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Bruce Whitney's avatar

Heather, respectfully: very few Iranian observers/analysts believe that Iran is much of a democracy. The Iranian parliament is filled with hard liners who support the mullahs/IRCG because the Guardian Council, which is the Iranian election authority, is a hard line body controlled by leadership. The Guardian Council vets all candidates who want to compete in elections and consistently deems Iranians with more liberal/moderate views ineligible.

As far as security goes, the Iranian president doesn't decide security decisions and the parliament doesn't either - that's reserved for the leadership.

A charitable view of Morton's comment is that it was mainly directed against our own beleaguered democracy. But implying that Iran has a functioning democracy is just wrong.

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Heather Schlessman's avatar

I think the charitable view is the one we were going for, but I appreciate the information.

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Bruce Whitney's avatar

Understood.

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