He Said: What Do We Lack Compared to Stalin?

I was at the house early in the morning. The leader was in the restroom. When he came out, I noticed he stepped out with his left foot. I have no doubt that the issues surrounding the JCPOA, sanctions, and the global situation have left the Supreme Leader distracted. He always steps out with his right foot. Although I tried to avert my gaze, he noticed me, but quickly shifted my mind elsewhere: - Vahid, this bus that overturned at the university, a bunch of students were killed, was there a writer or journalist on that bus? I replied no, sir. He said, then why do people think it was the government's doing? ... Poor things, where were you the day we executed thousands of young people and students without a bus? They don’t believe it; they should go ask Mr. Raisi, who was a member of the four-person execution committee. I said: Many were surprised why you didn’t appoint him as the head of the Expediency Council? He said: I had three options, Raisi, Larijani, and Ahmadinejad! - (laughs) - I especially appointed Larijani so that he (Ahmadinejad) could, as he says, pour water where it burns! I asked, sir, what is the disagreement among them? He said: Haven’t you heard that the cart that goes uphill, the mules bite each other? He asked: By the way, Vahid, what do people say about the clip we released from 88? I replied: People say, why are the attendees' images blurred and unclear? He said: People are mistaken. They should see how Stalin completely erased people from the photos of the revolution. What do we lack compared to Stalin? Huh? What do we lack? The leader was angry. He was about to stand up and grab my collar saying, 'What do we lack compared to Stalin?'. I wanted to change the atmosphere. I said: By the way, sir, did you hear that Angelina Jolie wants to run for the presidency of the United States? He said: Yes, I heard. They showed it to me on the internet. I liked it, though under another name. By the way, she is very beautiful. Melania Trump doesn’t count. The Supreme Leader's animosity towards Melania Trump is increasing daily. I think they have placed her at the top of the list of foreign removals when the time is right. I said: Mir Hossein wants his negotiation tapes with you to be published as well. He said my words are the tape! How much I advised him. I said, look, don’t look at me. I was embarrassed. I am sitting in the place of Cyrus and Darius. The little reputation I had is gone. I burned. But you survived. You sat in a place that elevated you. You were sitting where Ahmad Qavam, Mossadegh, and Foroughi sat. Have some capacity. Maintain your dignity. He said, 'No, the elections have become something, you must do something or else I will do something.' I also intended to punish him, but I heard he has been placed under house arrest. I can no longer reach him. I will wait; if his house arrest is over, I will settle the score with him. He said: What other news? I replied: People are insisting that Dr. Velayati must resign from his 38 positions. He said: What is wrong with these people? Dr. Velayati does not have 38 jobs; he has 39. One of the last jobs is managing the income of the 38 positions and their accounting. Poor man has no time; otherwise, I would give him another job abroad to go mix with the opposition. (The leader scratched his foot a little and said) 'Has anything come from London recently?' ... - No, sir, how so? - 'Nothing, I scratched my foot, and it reminded me of the butt-kissing tweets.' I said: By the way, the issue of government sons-in-law has come up again. They have revealed that Dr. Velayati's son-in-law has this many jobs. He said: People must understand once and for all that being a son-in-law is their night job; they cannot be unemployed during the day! I said: Mr. Mohammad Yazdi, a member of the Guardian Council, has stated that Iran has advanced in these 40 years as much as in 400 years. He said: He has been ungrateful. Drying up Lake Urmia alone would take five or six hundred years. Do you think this is a joke? Or consider the Zayandeh Rud. No government could sell the unproductive desert soil by truckloads for dollars to spend on Karbala for another thousand years. Then, with irritation, he said: 'Now I say Yazdi should come explain whether he said the number 400 to please the enemy or was influenced by bad surroundings. This nation could not overthrow the monarchy for two thousand five hundred years; we did it overnight ....' The leader swallowed the continuation of his words. I think he was being considerate of me. He said: By the way, it seems the daughters of Hashemi Rafsanjani have found the black box of their father's pool; they are constantly looking for the cause of that late lamented's young death. There was little phase; Fatemeh also came forward to inform us that they want to assassinate your father. Vahid, that man was doing things lately, saying things that seemed like he wanted to be assassinated .... And now what? Your father killed so many. Executed so many young people. Have they forgotten the summer of 67? .... I was not aware back then. I had no news. There was a system, and I was in that system .... Tomorrow, Vahid, if there was a court, a people's court and this nonsense, Vahid, you would come to testify that I had no involvement in the executions, nor did those bastards inform me. Because they knew I would stand in front of them and say this boy, this girl, sells newspapers at the corner, has a father, a mother, a sister, a brother, has a future, why should you execute him? ..... You should witness all this from now on, Vahid. Go take notes. Write it in your daily memories .... All these years you were my standard-bearer; did you see me kill a young person? Kill a student? A Kurd, a Baha'i, an environmentalist? ..... But these vile ones killed ...... The leader, to affect me, added a few drops of tears to his suppressed sobs. No matter how hard they tried, it did not come out more. Of course, afterward, suddenly he came out of his sorrow and said: Of course, one time you will see in the middle of the trial, al-Qaeda attacked, sent the people's court and the judge and the clerk and the prosecutor to the air, saved us. I said: Sir, regarding Mr. Golpayegani's remarks about your simplicity and that your sons are tenants and that they pay for even a photocopy taken here, it is very significant from an international perspective. If you allow, we should also bring a goat to the house and say the leader feeds on this goat's milk and wears clothes made from its wool and uses its voice instead of CDs and MP3s. He said: That’s a good idea, but first, we need to hide that giant private airplane somewhere. The smell of the regime He said: Vahid, regarding this foul and unpleasant smell that has engulfed Tehran ..... Now, fortunately, its source has been identified as the Plasco sewage, if it is not a lie. But I was just thinking about the enemy. Tell the police forces that wherever they hear or smell that someone has jokingly or seriously said this smell is the smell of the regime, they should deal with it severely, (angrily) so that he cannot get up from his place. (angrier) So that he remembers his Lord and his Lord. (furiously) So that he loses his sense of smell (even angrier) .... So that his father comes in front of his eyes ... so that ..... I rushed out of the room, so that the fear of being beaten by the leader sent shivers down the regime's spine ..... excuse me, sent shivers down Vahid al-Azma's spine. Both the leader and I were confused. I apologize. The poem of the week A dog wonders what a donkey is doing, in astonishment that what a donkey is doing, emerging from the nest to witness that you are a shovel of a snake. Everyone sees a role of you, the role of all your cunning is near the rice bowl. A truck full of dollars for the orchestra of murder and plunder of the country. Def and tambourine, three-stringed and stringed you in the eyes of a free young man, sometimes in Evin, sometimes in Qezel Hesar. You bury a grieving mother in the eyes of a dying man, a noose of execution in your eyes. You are the last stone of stoning. Although you are sitting high, you are worthless and lowly. Your days come to an end, although your end is the end of your days. I learned from the worthlessness of the thorn on the wall that no one becomes someone from this high sitting - Saeb Tabrizi Hadi Khorsandi Hadi Khorsandi is a well-known Iranian writer, poet, and satirist residing in London. He has long shared his writings with Iranian audiences and Persian speakers, presenting satirical writings in the form of weekly letters with Radio Farda's audience.