We’ve seen how the new Republicans have been loudly proclaiming their allegiance to President Trump as they advance their candidacies for various elected positions, and thereby proudly brandishing a populist conservative / right wing extremist position new to the Republican Party. But how about in … Iran? Rohollah Faghihi reports in AL Monitor on the new generation of Iranian hard-liners:
Hard-liners in Iran face the key challenge of a new generation questioning the approach being taken by the old guard. Members of the younger generation, unlike their older peers, are challenging anyone who acts against their expectations, even including when that person happens to be Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, the most popular figure in the conservative camp.
Traditional Iranian hard-liners are broadly characterized by their anti-Americanism and opposition to engagement with the West, desire for “revolutionary” foreign relations and opposition to any form of liberalism promoted by Reformists. In short, they have a general intolerance toward cultural and political change.
The new generation, however, espouses the hard-line discourse, yet do not adhere to the Principlist camp of conservatives. They call themselves “innovative revolutionaries,” on a mission to lead a renaissance in their camp. They accuse the old guard of being overly cautious and of betraying the spirit of Ayatollah Rouhollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic. This generation tends to be more uncompromising than their predecessors, viewing their rivals as sworn enemies with whom forming alliances is unthinkable. …
The innovative revolutionaries vehemently oppose any cooperation with the Reformists, whom they consider promoters of liberalism and secularism, considered anathemas to the Islamic Revolution’s principles. In this regard, during Rouhani’s tenure, the new generation has criticized him for various reasons. They loathe older, pragmatic conservatives, including former Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati and parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, for backing Rouhani in the past two presidential elections. When it comes to the Reformists and Rouhani, the new generation accepts no compromise and has no qualms about challenging those moving closer to their declared enemies.
Their movement is failing to win elections and the affections of the people, it must be a lack of purity, so let’s kick out the old perverts. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? A good old RINO expungement in action. The GOP didn’t control every single elected seat nationally or in the states, so let’s kick out some of our more moderate members for being impure, and bring in those who more explicitly embrace the Holy Writ ideology, and that’ll bring us to victory. That’s been the activity since at least the time of Reagan, although I see Newt Gingrich as a big signpost on that Trail to Oblivion. (As I’ve noted before, though, Barry Goldwater (R-AZ) saw this coming, and with a sense of foreboding, no less.)
Iran is best described as a managed democracy, meaning that there are those holding unelected seats of high power who control the list of who may vie for elective seats of power, and then, via the Supreme Leader, controls those who’ve won the elections. This new generation of hardliners will need to find ways to capture those unelected seats before they can have realistic hopes of capturing those elective seats, and the power that goes with them.
I think they realize that. It’s certainly suggested in the following:
In a May interview, Payam Fazlinejad, a young hard-line analyst, said of the new generation, “We are faced with ‘innovative revolutionaries’ who have distinctly critical thoughts, which are based on the originalist remarks of the Imam [Khomeini] and the [supreme] leader [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei]. [They] think about reforms and renaissance to help the [Islamic] Revolution overcome challenges.”
Returning to the words of the founders, as if they are without flaw and will always apply. Thus do fanatics avoid the need for intelligent thought. We’re starting to see that in the American candidates who embrace Trumpism. However, we may be more fortunate than the Iranians, as the analogy is imperfect and Trump continues to commit error after error, alienating more and more of the moderate Republicans. If their team politics discipline can be broken for the terrible curse that it truly has become, we still have a chance of avoiding the apparently inevitable fate of the Iranians – controlled by those who dare not think, dare not learn, dare not adapt.
Because adaptation is compromise, and compromise is unthinkable.
