Leaders facing domestic problems find it advantageous to blame outsiders, typically the United States, because casting blame elsewhere diverts attention from internal government failures — Chavez and Ahmadinejad use this to explain economic misery they would not want attributed to their own governance.

causalpending

Speaker

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita

Evidence Quote

you wouldn't want people sitting around saying it's because of the way the mullahs are running the government you need their support to stay in power so you would want to say well it's the evil United States

Source

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita on Democracies and Dictatorships 2/12/2007EconTalk
Created: 6/15/2026, 9:20:39 AM

My Notes

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