I truly do not know what to say to a person who honestly finds more to worry about in relation to the US - a country that is admittedly not without fault - than a regime like Iran. I find that perspective utterly remarkable.
You've never had the government you elected replaced by a dictator, nor had your land stolen because Del Monte or some mining corporation wanted it. The US has been linked to some truly despicable actions and people around the world.
The current Iranian government knows full well that their best chance at staying in power is to provoke the US and have their people rally around them. They don’t want to go to war; they just need a stream of sabre rattling to come out of the US. One of the few things less popular than the government is the US, because they still harbour a great deal of resentment over having the Shah installed as dictator.
Currently, the Iranian economy is in the toilet, they are running out of medicines, their oil infrastructure is worn out and they don’t have the resources to fix it. The government is not popular with their own people, neither is the theocratic nature of their system of government. Despite the bluster, they pose little threat to anyone either in the region or globally. Left alone, it's only a matter of time before rebellion sets in.
, but I think part of the problem with the middle east is there is no functional love of democracy to rise up in the place of a dictatorship. Iraq (and Libya, and Iran, and Syria) will once again devolve into a 'might is right' at the collapse of any organized goverment, democratic or despotic. Enter the Taliban, stage right.
I'm not a poli-sci guy, but from what I understand, most of the middle eastern 'states' are arbitrarily hewn by former colonial powers forcing the traditional 'tribal' groups into disfuctional 'countries' (like Iraq, where a lot of the government is balanced between three+ groups).
Puppet states supported by the US or the Soveits (remeber THOSE guys?) in the middle east and elsewhere were a shade better than a full on dictatorship.
Until the
Millions of Muslims (or other religious stripes in the region) stand up to the
hundreds Taliban and Al Quaeda militants, the region can / wants to subconsciously be governed by force. Weapons are present everywhere, so it's not like the civilians are all unarmed. There is no Stazi or KGB that evesdrops on the civi's to punish them with the Taliban, for example.
What is worse - the middle east devolving into a a dozen Libyas, or the currenty situation.
