Topic: Politics
Does anyone here read Juan Cole? I do from time to time. I respect the fact that he can read and speak Arabic (more the former than the latter) and that he puts in a lot of effort to pick up stories from the middle eastern media. But I'm often left baffled by the moral comparisons that he draws. Here is an instance from June 26th last year (see bottom of page):
"By the way, rightwing US commentators often slam Iranian elections because the candidates are vetted by the clerical Guardian Council for their loyalty to the Khomeinist ideology. In the past two years, the vetting has grown ever more rigorous, excluding relative liberals from running for parliament or president. The commentators are correct.
However, in the United States the "first past the post" system of winner-takes-all elections and the two-party system play a similar role in limiting voters' choices of candidates. Neither libertarians nor socialists are likely to be serious contenders for the presidency in the United States, since neither of the two dominant parties will run them. The US approach to limiting voter choice is systemic and so looks "natural," but US voters have a narrower range of practical choices in candidates than virtually any other democratic society."
Bizarre! He's equating direct 'vetting' of candidates by the Guardian Council for conformance with the ideology of one person, the late Ayatollah Khomeini, with indirect 'vetting' of candidates for conformance with the views of the majority of American voters! His comparison takes no account of the fact that in the former case, candidates get rejected for having views that might actually be popular with voters, while in the latter case they are rejected because their views won't be. How can someone so otherwise intelligent make such a fatuous comparison? The world of academia seems to be full of this.
_ DY
at 4:04 PM BST
Updated: Friday, 5 May 2006 6:08 PM BST
