of that idealistic, repressive, anti-Western government and this one. History has vindicated Bush no matter how much shit he took (he took a TON) from members of his own party who wanted him to ramp up the rhetoric. There is a strong precedent for showing clear, passive support rather than making reactionary, thoughtless, and pointlessly aggressive statements which could potentially backfire and make the situation far worse for no other reason other than we're Americans, and if it's one thing we excel at, it's talking shit.
If the IOC made Shit Talking an event in the next Olympics, the U.S. would take home the gold, silver, bronze, and a bucket full of its opponents tears.
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