Freedom-loving forces

From an interview this morning by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! with dissident Iranian investigative journalist Akbar Ganji [emphasis mine]:

AMY GOODMAN: How can you bring democracy to Iran? How can the pro-democracy movement in Iran be empowered?

AKBAR GANJI: [translated] We have a widespread democratic movement within our country. There are two main weak points for this movement. First is the lack of organization, and there is no leadership. We need to better organize the movement and to elect democratically a leader for this movement, a leader like Gandhi. If we can manage to do this, the road to victory is short.

But we should bear in mind at least one point. Wherever in the Middle East a free election is held, Muslim fundamentalists will inevitably win. In addition to fundamental structural problems, also Western foreign policy is responsible for this. Iran is the only exception in the region. Should there be a free election in Iran, the winner will be democratic and freedom-loving forces. But those parties look at U.S. foreign policies with suspicion.

One of great disgraces of the Bush Administration's foreign policy has been its alienation of the Iranian middle. We're paying for it.