It’s always sad when a child has his childhood fantasies ripped away from him. It didn’t seem that long ago that Roger Cohen (and David Ignatius) were telling us that the “Mad Mullahs” of Iran were just a neo-conservative myth.
Even now, in Iran’s day of anguish Cohen writes:
Iran exists still, of course, but today it is a dislocated place. Angry divisions have been exposed, between founding fathers of the revolution — Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, and Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the former president — and between the regime and the people.
Khamenei, under pressure from Rafsanjani, appeared ready to let the election unfold, but he reversed course, under pressure, or perhaps even diktat, from the Revolutionary Guards and other powerful constituencies.
Khamenei, apparently, was forced to do his dirty deed, stealing the election from the less obviously extreme Mousavi. But wait a second, Roger, what did you call him? “Supreme leader?” Old myths die hard I suppose. I wonder how he felt the first time he discovered that there was no such thing as a tooth fairy? Did he take it this hard?
It’s not like there weren’t observers who didn’t see this coming or who didn’t believe in the tooth fairy in the first place. And of course there are those who, unfortunately, know what’s about to come next.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
