Here There and Everywhere

What Iran and the United States Have in Common

I don’t think I ever met an Iranian woman I didn’t like.

The Iranian women I met – it seemed to me – were all gorgeous. They were educated, and they liked to read books and if you ever want to have a great conversation, look for the Iranian woman. I survived many a stuffy reception, finding intelligent women and talking books, or customs, or history.

So I shudder as I see our forces gathering for a potential strike on Iran.

I get it. Iranian men are smart too, I used to run into them in college, always talking engineering, as in huge national engineering projects, and, way above my head, nuclear physics. They are smart, creative, and great problem solvers.

Here is what makes me laugh. I don’t think the Iranian nuclear threat is the problem. I think Iran is too much like the USA.

Iran has a strong, unpopular leader who is particularly tough on uppity women (do you see where this is going?) and has an economy which is slowly tanking. Iran wants the population to be COMPLIANT and does not like civil protest. Iran is hard on student protestors, but especially hard on non-compliant women.

Our equally unpopular leader, equally chaotic, arbitrary, and cruel, envies the Ayatollah’s theocratic autonomy. Theocracy in Iran has all the power; they can jail people with impunity. They kill protestors with impunity. Not only are they the LAW, but they are above the law.

So how is that working out for Iran? Not so great. It hasn’t worked out so great since the overthrow of the Shah. When people don’t have a voice in how the country are run, they aren’t happy, and unhappy people have ways of resisting, and sabotaging the oppressive regime.

I think that all this massing of power and threatening to invade Iran is a distraction from our own orange leader’s problems with leading. After one year of his leadership, jobs are declining, people cannot afford health care, colleges are afraid to teach critical thinking skills, and we have poorly trained goons and thugs with carte blanche to invade people’s houses, shove demonstrators around, and to kill with impunity. Or at least that is how I see it. I have seen no accountability for the killing of Renee Good or Jonathan Pretti in Minneapolis, nor for the homicides in the “detention centers” which are like huge cattle corrals.

And to what point? As long as the Iranians are increasingly unhappy with their own leader, their leadership has big problems. When the leadership can point their finger at an impending danger caused by an encroaching bully, it rallies the people to the national cause.

Oh, but the power and the might makes the heart beat faster, and what a perfect opportunity to play with all our ships and planes and the great glory of it all, you know, like what happened in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Oh wait! Another similarity! Our leader uses emergency powers because of an ALIEN INVASION! The Rule of Law no longer applies! We are overrun by our roofers! Our gardeners and landscapers! Our waiters! Our housekeepers! Our fruit and vegetable pickers! Our meat packers! Our teacher assistants! Our janitors! Our nursing home care-givers! Our teachers and professors! Our potential citizens, tempest-tossed, waiting by the Golden Door (posted on our Statue of Liberty, welcoming our fore-fathers to this country).

These are not the criminals and rapists our toddler-in-chief tells us he is saving us from; over 90% of those violently arrested and detained are NOT criminals, just people who will work hard to try to provide their family with a living wage and a roof over their heads, and enough food. Many are documented, going through the system. The system is failing them, and failing us, as a country. We are a nation of immigrants.

Like the Ayatollah, our leader seeks total control, including “protecting” our elections – protecting us from voting against him and his politics of hatred, inequality, and humiliation.

Do you think there is a long-term strategy in all this? Do you believe in the Board of Peace as a functional institute? Do you see anything here that is truly in the national interest of the citizens of the United States of America? All I see is a dance of chaos, self-enrichment, self-aggrandizement, vanity, and a grab for all the power.

February 25, 2026 - Posted by intlxpatr | Afghanistan, Cross Cultural, ExPat Life, Free Speech, Iran, Living Conditions, Political Issues, Quality of Life Issues