{Reposted from the Humorous and SATIRIC PreOccupied Territories blog}
Tehran, December 1– Insider reports emerged today that Iran’s Supreme Leader has admitted he feels let down at the fact that the incoming US president has not seen fit to invite him to participate in shaping the next administration directly.
Aides to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei of the Islamic Republic of Iran disclosed Tuesday that their leader had expected to form part of Joe Biden’s transition team, and now admits to disappointment that such a position has not come to pass.
“It’s not a big deal, I don’t think,” explained one official, speaking on condition of anonymity. “It was just the general thrust of the way things were going, with all the conciliatory rhetoric from Biden and some of his coterie, about going back into the JCPOA and maybe lifting some sanctions – it seemed that making everything the next administration aims to do dovetail with the Ayatollah’s interests was the new trend, nd what could serve that trend better than having the Supreme Leader himself take part? So you can see he might find this a letdown of sorts.”
A second anonymous adviser also noted that some time remains before the situation can change. “There could be late hires,” he argued. “Perhaps with all the current brouhaha in American society surrounding the Trump campaign’s legal battles against the vote tallies, Biden prefers to disturb the waters only a little at a time. Think about how Republicans would pounce all over again were this announcement to take place right now. Give it a week or two.”
Still, regime sources insisted, Khamenei nurses a grudge from the slight of not being invited to determine US Middle East policy as soon as Biden secured electoral victory. “It hurts,” acknowledged one. “The Supreme Leader all but wrote the Obama policy, not just in terms of direct dealings with Iran, but the whole region – not doing anything about the mass murders by Tehran ally Assad in Syria; shrinking form confrontation with Iranian proxies; and abandoning other US allies in the region to favor the Ayatollah’s hegemonic ambitions. Khamenei has grown to think he has established almost a birthright to continue doing so under the man who copiloted the Obama administration. It’s hard to think of any Obama-era policy that Iran would have wished were different. To be excluded in such a public way at this juncture, when everyone keeps saying they’re prepared to let bygones be bygones, that’s not easy to take.”