True and cca 8 years ago it was not all doom and gloom either in Iran, I had quite a few anti-regime talks with random folks who just came to me as visible outsider, not sure about now.

But his point still stands, things can and do go to shit, anywhere. 90s were a magical period when world consistently fell even from major news like moving towards bright future. 9/11 changed that for good and common americans let that fear-based manipulation (and 2 absolutely meaningless wars as we see now) happen and gradually roll over entire world, that's also one of 'super powers' of being a superpower.

Exactly. This is what they looked like for a casual observer in the West, who reads magazines and watches TV, but does not study such things in depth. Things looked liberal and Westernized, a few more steps, and these countries join the club of relaxed liberal democracies.

Not that these liberal vistas were not true, but they did not represent the whole truth.

The same applies to UAE, to the modern Saudi Arabia, etc, but also, say to European countries themselves (hi, Hungary, are you blazing the trail for Poland?) and the US (where suddenly half the population supports Trump).