Back to the Future: Iran

Interpress News Service has a Gareth Porter extravanganza on Iran.

Iran’s ties to Shi’a in the region.

Iran’s economy and ties to the West are central to leadership election. But irredentist Ahmadinejab has substantial power in rural areas.

Iranians unsure whether the election of Obama represents a new direction or whether he’s captive to the same interests that have dominated Washington. His early pronouncements have increased their pessimism, but they do understand he is not Bush and not McCain.

Analysts urge Obama to start setting up negotiations before the inauguration to avoid losing the initiative.

Can Iran and the US talk, or are Iran’s demands for comprehensive talks and US demands for Iranian cessation of uranium enrichment at cross purposes?

The full video can be found here.

Melissa Etheridge And Rick Warren

I hope that this doesn’t kill her career (h/t Juan Cole, who probably lost a lot of readers over this):

I was told that Warren’s friends among the MPAC Muslim community had urged him to call Melissa Etheridge Friday night in the run-up to their being (serially) on the same stage Saturday night, and that he did so and they talked for half an hour. During his address, Warren mentioned also seeing Etheridge backstage on Saturday.

Local television in Los Angeles showed a short clip of Etheridge after the event asking gay leaders to reach out to Warren, just as they wanted him to reach out to them.

This stance was big of her, since she and her partner had planned to marry but were prevented from doing so by the same Proposition 8 that Warren worked for, and she was so upset she suggested she would refuse to pay California taxes since she is obviously not considered a full citizen by her fellow Californians.

Warren took the stage, friendly and ebullient, and implicitly complained about the bad press he has gotten since Obama announced he would read the invocation. He said that the media likes conflict, and where there is harmony there is nothing for them to report. When there is no conflict, he said, the media will create one.

Warren said, “Let me just get this over very quickly. I love Muslims. And for the media’s purpose, I happen to love gays and straights.”

He explicitly mentioned meeting Etheridge, and explained that he has been a long time fan of hers, beginning with her self-titled first album of 1988. “I’m enough of a groupie,” he said, “that I got her autograph on the Christmas album.”