In one of those anachronisms that remain in the mainstream media, Time magazine has named the Pope its Person of the Year. A good question, indeed perhaps the only question about this is "Why?" What has the Pope done? He was elected and elevated to the papacy. He is the first Pope from South America and the first Spanish speaker in the papacy in centuries. That's about it. Naming the Pope the Person of the Year is much like the Norwegians naming Barack Obama the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. Obama had done nothing but take office and give some speeches; he had no concrete achievements regarding peace.
I think that a better recipient of the award would have been Hassan Rouhani, the president of Iran. Here is a man who achieved two immensely important goals for his country. First, last summer, Rouhani worked hand in hand with Vladimir Putin to prevent the president Obama from launching a military strike against the Assad regime in Syria after it used chemical weapons to kill thousands of people. Indeed, they got Obama to, in effect, recognize the Assad regime as legitimate and likely to remain in power rather than as a target of international disapproval. Assad and Syria are the principal Arab allies of Iran and a key ingredient in Iran's plan to become the hegemon of the Middle East. Saving Assad from a strike by the USA and further securing Assad's position as president gave Iran a major victory. Second, Rouhani managed to negotiate a deal with the USA and its partners to end the sanctions that were crippling Iran in exchange for essentially nothing meaningful. One expert estimate is that Rouhani got the bulk of the sanctions lifted in exchange for moves that made Iran's path to nuclear weapons about two weeks longer. Rouhani use Obama's need for a public relations victory to get material gains for Iran in exchange for nothing.
Of course, there is no way that Time would name Rouhani as the Person of the Year; doing that would highlight the inept foreign policy of Time's hero president Obama. Still, he is the correct choice.
I think that a better recipient of the award would have been Hassan Rouhani, the president of Iran. Here is a man who achieved two immensely important goals for his country. First, last summer, Rouhani worked hand in hand with Vladimir Putin to prevent the president Obama from launching a military strike against the Assad regime in Syria after it used chemical weapons to kill thousands of people. Indeed, they got Obama to, in effect, recognize the Assad regime as legitimate and likely to remain in power rather than as a target of international disapproval. Assad and Syria are the principal Arab allies of Iran and a key ingredient in Iran's plan to become the hegemon of the Middle East. Saving Assad from a strike by the USA and further securing Assad's position as president gave Iran a major victory. Second, Rouhani managed to negotiate a deal with the USA and its partners to end the sanctions that were crippling Iran in exchange for essentially nothing meaningful. One expert estimate is that Rouhani got the bulk of the sanctions lifted in exchange for moves that made Iran's path to nuclear weapons about two weeks longer. Rouhani use Obama's need for a public relations victory to get material gains for Iran in exchange for nothing.
Of course, there is no way that Time would name Rouhani as the Person of the Year; doing that would highlight the inept foreign policy of Time's hero president Obama. Still, he is the correct choice.
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