We should reach out to Iran, others

Published 9:00 pm Saturday, August 19, 2006

Regarding the Wednesday letter “CBS wrong to talk to Iranian president”:

I am always confused when anyone in America says the public shouldn’t have access to information. Iran is in the news almost daily and we have seen the news clips of this guy making crazy pronouncements. I found the interview interesting and disturbing. I think we should have as many people as possible, business leaders, aid groups, civic leaders, educational leaders, friendly Arab states, etc., talking to this guy and others in Iran, trying to work out some common ground that will support our objectives. We deal with terrible people from terrible countries every day in the U.N. We should reopen our embassy in Iran and begin talking to them about ways we can help them open up their country to the West, while reducing their threat to the world.

I spent 25 years negotiating contracts – threats, name-calling and refusing to talk to people gets you nowhere. Ultimatums never work; they just make people more unreasonable. We can’t fight with everyone we disagree with and we have proven we can’t kill everyone who hates us. I think we should get back to trying to sell the greatest product in the world, freedom, by reasonable means. But maybe I’m just old fashioned.

Mike Mitte

Edmonds