"The Surreal Experience of Meeting Khamenei"

[mainer]

Interesting account from a former Ambassador:

He launched into a monologue alternating between grievances and fantasies about the United States: American sanctions harming the Iranian people are illegal under the U.N. charter, and the Americans maliciously manipulated the U.N. Security Council into following suit. U.S. leaders intentionally sow havoc globally in order to distract the American people from their country�s declining power. The Americans prop up illegitimate regimes in the Middle East and then just toss them aside when inconvenient, leaving chaos and violence. Look at Iraq. Look at Libya. Look at Afghanistan. Trusting the United States always leads to disaster. U.S. democracy is in meltdown, as witnessed by the Occupy Wall Street protests (which had concluded nine months earlier, an eternity in American political life). On and on, for well over an hour.

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-surreal-experience-of-meeting-khamenei/

[Kid Berwyn]

1. Great, quick read.

The ambassador makes clear Khamenei, in the end, was right in his assessment of the USA.

The third aspect almost prompted me to nod: while undoubtedly Washington officials had gaps in their understanding of Khamenei, the Americans in those meetings I once attended in Washington grasped precisely what was essential. I realized from listening to Khamenei that we got it right: his paranoia; his singular, hostile focus on the United States; how he was consumed with, and identified by, enmity toward Washington. By contrast, I thought, Khamenei gets us wrong. If he truly wanted to understand us, Khamenei could have queried Iranians who had studied in the United States or who had served at the Iranian mission to the U.N. But his obsession with U.S. enmity and decline led him to board flights of his preferred fancy: an imploding country of race riots, collapse of faith in democratic institutions, predatory economic mayhem, and falsified elections, all of which he outlined as if true. (What seemed preposterous in 2012 may now sound to many almost prescient, although prompted by Khamenei’s loathing rather than an informed read of America’s future.)

[samsingh]

2. sounds trumpian

[usonian]

3. Maybe ***** will get to meet him soon.

And have tea with Mussolini.