Guest blogger “Ross” over at Andrew Sullivan’s place is a little confused in his critique of Michael Ledeen’s optimism about democracy in Iran:

…I’d be more convinced that “a bit of guidance in the methods of non-violent resistance, a bit of communications gear, and many words of encouragement” will bring down the mullahs in Iran if there were a single example of a successful democratic revolution anywhere in the Arab world that Ledeen could cite.

This might be a salient question if we were discussing an Arab country, but Iran is Persian. And in fact most polls I’ve seen indicate that in a free election, it’s likely that a democratic Iranian government would be pro-west and pro-America. The generation that’s grown up over the past quarter century of mullahcracy has had its fill.