Demonizing Iran

A new data point has surfaced this morning that may serve as a measure of the efficacy of our leading an effort to demonize Iran and to enlist other economically developed nations, particularly from Europe, in support.  The data point comes from OPEC and was just reported on the BBC News Web site:

Iran will assume the presidency of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) for the first time in 36 years.

The country's oil minister was elected as Opec president at a one-day meeting of the group, which is made up of 12 oil producing states.

Masoud Mir-Kazemi will hold the presidency from 1 January 2011.

Iran, which takes over from Ecuador, is Opec's second-largest oil producer and holds about 10% of world oil reserves.

It seems appropriate to read this as an institutional response to our efforts to isolate Iran through economic sanctions.  There is apparently at least one community that has rejected this strategy, and they have chosen an interesting (and hopefully effective) way to make sure that we get that message of rejection!