Fareed Zakaria had a segment this weekend with Dr. Seyed Mohammed Marandi, a pro-Ahmadinejad professor at Tehran University who appeared on the show with the permission of the Iranian government.
Fareed did a good job in pushing back but it is important to watch the government hard-line and its willingness to deceive in order to realize how improbable reconciliation is between the government of Iran and the people who are resisting it.
MARANDI: I think you also have to keep in mind the fact that some of the measures taken by the security forces have to do with the fact that there has been a lot of interference from outside the country.
Right now you have almost 40 television channels in Persian being broadcast into Iran from the United States and Europe -- basically funded by the American government and European governments, or in some cases owned -- which have played a very negative role over the past few weeks, turning people against one another.
This sort of behavior and this sort of funding coming from the United States and its European allies really does not serve their interests.
ZAKARIA: Professor Marandi, you can't possibly expect us to believe that. Here you have a two-term president of Iran, Rafsanjani, calling for opposition to the regime; a two-term prime minister of Iran, Mr. Mousavi, calling for the creation of an opposition movement; a two-term president, Khatami, calling for a referendum.
You have people under house arrest. You have major clerics in Qom asking that Ahmadinejad's election be boycotted.
Are you telling me all these people are doing this at the bidding of the United States? Surely you must realize that that's kind of a ludicrous claim.
It is worth watching the segment: (can't get CNN to embed this morning to click the link)
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2009/07/26/gps.interview.inside.iran.cnn
