On 10/3/07, Venkat Mangudi wrote: > > Funny, I was reading this piece on the same topic. Nice one in the New > Yorker... > > http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/10/08/071008fa_fact_hersh?currentPage=2 > >
What struck me most about the speech, were the answers that the audience expected. I think its a cultural difference more than anything. People asking questions during the Q/A wanted Yes-or-No answers, while the iranian president gave answers with more depth - in that he pointed out it was not possible to give a simple yes and no answer to everything (which seems to be the prevailing black-or-white american foreign policy, with-us-against-us etc....). Equally odd was what seemed to be an obsession of some members of the audience with gay rights in Iran. It might be a relevant issue in the US or in Europe, but in all honesty there is no reason why the leader of iran would give a damn about it. The audience didnt seem to have grasped that - its like they wanted an Iran, in their own black-and-white american image.
