I said to myself:

“Let’s see if any Iranians are going to appear in the Republican and Democratic Conventions in the next two weeks?”

I was fed up with all the rubbish we hear every day from Donald Trump. About how bad Obama has been in dealing with the Ayatollahs.

If you do not know me, and my angle, let me brief you.

No, I am no Shakespeare or Hafez

No, I do not appear in newspapers.

No, I do not go to conventions

No, I do not belong to any political party

Yes, I am arrogant, because I am driven by deep feelings. 

I was born exactly at the time of the Full Moon in the month of Day (Capricorn) in 1957. Appreciate astrology, and ancient Iranian history if you want to tune into me. That is the frequency this radio station is on. So it is a weird angle from which I view matters. 

At this point move on, or stay with me.

Thanks for staying.

The US has used Iran, especially a fanatic view of Iran, for its own domestic purposes, no matter who was elected.

But it is not as if we do not have Iranians in US, to take care of their community. We have. But no one shouts like me. I only do this because no one else does it so bluntly, and so childishly clear.

Back to the conventions.

I stayed up late every night in the UK, to see first-hand what the speakers at RNC and DNC would say, without media spin. I thought, these are people who came to the US before any Iranian. They run the US. You will not see any Iranian on the podium. But why?

Let me give you a simple story.

I remember, my Freshman year at Princeton, a new friend of mine in the hallway, was invited to a girl’s house for a week end. He said that, at dinner time the father came over with a book, and asked him, “what is your family name?” He then opened it and looked up his name. It was not there. He had failed the test. 

I was always told, that in the US is the land of the free. I expected the people in the US to be people who did not have a social hierarchy. Just a monetary one. But this instance proved to me that those who came on The Mayflower are the aristocracy of the US. So why live in the US, when you have proper aristocracy in the UK? And the Brits knew and respected my family's aristrocratic history. Try telling an American that your ancestor was the Chancellor of the Exchequer for Persian Emperors way way before The Mayflower was built. They would laugh and tell you that that is rubbish.

My Iranian friends in the US tell me:

“Chera nemiyayi Amrika?” (why don’t you come to the US)

“Inja azad hasti” (You are free here)

Once I came over to see them in Los Angeles. One day my ex had to go to an Iranian shop to get lemon juice.

“Agha shoma ab limoo Yek o Yek dared?”

The Iranian American noticed she spoke in good British accent said:

“Inja Amrika hast, na Ingelis, Yek o Yek chieh?” and turned his back to her.

My ex stormed back to the car and I asked her, “Chi shod”.

She said that she was hoping that, when she entered an Iranian shop, she would feel the Iranian culture. She was hoping to get the same greeting and warmth and above all politeness.

But no, this buffoon Iranian American, had suddenly found this new “freedom”, and thought that he could scoff off a fellow Iranian. He was more than equal.

So I rushed into the shop and got hold of that “bloke” as we say in the UK, and told him that the British Iranians have not lost their Iranian manners. I taught him to respect common decency and respect that is everywhere in the world. He had treated us as new comers in the US and treated her arrogantly. I told him that I was one of the few Iranians who had made it to Princeton but I do not turn up my nose. He then apologised after he recognised who my ancestors were. But was it necessary to go that far to buy an Ablimoo?

There are millions of Iranians who are very rich. We know that, unlike other immigrants in the US, the Iranian immigrants all came after 1979, after they sold their riches in Iran. House prices in Beverley Hills rocketed. 

Sure we had the odd billionaires like Bijan who came way before, but they are few and far between. If you had to generalise, you can say that unlike the other immigrate to the US, Iranians did not have to grovel. Most paid millions to lawyers and came into US first class. Suddenly they were better than any aristocrat from Iran. In contrast these "Noveau Riches" made us aristocrats look like "Nouveau Pauvres"

With that in mind, now look at the RNC and DNC and think, why isn’t there one Iranian speaker there to take on the likes of Donald Trump head on, or to support him?

The normal answer is, “Ali the other newly arrived immigrants are also quiet”. 

I was about to agree, until I saw a Sikh opening the RNC meeting with a prayer. She put her veil on and all the RNC members dropped their heads and prayed with her, even though they did not know what she was saying. They believed her. WOW!

After that shock, I was truly pleased with the RNC. I just did not think that they would be so open minded to have a Sikh to say the prayers. Shame about Trump.

Then DNC started and it was the same. All the older Americans spoke. They all talked about how a few generations ago, their forefathers came penny less and they made it. So many had parents who worked in bars, and they made it to the Senate. So many needed social help and it was there as a safety net, all thanks to the Democrats.

But then I saw one Pakistani stand with his wife and speak of his life and his loss. He had come to the US to get away from dogma and go for freedom. But he did not think he would be second class citizen. He told Donald Trump to read The US Constitution. The DNC crowd exploded like never before. I am not a Muslim but I exploded as well.

I knew that in my own family we had people who had gone to the Korean War. I am sure we have hundreds of Iranians who have gone to West Point. But none of them, not one, has bothered to get up in DNC or RNC and speak the truth about Iran.

Now back to the question, why I do not go to the US?

I live in the UK because I am respected as an Iranian. This is the country who found Iran as I know. If it was not for Sir Henry Rawlinson, we would not know cuneiform. My own teacher Reverend Sharp taught cuneiform in Pahlavi University for 40 years. The love that the British showed to Iran is second to none. Arthur Upham Pope is the American I look to for the love Americans showed to Iran. 

Both these men and others were more Iranian than most Iranians. Being in the UK I learnt to appreciate history and culture. I could exist and be more than a monetary entity. In the US, you are the amount of money you have. The Brits respect the aristocracy of their country and other countries. But in the US, it is just your bank balance.

And that brings me to what Donald Trump wants to do. He is a businessman who wants to put a price tag for US foreign policy. To him, the US government and especially their Foreign Office, is now going to charge everyone for their services. So NATO countries will be billed for services rendered. He will “cut a deal” with politicians in Europe for any US diplomatic effort.

Or to put it the other way round, anyone can buy the services of the US, if they pay high enough. As crazy as it sounds, the billionaire Iranian community in the US will be able to fund Trump to create a regime change in Iran. Of course it will all be done democratically and written like a blockbuster movie out of Hollywood. The Democrats would never “cut a deal” with the Iranian Opposition. They cut one with Rouhani for $150 billion.

But we hear that Trump is not just a person who will do anything if the price is right. He will look to “clean up” illegal immigrants. Iranians went mad last year when they found out that they will have to state where they came from in their US Passports.  These posh Iranians were afraid to be regarded as unequal or second class citizens. They had bought front row seats in the US. They were the Shahs of Sunset.

Iranians who were poor, arrived in the US, just like other people seeking new life, and knew that the only difference between them and others was money. They did not mind that. It was the penance they would pay in abandoning Iran. But now they were branded. Even the billionaire Iranians had to say where they came from and would face visa restrictions if they left US. I felt vindicated, that not going to the US after Princeton and settling in the UK was fine. I was both Iranian and British. I did not feel that I had abandoned Iran, or had to suffer penance.

The Iranian Americans always used to say:

“Inja kesi kari nadareh as koja miyai” (over here no one care where you come from)

But perhaps the greatest truth came from the Japanese after Pearl Harbour, who suffered what Donald Trump is about to unleash upon Iranian and other immigrants.

“A Jap is a Jap”

“An Iranian is an Iranian”

“A Syrian is a Syrian”

“An Iraqi in an Iraqi”

This is what I call Donald Trump’s “Bulldozer Politics”. He flattened America with his bulldozer and built his style of buildings and skyscrapers, shutting out the sun light across US, destroying the skylines. And he will build a wall to contain people in the US and in the Middle East. It will be just like what the Japanese went through. George Takei explains it here in facebook but he also talks about it below:

Ultimately there are those of us, who have "thicker blood", or are much more nationalistic to be concerned by politics or religion. We are nationalists, and as such, to have a new nation in the making, judge us, is ridiculous. In the ancient past, the people of Iran would have had to stay in Iran and fight for their freedom. It is about time more people wrote about this. Am I the only one?