One Dear Leader sends his best regards to another. Can’t wait for the chai-sipping session (via LAT):

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad today posted a congratulatory message to President-elect Barack Obama on his official website.

But his lengthy note also cautioned Obama to change America’s ways and to reverse policies based on what he described as “belligerency, occupation, bullying, demagoguery,” among other things.

It is part of Iran’s complicated response to the election of Obama, who has said he’d be willing to speak with Iran’s leadership, as detailed in a report written for today’s Los Angeles Times.

Ahmadinejad begins his note with the kind of flowery, somewhat overblown language typical in the Middle East:

I congratulate you on your success in mustering the majority of votes cast in the presidential elections. You know pretty well that the opportunities God grants to people he has created are short-lived, and they could either serve perfection of mankind and interests of nations or, God forbid, disserve nations. I hope that His Excellency will favor the genuine interests of people and justice over the never-ending demands of a selfish and fallible minority, so that you can seize on this chance in the best manner and leave behind a good legacy.

But he quickly gets down to the nitty-gritty, advising the freshman senator on what he must do to be an effective president.

Ahmadinejad writes that Obama must “overhaul” America’s domestic and foreign policies because the people of the world and U.S. expect it.