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.

It's a good thing Dan Rather showed us all those democracy-loving Soviets on the evening news over the years, otherwise, I wouldn't have known they were there. I thought they were bused in for the demolition of the Belin wall. I didn't know they actually LIVED there. Not the Arab world, true, but it would be hard to find a more repressive and brutal regime that was eventually defeated from within. 20 million dead civilians can't be wrong.

Yes, I know they were East Germans but you get the point.