Hardliner Raisi's win in Iran election may turn out be good news for Biden

The cleric may be push a deal on Iran's nuclear programme more effectively than reformists.

To some critics, U.S. elections are managed affairs. According to this cynical view, the “powers that be” narrow the field of candidates, the two parties don’t represent the real range of public opinion in the country, and periodic elections are just shadow plays staged by powerbrokers behind the scenes. In this way, U.S. democracy is a sham.

Although certainly distorted by the powerful, U.S. democracy is not entirely scripted. If nothing else, the victory of Donald Trump in 2016 should have dispelled this particular misconception since the array of forces within the Republican Party, the intelligentsia, and Wall Street were