Iran and the USA have a common enemy, Arab belt bombers.

man that would be some shift. can we do that after we have spent the last 8 years claiming that they are evil? this is not a reorientation this is a 180 degree about face. I think we line up a lot better with Iran than saudi arabia but too many people have too much invested in keeping the status quo that if obama tried that the gop would riot.

It's a distraction to bring this up now. Concentrate on Iraq and the economy.

Also, Iran and Russia have a historical rivalry that goes back to the days of the czar. This used to be the basis of the Iran-US alliance back in the days of the shah, but there's no reason why it can't be a point of common interest again today. I'm sure they're looking over their shoulder at China as well. How we treat Iran and India will determine what kind of influence the US has in Eurasia over the next generation.

Iran's control over the Shia militias is responsible for the reduction in violence in Iraq. No matter what McCain says about the surge.

Iran is the most stable country in the region.

We should be negotiating with them now. Not with Ahmadinejad. He's not a popular figure in his country, but more importantly he isn't the real leader.

We share common enemies with Iran, which could be the basis of friendship: Bush, Cheney, the Neocons, and the Democrats and Republicans.

@doubtful

That's a key point, I think. Ahmedinejad is not the supreme leader in Iran, nor does he have any direct control over Iran's military or security services. Thus his overheated invectives about decimating Israel or the US are just that: rhetoric. Now, he does represent an not insignificant bloc of radicals in the government, but utitmately Supreme Ayatollah Kahmeni calls the shots and he seems far less given to Ahmedinejad's apocalyptic pronouncements. I wonder what kind of back channel communications or diplomatic efforts might be possible with Khameni or the Supreme Islamic Council, bypassing the idiot Ahmedinijad altogether?

Off topic a bit: Palin backers getting publicly racist and ugly. She’s getting OC and Schmuck Talk doesn’t know how to ramp her down, even if he wants to.

Iran is also, apart from Israel, the most democratic of Middle Eastern states. Rapprochement (after some no doubt very hard bargaining) may even revitalise the great missed opportunity ignored by Bush and company after 9/11.

Downside, of course, is some less than gruntled Saudis, Pakistanis, and (possibly/probably) Israelis.

The price for a stable Iraq under a Shiite-majority government is better US relations with Iran. If we didn't want to improve our relations with Iran, we ought to have left Saddam in charge in Iraq. We've got to get our priorities straight.

The Soviet Union under Stalin was an evil place indeed, but how much sense would it have made on December 8, 1941 to seek a declaration of war against Japan, Germany, Italy and the Soviet Union? McCain and his neocon friends seem just that silly.

The U.S.-Iranian "Grand Bargain" enunciated by Flynt and Hillary Mann Leverett seems reasonable and level-headed enough to be applauded. Where I take exception to their proposal, however, is in the comparison they draw with Nixon's sell-out to the PRC (so-called 'People's' Republic of China). In that little misguided exercise, the U.S. was obliged to completely abandon its active support for the people of Tibet and the consequent atrocious mistreatment of the Tibetan people combined with a systematic and deplorable destruction of their culture and religion. As a precedent, therefore, I think the analogy of Nixon's surrender to China is both ill-chosen and inauspicious.