Lunatic runs asylum

The lunatics have taken over the asylum.

Even talking to Ahmadinejad is comparable to negotiations with a paranoid skizophrenic claiming to be the chief physician of a mental institution.

Of course, president Obama would not take Ahmadinejad up on this "generous offer":

If president Obama was to talk to Ahmadinejad under the current circumstances and with the terms set by official Iran, it would be tacit approval of a regime considered illegitimate by large parts of its own population and by leading clerics.

Secondly, Ahmadinejad's primary interest is to use the opportunity to aggressively propagandize his claim Western powers are deliberately undermining his republic.

A game of Iranian Roulette

If president Obama was to answer aggressively, defending the values of democracy, enlightenment and human rights against Ahmadinejad's hooded justice, Ahmadinejad could use it as "proof" of his conspiracy theories, fuelling already vindictive sentiments from the establishment against the opposition.

If president Obama would stay on the defensive, merely stating the West has not interfered, Ahmadinejad would monopolize the air time, Obama would look weak, and observers would conclude Ahmadinejad won a victory.

Ahmadinejad is obviously reaching for straws, doing what he can to keep the press reporting his inane statements, unworthy of a head of state of any country.

Just getting the Western press to air his comments probably counts as a win in his book, proving he is the doctor and not the patient.

What dr. Ahmadinejad fails to understand is that his presidency is over no matter how he twists and turns the picture.

International politics is not a Rorschach image you can make to appear like anything you like, if you merely reiterate the same lies over and over.

Ahmadinejad may have good experiences at home beating and bullying people into accepting his twisted world view, but when it comes to the world population, there is no significant division.

It will be no problem for Obama to politely decline or simply ignore the over-reaching by Ahmadinejad.

It is obvious to anyone on both sides of the political fence Ahmadinejad is offering the American president a game of Iranian roulette - no bullets in one revolver and six in the one handed to the opponent.

Even the most hardline Republicans would aquit Obama for not doing Ahmadinejad any favours.

Ahmadinejad disarmed Western left wing

Even those who are sceptical of sanctions, pulling in the direction of negotiations, are privately shaking their heads at the madness going on in Iran.

Even dictators are deeply disturbed, unable to tell if Iran is a mock democracy, where voters are being arrested and media closed or a failed dictatorship completely losing stability - stability being the only sane argument left for authocratic regimes anywhere in the world.

Nobody wants to add even a percentage point to the probability of Iran in its current shape ever achieving nuclear military capacity, whether for strike or for proxy operations.

That would be like negotiating with the paranoid skizophrenic hostage taker and end up electing him mayor of the city.

This could happen in Gotham City, but not likely in the real world, and the real world is the one we are living in, if anybody's confused after following the Iranian election.

Israel is preparing for a strike. Saudi Arabia has afforded an air tunnel, and the same goes for Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, and Turkmenistan - supposedly for US use against radical forces in Pakistan, but also useful in case the Iranian government acts up any further.

Ahmadinejad may have the upper hand in domestic Iranian negotiations, but it has been gained at the price of all leverage in international negotiations.

When it comes to the nuclear dispute, official Iran can either fold or fold. There is no strong opposition in the West against strikes for Ahmadinejad to soak up and manipulate in his favour, even if many are against preemptive warfare.

Their only argument is, paradoxically, provided by the Iranian protesters, who have given Iranians a face it is difficult to put out of the mind long enough to arm the cannons.

But if Iran grows to become a geopolitical threat, this point is moot. If you pay attention, you will now have outspoken voices on the left wing arguing along lines that closely resembles those of European new right politicians and US Neoconservatives, at least with regards to Iran.

Geopolitical amateur engineering self-destruction

Ahmadinejad has acted like a geopolitical amateur, setting his own country up for a series of devastating strikes, which will likely leave the republic a desolated ground in need of serious rebuilding.

The final chapter of Ahmadinejad's grandiose plans is foretold in the movie Untergang. He will lead Iran to destruction.

For all the geopolitical engineering exercised by Ahmadinejad and the remaining faction backing him, they have only achieved to unite the world against Iran, making it virtually impossible to defend the regime from the aggressive goals of any enemies abroad.

This is a point often lost in the congratulatory articles about the Green Revolution, Neda and the new moderate, pro-Western, literate and amiable face of Iran - as much as it has improved the possibility of forming new ties between Iran and the West, the post-election conflict also serves some very bellicose anti-Iranian pundits.

As Iran is crushing its opposition and arresting its dissidents, Ahmadinejad is also disarming the people in the West who would protest against foreign intervention in Iran.

As Israeli, European and American hardliners gain momentum from the Iran crisis, fewer will be able to argue coherently that Iran is not as much of a world threat as suggested by these groups.

What remains is the broken image of Iran:

Today's Iran is an asylum run by lunatics who, like all lunatics, claim to wield mysterious powers and speak to God.

July 5 2009