Iranians of all political stripes, ages believe U.S. will attack

In an essay published in Maine’s Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel newspapers in Maine, Visiting Professor of Politics Eric Hooglund writes about his early summer trip to Iran, which coincided with U.S. Senate and House resolutions (since blocked) authorizing President Bush to set up a naval blockade of Iran. It was big news in Iran, writes Hooglund, where the media “uniformly depicted the U.S. congressional resolutions as tantamount to a declaration of war…. Consequently, I was put in the uncomfortable position of having to explain…why I believed these resolutions did not mean war.” Attending a village wedding, “our discussion turned to U.S. policy. Jasmine, an articulate 20-year old computer science major who had composed and read a poem for the bride and groom, asked, ‘Why does America hate Iran and want to attack us?'” [More…]