IRAN VETOES KERRY VISIT, WORLD IN FLAMES – AT 5:47 P.M. P.M. ET:  From The Hill:

Iranian legislators on Sunday decided to not allow a visit from Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.), according to Iranian media.

"Members of the Iranian parliament's Foreign Relations Committee (a subcommittee of the parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission) voiced opposition to the request after studying the issue," Hassan Ebrahimi, head of the committee, told the semi-official Fars News Agency.

Kerry had been denying, to the American press, that he had plans to visit Iran.  If true, the action by Iran's parliament is preemptive.  However, please note this:

"Members of the Iranian parliament's Foreign Relations Committee (a subcommittee of the parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission) voiced opposition to the request after studying the issue," Hassan Ebrahimi, head of the committee, told the semi-official Fars News Agency.

The request?  Kerry should come clean and tell us whether he did make a formal request to visit.

The whole thing is embarrassing anyway.  The idea of a former presidential candidate visiting a country that is currently murdering its own citizens in the streets is sickening.  It has echoes of George McGovern saying, during the Vietnam War, that he'd gladly visit North Vietnam and beg for peace.  McGovern, of course, didn't have to beg.  We simply withdrew from Vietnam and, in 1975, cut off aid to our South Vietnamese allies, courtesy of Congress, handing the south to the Communists.

Iran is the first great test for Obama in 2010.  The suggestion, and we can't nail down the facts on this precisely, that he may have permitted a trip to Tehran by Kerry is not encouraging.

January 3,  2009