HH: When they write about Iran, that we need to engage them, a full blown diplomatic offensive, what possible opportunity is there to engage Ahmadinejad and Khatami, and the rest of the mad mullahs?
CH: Well, it’s not as if it hasn’t been tried, you see. I mean, I’ve talked recently to a lot of people in Washington, British and American, and other Europeans, too, who’ve been involved in these very long, drawn out negotiations of Iraq. They’ve been made a lot of very handsome offers for directors, and they’ve been handed great bushels of carrots as well, often, I would say, rather humiliating sized bushels. And the thing is, they won’t take them. I mean, they won’t take these offers. It’s not that we are refusing to be nice to them. It’s that they aren’t interested in this kind of negotiation. And certainly not if it comes at any price such as they have to prove they’ve been adhering to a treaty they solemnly signed, namely the non-proliferation treaty. They won’t do that. They’ve been repeatedly caught cheating and concealing. And so, for anyone to say that we haven’t exhausted the option of being nice, or making nice, is flat out fatuous. Were it otherwise, I still think that it would be a very good thing for the United States to say publicly where Iranians can hear it, because we know that there’s a huge reservoir of sympathy for democracy and friendship within Iran. And also, the people can get satellite dishes and internet access and so on. They’re not imprisoned as the Iraqis were, and the North Koreans still are. We can talk directly to them. I’m in favor of making all kinds of approaches of that sort, over the heads of these scrofulous mullahs who of course do not reflect the Iranian people’s choice, and are the product of a laughably rigged election.
Thanks for that.
I'll forward that to a few people.
God I miss Hitchens.
I'm glad you have Ozzy and Catherine Zeta-Jones, but Hitch I'd like back one day!