is this quest for democracy and change is grassroots and it's not from above, it's not like iraq or afghanistan where it's imposed by the government, it's actually kind of a secular movement. a people's movement has happened over the past couple of years. grassroots. and i think that's what's important. it's also important because it's strategically placed. it has oil. it's close to the persian gulf. it's got a lot of influence in the region. but other than that -- >> charlie: borders with efshg, almost. >> it borders -- >> charlie: borders with everybody, almost. >> it has a dynamic, educated population. >> iran is the bell weather state for the middle east, for the past 100 years everything has happened in the middle east either in iran, turkey or egypt. read the bible. read herodotus. the two two canonical texts about civilization. in the bible, there is no nation that plays a more significant role in the freedom of jews, in the building of jerusalem than persians. iran is not two-bit hustlers who rule the country now. iran is one of the oldest civilizations in the world. it has produced haf

iraq, afghanistan, palestine, syria, lebanon. and beyond. >> rose: and how is it using that leverage in your judgment? >> i don't think it's using it to the full extent possible but i also think that the three plus three group three years ago when we presented our offer to iran we included deliberately a section which said we also want to cooperate with iran on regional issues. what we meant was the need to recognize iran's interest in the region and without giving iran any preferences compared to other countries to allow iran to participate on equal footing with others in regional discussions and then convinced iran wants it. and if we all are reasonable and if we all recognize that there are security interests of iran just like there are security interests of other countries in the region, if we recognize that iran must cooperate, we fully remove any reasonable doubt, any doubt at all regarding its nuclear program. and if we engage iran on these grounds, if we develop a package which would oblige iran to do what we all wanted t

for instance, america is dealing with afghanistan. america is dealing with middle east. america is dealing with balkans. america is dealing with terror and energy transportation. diversification of energy source s. we have the same agenda. we have been dealing, also, with these issues. it's good that we are being coordinating it. we have the same views, you see. so i don't think there are many companies in the world that they have the same agenda. >> rose: you also have a good relationship with iran. >> iran is our neighbor. and they have different regimes. we are democrat and we are trying to be member of the european union so this is different, of course. but if you have a neighbor definitely you are... you want to be friendly and you want cooperation with them. we've had a very stable border with iran since 1659. so there's no border problem. there's no conflict. >> rose: you don't support sanctions against iran. >> u.n. sanctions is binding us also. >> rose: right. >> so therefore we are are applying this. we are arguing our reports to the u.n. committee. but since w

it's not afghanistan and you know it's not afghanistan. >> you see, the answers are clear. when there's a claim made by the u.s. government it is too well to accept it. but when mr. bush killing a million people in iraq does anybody talk about human rights violation there is? i mean, there seems to be a major contradiction here in a selective memory that i'm speaking of here and when it becomes selective, it becomes this... not honest. and when it's dishonest it cannot be accepted. so we have to speak of the mistakes that have been made and then we'll move forward 30. years ago around this same time saddam attacked us back there there was no speak of hamas and hezbollah, they didn't exist and there was no such talk of a nuke beer bomb and why did the u.s. government choose saddam over us choose to support saddam against us? what did we do? and it went full force behind saddam and the war against us. if yo go to china and japan or africa or south america and ask kids in elementary school what the problem between iran and the united states is, is it the nuclear bomb that perh

it's not afghanistan and you know it's not afghanistan. >> you see, the answers are clear. when there's a claim made by the u.s. government it is too well to accept it. t when mr. bush killing a million people in iraq does anybody talk about human rights violation there is? i mean, there seems to be a major contradiction here in a selective memory that i'm speaking of here and when it becomes selective, it becomes this... not honest. and when it's dishonest it cannot be accepted. so we have to speak of the mistakes that have been made and then we'll move forward 30. years ago around this same time saddam attacked us back there there was no speak of hamas and hezbollah, they didn't exist and there was no such talk of a nuke beer bomb and why did the u.s. government choose saddam over us choose to support saddam against us? what did we do? and it went full force behind saddam and the war against us. if yo go to china and japan or africa or south america and ask kids in elementary school what the problem between iran and the united states is, is it the nuclear bomb that perhap

that this change must present itself, must show itself in iraq, it must show and happen in afghanistan. it must show and happen in palestine. it must show with regard to iran, now please pay attention. i am trying to help here. i'm trying to help you. i'm trying to help america here. those who are behind this seize or within the u.s. administration in the obama administration are moving things in a direction which will make mr. obama to take radical positions, especially with respect to iran. some members of the permanent members of the u.s. security council little also doing the same thing. pleading-- leading mr. obama to a position that is irreversible vis-a-vis iran. as soon as mr. obama enterers into a series of behaviors that resembles mr. bush's behaviors, two things will happen. first, mr. obama's time is over. in other words, when mr. obama becomes radical in his behavior, what that means is there is no change. and therefore he has been defeated. he has failed. and his presidential term will be not useful. secondly, america's most important-- historical opportunity will be-- op

. >> when you're doing this, whether making decisions about a budget or about war and peace or afghanistan or whatever it is or whether making decisions about what is thought to be the nature of the health care reform package or the financial reform package, are you getting at people who walk in and say and are you listening to people from your staff or elsewhere who say no don't do it that way. do it this way. >> there's plenty of healthy debate. >> charlie: is there? >> yeah. there is plenty of healthy debate. now i think one of the... just returning to some of the discussion we had earlier one of the questions is were there enough different perspectives in that debate so there was plenty of healthy debate. whether the spectrum.... >> charlie: was wide snuff? well, was it wide enough? probably not. the fact that you would entertain the idea means it wasn't wide enough. >> i think that would be a reasonable interpretation. >> charlie: here is the other thing that fascinates me about being at the level of government that you were at. do you have time to do some of the things that would hav