Oh. No. Immadinnerjacket wants talks with Trump

[Lemon Drop]

I see his attraction to Trump, but there's no way those two will produce anything good for either country.

But now, in a surprising split among Iranian hard-liners, some are expressing a different opinion: It’s time to sit down and resolve 40 years of animosity with the United States, by talking directly to Mr. Trump.

And the most striking voice in that contrarian group is former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, largely known in the West for his anti-American bombast, Holocaust denial, and suspiciously lopsided victory in a disputed vote a decade ago that set off Iran’s worst political convulsions since the Islamic revolution.

“Mr. Trump is a man of action,” Mr. Ahmadinejad said in a lengthy telephone interview with The New York Times. “He is a businessman and therefore he is capable of calculating cost-benefits and making a decision. We say to him, let’s calculate the long-term cost-benefit of our two nations and not be shortsighted.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/19/world...talks.html

[rjmacs]

Who knows what to make of this? Ahmadinejad counts himself among the hardliners who opposed the JCPOA inside Iran's political elite, and as president he was as much an autocrat as Sweet Potato Saddam.

He's a longtime rival and opponent of Javad Zarif, the foreign minister who negotiated the JCPOA. The Iranians don't need photo ops with our president, so this might be more about destabilizing domestic politics than it is about doing anything about the nuclear deal....

[deckeda]

Ahmadinejad is no fool. He sees an opening and a U.S. president foolish enough to listen to him.

[rjmacs]

deckeda wrote:
Ahmadinejad is no fool. He sees an opening and a U.S. president foolish enough to listen to him.

Can you describe the "opening" you mention? That is, what specific advantage or outcome do you posit he's seeking?

The official position of the current Iranian regime is that any agreement to constrain Iran's nuclear program would require Congressional ratification (treaty status) before going into effect, meaning that any agreement negotiated with Sweet Potato Saddam without the blessing of Congress would be worthless.

[mrbigstuff]

It's gamesmanship. Just like anything else when ultimata are issued, attempted negotiation is still worth a public hearing.

[deckeda]

rjmacs wrote:
[quote=deckeda]
Ahmadinejad is no fool. He sees an opening and a U.S. president foolish enough to listen to him.

Can you describe the "opening" you mention? That is, what specific advantage or outcome do you posit he's seeking?

The official position of the current Iranian regime is that any agreement to constrain Iran's nuclear program would require Congressional ratification (treaty status) before going into effect, meaning that any agreement negotiated with Sweet Potato Saddam without the blessing of Congress would be worthless.
Would Ahmadinejad not want some power back? I think he’d enjoy a little division in Iran by BFF-ing Trump.

[rjmacs]

deckeda wrote:
[quote=rjmacs]
[quote=deckeda]
Ahmadinejad is no fool. He sees an opening and a U.S. president foolish enough to listen to him.

Can you describe the "opening" you mention? That is, what specific advantage or outcome do you posit he's seeking?

The official position of the current Iranian regime is that any agreement to constrain Iran's nuclear program would require Congressional ratification (treaty status) before going into effect, meaning that any agreement negotiated with Sweet Potato Saddam without the blessing of Congress would be worthless.
Would Ahmadinejad not want some power back? I think he’d enjoy a little division in Iran by BFF-ing Trump.
Ahmadinejad currently holds no office in Iran. What power is available to him? It sounds like his efforts are to encourage Iranian-U.S. talks, not to be personally involved..... though I still don't understand it.

[deckeda]

I realize he holds no power. Hence my inclusion of the word "back." He may want to be a negotiator, but his partner in that (Trump would meet with a non world-leader?) doesn't seem credible, which means to me I doubt he is, either.

[AllGold]

Lemon Drop wrote:
“Mr. Trump is a man of action,” Mr. Ahmadinejad said in a lengthy telephone interview with The New York Times. “He is a businessman and therefore he is capable of calculating cost-benefits and making a decision. We say to him, let’s calculate the long-term cost-benefit of our two nations and not be shortsighted.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/19/world...talks.html

miley-laughing001: Either he is playing to Trump's narcissicm or he's been watching way too much Fox News.

[pdq]

These are two peas in pod. Two sides of the same coin.

Ahmadinejad (and Kim Jon-Un, and Duterte of the Phillipines, and Putin...etc) are all looking for power and validation and they recognize someone who can give it to them. I like to think of myself as a pragmatist, and if I thought this might accomplish something, I’d give Trump the benefit of the doubt - hell yeah, give it a shot.

But I see no evidence from recent years that that’s the case.