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CounterPunch
November
21, 2002
Letter from
Ayatollah Ashcroft to His CounterPart Ayatollah Shahroudi of
Iran
by ALI MOAYEDIAN
Dear Ayatollah Shahroudi,
It's been a while that I have planned
to write to you. But as we are both aware, the anti-God forces
in our countries keep us quite busy! I have been very occupied
doing my share to keep these forces in check here. But their
attacks against God and I has not died down, and they have been
pushing me to the edge. The funny thing is they claim they are
law-abiding citizens who are fighting to preserve their constitutionally
guaranteed rights. Big words coming out of little heads! What
does our actions have to do with the law and the constitution?!
These ignorant infidels fail to see that it's God that's above
all, and it's God that we serve. It was God's will that put me
and you where we are, and it's God that drives us to do what
we do. We do respect law and constitution, as long as they are
within the God's domain. And we judge as God shall do on the
judgment day. Is that so difficult to understand? You and I do!
Now I'm finally writing to you to congratulate
you on your greatest achievement. When I heard the news that
you have sentenced that infidel Aghajari to death, adrenaline
rushed through my veins, and I suddenly felt I have wings and
could fly high up. My biggest regret at that moment was that
I could not be present in your courtroom and witness this brave
and just ruling. How dare this professor advocates people not
to follow us like monkeys! In this day and age we need followers,
specially of the blind type, more than ever. I actually feel
jealous about your ruling. I feel you are getting closer to God
and I'm being left behind! And I sure wish to join you in every
step that you take towards God!
It made me even happier that you have
also sentenced this blasphemous man to lashes and banned him
from teaching for 10 years. We certainly don't want the evil
thoughts of this man to be propagated through the vulnerable
academic community. Actually, based on my research, the weakest
link in our society is the academia. You should also be aware
of this fact. I do remember that in the early years of your revolution,
you and your peers closed all the universities for a few years
and performed a thorough cleansing of the evil thoughts, sort
of like what the exorcists do I guess. But that must not have
been enough. It's clear that the cancer has spread again. And
now that you are about to kill the first hopeless patient, I
cannot agree with you more. Sometimes we have to make painful
decisions. We know it must be done, and there are certainly many
hopeless patients in the academia. So it's so painful that we
only have to take out one patient at a time! There was a time
that the patients would just succumb to God's will and vanish
peacefully. Isn't it great when this creates a "chain"
reaction? But now that the patients are not so willing to vanish
quietly, we have to perform our God-given duties in the public's
eyes. But this is probably a blessing in disguise. It's true
that we are both modest people and prefer to perform our tasks
without any fanfare or witnesses. The only witness we normally
prefer to have is God. That works better for us in the courts
too. Doesn't it? But if we have to act in the open, there must
be a reason. God must have wanted it this way!
As I'm now witnessing the tremendous
pressure that is being applied to you to reverse this just and
historic order, I'm praying every day and asking God to give
you strength to successfully carry out this holly task and cleanse
the earth of this man and then stop him from teaching ever again.
That will surely strengthen us in our beliefs and give us hope
that very soon we can also implement the policy of "you
are either with God or against us" in this greatest country
of the world!
And before I forget, I also want to ask
for your advice regarding another important issue. I've always
followed with interest the regular checkpoints that your Basij
volunteer forces set up in the streets and roads to enforce God's
wishes. We have recently implemented our own checkpoints program.
But I'm afraid our forces are very inexperienced and naive and
cannot run this program very effectively. So I was wondering
if we can benefit from your experience in this area. It would
be extremely helpful to us if we can borrow a few hundred of
your Basij personnel for a period of a year or two to train our
staff. I'm in particular interested to learn how we too can run
this as a volunteer program so we can also operate outside the
limitations set forth by the law and constitution and similar
buz words.
Of course I will personally make sure
that your Basij forces will not be fingerprinted or photographed
when entering the United States, as this kind of treatment is
only reserved for ordinary people who live within a 5000 mile
radius of the terrorists and is really intended to convince these
people and everyone else that we are serious about what we do.
Then perhaps they'll stop talking so much about us or other important
issues. Why is it that everyone takes this "freedom of expression"
thing of ours so seriously? Even our people are starting to grasp
that there is a limit to everything including exercising, freedom
and expression. It's about time people from other countries did
that too. We think fingerprinting them will show them who the
boss is around here, and photographing them upon arrival pops
their eyes wide open so they can see better for the rest of their
stay here, and of course we'll do everything in our power and
beyond to make that stay uncomfortable! The party is over!
I also want to assure you that your Basiji
staff will enjoy the most comfortable accommodations during their
tenure here, and their devotion to God and to me shall be generously
rewarded both in this world and the next. I sure hope that this
will result in more cultural exchanges between the United States
and Iran.
You know, I've also been thinking a lot
about the public hangings and the stonings that your staff have
been performing. Since I know you are specially found of crane
hangings, I hope the sanctions hasn't stopped you from acquiring
U.S. made cranes for the job. If it has, I'll sure be glad to
ask for a special waver or favor for crane sales to you. We've
of course been trying to stay in par with you as far as the number
of executions go, but we are definitely lagging when it comes
to execution methods. What are executions good for if the public
cannot view them and learn from them? God willing we are going
to do something about this. Right now I'm shooting for public
executions starting in early 2004 followed by stonings in mid
2006. And there again I'm counting on you to share with us your
expertise. This is certainly another area we can benefit from
cultural exchanges!
And finally, my biggest wish right now
is to enjoy your companionship and play host to you personally
here in the United States or enjoy your hospitality there in
Iran. There are certainly a lot of ideas and experiences the
two of us can share and exchange. I cannot stop thinking the
ideas the two of us can come up with if we put our heads together.
After all, as one of my dearest friends Dan Quayle once said,
"what a waste it is to lose one's mind." And here we
are talking about two minds!
I wish you continuous success in serving
God and punishing your people. And I look forward to hearing
from you soon.
God Bless you! Yours Truly, Ayatollah
John Ashcroft
P.S. I hope you'll allow me to use the
title of ayatollah. I felt I've earned it, and that also makes
me feel closer to you and my other peers there. I actually feel
more ayatollah than some of the ayatollahs over there. But if
you feel I need to do more to deserve this title, I'm certainly
ready for the challenge.
Ali Moayedian
can be reached at ads@best.com
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