Maziar Bahari, Washington Post’s Post Global, November 24:
As I watched President Bush standing under a gigantic statue of Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam the other day I was thinking to myself, “Why should it be so far-fetched to imagine an American president standing under a portrait of Ayatollah Khomeini in the Iranian parliament?” After all the Vietnamese killed more than fifty-thousand Americans. For some ridiculous reason the animosity between Iran and the U.S. has remained the only constant in the tumultuous Middle East region in the past three decades. As the American people showed in November 7 elections, they are ready for a change. It is time for the American government to give up the idea of regime change and start talking directly to the Islamic government without any preconditions. Mr. Cheney and company may really like to topple the Ayatollahs. Many Iranian men also would like the newly-divorced Britney Spears to convert to Islam and marry them. For the record, neither is on the cards.…