"Only Ahmadinejad could go to America."

And perhaps only Bush could embrace him, if only Bush would invite and welcome Ahmadinejad the way Mao did Nixon. I’ve argued before that Bush and Ahmadinejad are the best of allies. Both provide the other with the threatening rhetoric they each depend on to incite the nationalist fervor and sell the politics of fear to their domestic audiences. Is it too much to hope that either of them recognize the accidental end game such means have made possible? I suspect it is. And I say that not because I think Ahmadinejad is incapable of or unwilling to pull off an Iranian-American détente. I say that because I have no faith Bush will recognize the opportunity, much less be willing to take advantage of it.