Bad news for Hillary Mann Leverett, but potentially good news, I think, for the people of Iran. Jay Solomon reported this past weekend in The Wall Street Journal that the Obama Administration now thinks the regime is shaky:
The Obama administration is increasingly questioning the long-term stability of Tehran’s government and moving to find ways to support Iran’s opposition “Green Movement,” said senior U.S. officials.
The White House is crafting new financial sanctions specifically designed to punish the Iranian entities and individuals most directly involved in the crackdown on Iran’s dissident forces, said the U.S. officials, rather than just those involved in Iran’s nuclear program.
Hillary Mann Leverett and her husband, Flynt Leverett, both former American national security officials, believe that the opposition movement is irrelevant, and so for this, and other semi-inexplicable reasons, they are proposing — regularly, via The New York Times op-ed page — that America pursue a policy of conciliation with the ruling junta, in the hope that they will be nice to us in return. Abbas Milani, writing in The New Republic, had this to say about that:
The Leveretts refer to “half-hearted efforts” by the Obama administration to establish ties with Iran. But the president of the United States has reportedly written two unsolicited and still unanswered letters to Khamenei; he has gone out of his way not to offer full support to the regime’s opponents; h… >>>
