READING THE TEA LEAVES….In the latest news from Bizarro world, the LA Times suggests that underneath all the Great Satan bluster Iran actually wants us to stay in Iraq:
On Tuesday night, Tehran’s English-language news channel featured commentary from political scientist Pirouz Mojtahedzadeh, who called for the U.S. to remain in Iraq until it has established a strong, stable central government capable of providing adequate security.
….Analysts familiar with official thinking say there is growing support for views like Mojtahedzadeh’s within Iran’s professional foreign policy establishment, if not within the hard-line circles closest to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and a feeling that a drawn-out timetable for withdrawal would be preferable to a quick pullout.
“They’ve not said it directly and openly as an official policy line, that they’d like the U.S. to stay, but I think there’s a sense among the Iranians that they understand that the U.S. cannot just leave immediately,” said Hadi Semati, an Iranian political analyst who is a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution.
So, um, this means we do have to leave, right? Because it would be cowardly to do what our enemies want us to do. That’s why we’re not supposed to vote for Democrats, as I recall.
Or….maybe this is just a clever bit of reverse psychology? Or an accident on the part of the director of Iran’s English-language news channel, for which he has already been stoned to death? Or the bald truth, because they figure it’s better for us to be tied down in Iraq than planning an invasion across the Zagros Mountains?
Crikey.
