This is a good time to ask apologists for the Islamic regime, who degrades Islam? Who imposes stoning, forced marriage of underage girls and flogging for not wearing the veil? Do such practices represent Iran's ancient history and culture, its ethnic and religious diversity? Its centuries of sensual and subversive poetry?

You need imagination in order to imagine a future that doesn't exist.

Those in the west who dismiss the repressiveness of laws against women in countries like Iran, no matter how benign their intentions, present a condescending view not just of the religion but also of women living in Muslim majority countries, as if the desire for choice and happiness is the monopoly of women in the west.

You need imagination in order to imagine a future that doesn't exist.

The negative side of the American Dream comes when people pursue success at any cost, which in turn destroys the vision and the dream.

America was based on a poetic vision. What will happen when it loses its poetry?