For those who say the US shouldn't meddle

[DarrinS]

A good article from The Nation

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090706/nichols

excerpt

President Obama's tepid response to the evidence the Iranian election was stolen from the people of that country by current president President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his thuggish allies is disappointing.

...

The president says he entertains "deep concerns about the election" in Iran. Well, who doesn't? Expressing concern is "nice," it's "diplomatic"--in the worst sense--but it is not sufficient to the cir stance, as Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are reportedly arguing within the White House.

...


By every measure, the US president's response has been less than that of other world leaders, especially French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has branded the announced election "result" a fraud and bluntly decried the government's clampdown on dissent "brutal," "totally disproportionate" and "extremely alarming."

It's sad when France is making us look timid.

[DarrinS]

Yes, it is exactly what they want.

See, you deal in glib responses with which you try to deflect any cognitive dissonance which might challenge your embryonic understanding of your own ideology.

Western business interests want access and control over Middle Eastern oil. They always have. It's why Mossadegh was deposed in the first place -- British Petroleum controlled the revenues from Iranian oil, Mossadegh planned to "unilaterally renegotiate" that arrangement, Winston Churchill appealed to Eisenhower on behalf of BP, and Eisenhower sent in the CIA to foment a "revolution" and install the Shah. Of course the Shah ended up nationalizing BP's holdings anyway, but it was on terms beneficial to the U.S., and the U.K. is our obedient little lapdog so they didn't yap too much about it.

It's why OPEC was formed. Middle Eastern countries which had grown tired of the Western powers controlling all their oil looked at what happened in Iran and feared either the Western powers or the Soviets would overrun them if they didn't team up.

It's why we prop up the Saudis.

It's why we've had Presidents who literally hold hands with the oil sheikhs.

It's why we've spent 60 years tiptoeing around the Israeli-Palestinian issue.

We all know this. It's why we agonize about importing foreign oil, about alternative energy, about gas prices, about money pouring into interests inimical to the U.S. Our economies depend upon cheap energy, countries like Iran have it in spades, and if any of them ever get their act together, they will hold an awful lot of the cards and they will not play them in ways beneficial to U.S. interests, regardless of whether the bearded ayatollahs or the banner-waving students are in charge.

So American business players have a vested interest in making sure they stay dysfunctional.

You know that we get most of our oil from Mexico and Canada, right?

[Extra Stout]

Anyone who has a basic understanding of what happened in 1953 and 1979 beyond the mendacious version fed to them by neoconservative pundits undestands full well why any President would keep mum on political protests in Iran.

I don't say this to defend Obama. I say it because it is plainly obvious to the most casual observer, and anyone who says he has a grasp of the situation and claims otherwise, like a Krauthammer, or especially a Michael Ledeen, is simply lying.

[braeden0613]

So after skimming through this thread, does the OP just want Obama to denounce the Iranian government? Or do you want some type of CIA or military response?

[MannyIsGod]

Wanting Iran to NOT be the biggest sponsor of terrorism and wanting them to NOT have nuclear capability is not hating on Israel. But that's just my opinion.

Shows how ing little you know, moron. You have no clue what the reformists stand for.

[clambake]

So after skimming through this thread, does the OP just want Obama to denounce the Iranian government? Or do you want some type of CIA or military response?

he doesn't know what he wants until he hears it.

[DarrinS]

So after skimming through this thread, does the OP just want Obama to denounce the Iranian government? Or do you want some type of CIA or military response?

No military response, but not a flaccid, limp-wristed response.

[DarrinS]

Shows how ing little you know, moron. You have no clue what the reformists stand for.

Ok, so you think I'm dumb and don't know what I'm talking about. Thanks for your contribution.

I find it amusing that Obama and Pat Buchanan seem to be aligned on this issue.

[MannyIsGod]

As recently as 1991(sic?) we encouraged Iraq's Shia to rise up, only to leave them in the lurch when they did. Ditto Hungary in 1956. Was this a smart thing to have done?

Yeah, we encouraged them and just watched on the sidelines as they were crushed. It was out right morally ty. It was encouraging the child on the block to stand up to the bully and then when the bully pulled a knife we just sat back and watched as he used it on the child.

Are Darrin, Krauthammer, and the rest of the moronic neocons advocating the US military step into help the reformists when they get slaughtered by the Iranian government? I seriously ing doubt it.

[MannyIsGod]

Ok, so you think I'm dumb and don't know what I'm talking about. Thanks for your contribution.

I find it amusing that Obama and Pat Buchanan seem to be aligned on this issue.

Oh I know for a fact you have no clue what you're talking about. So does anyone else that reads your posts. I feel no obligation to contribute anything to someone like you who can't be bothered to find out the facts on a situation BEFORE they open their mouth. You just instantly react based on your perceptions of said situation regardless of what is actually going on.

Neocons have learned nothing from Iraq.

[DarrinS]

Are Darrin, Krauthammer, and the rest of the moronic neocons advocating the US military step into help the reformists when they get slaughtered by the Iranian government? I seriously ing doubt it.

It's not only conservatives (or neocons, i.e. Jew lovers) that are critical of how Obama is handling this. Go read that article from The Nation -- hardly a conservative mag.

[Extra Stout]

You know that we get most of our oil from Mexico and Canada, right?

Oil is a fungible commodity.

It makes absolutely no difference where we get our oil from --- as long as somebody wants Middle Eastern oil and is willing to pay for it, controlling those revenue streams is extraordinarily profitable, and Western businesses would much rather they get those profits than somebody else.

I swear, it would be easier to explain this to a kindergartener.

DarrinS, congratulations, you are the quintessential example of an American conservative in 2009. You have negligible understanding of anything about the world further away than the front of your nose, so much so that you can't even scratch the surface of grasping the depths of your ignorance, yet you are so arrogant as to assume you have it all figured out, complete with pithy catchphrases. In fact, you have to deal in content-free single-sentence responses, because on top of your apoplexy-inducing stupidity, you have the attention span of a gnat.

It's astounding. Calvin Coolidge once quipped, "The ability of the human mind to resist knowledge is astounding," itself a pithy catchphrase, except that in this case it is possibly the truest assemblage of words ever uttered.

I need to stop trying to explain things to these morons or I'm going to have a nervous breakdown and end up like whottt.

[DarrinS]

Oh I know for a fact you have no clue what you're talking about. So does anyone else that reads your posts. I feel no obligation to contribute anything to someone like you who can't be bothered to find out the facts on a situation BEFORE they open their mouth. You just instantly react based on your perceptions of said situation regardless of what is actually going on.

Neocons have learned nothing from Iraq.

So what are the facts? Enlighten us.

[DarrinS]

Oil is a fungible commodity.

It makes absolutely no difference where we get our oil from --- as long as somebody wants Middle Eastern oil and is willing to pay for it, controlling those revenue streams is extraordinarily profitable, and Western businesses would much rather they get those profits than somebody else.

I swear, it would be easier to explain this to a kindergartener.

DarrinS, congratulations, you are the quintessential example of an American conservative in 2009. You have negligible understanding of anything about the world further away than the front of your nose, so much so that you can't even scratch the surface of grasping the depths of your ignorance, yet you are so arrogant as to assume you have it all figured out, complete with pithy catchphrases. In fact, you have to deal in content-free single-sentence responses, because on top of your apoplexy-inducing stupidity, you have the attention span of a gnat.

It's astounding. Calvin Coolidge once quipped, "The ability of the human mind to resist knowledge is astounding," itself a pithy catchphrase, except that in this case it is possibly the truest assemblage of words ever uttered.

I need to stop trying to explain things to these morons or I'm going to have a nervous breakdown and end up like whottt.

You're like Manny, only with a thesaurus. Fancy words don't always help an argument. Neither do insults.

[JoeChalupa]

Ok, so you think I'm dumb and don't know what I'm talking about. Thanks for your contribution.

I find it amusing that Obama and Pat Buchanan seem to be aligned on this issue.

I'm with Buchanan on this issue but it the issue is a target for republicans either way. If Obama speaks out then they will say he is being reckless and could cause the deaths of innocent lives...if he doesn't then he is accused of having a limp-wristed response.
Either way the right will go against what Obama does. No matter what.

[Extra Stout]

What this is about with regards to Obama is that it is the job of the opposition to oppose, so obviously any response he makes should be criticized as the wrong one. It's not the job of the Republican Party to make a Democratic President look good (though they might end up doing so unwittingly).

[Extra Stout]

You're like Manny, only with a thesaurus. Fancy words don't always help an argument. Neither do insults.

I think that if Manny and I are agreeing on something, given how rare that is, it probably means we have judged correctly.

[MannyIsGod]

Anyone who has a basic understanding of what happened in 1953 and 1979 beyond the mendacious version fed to them by neoconservative pundits undestands full well why any President would keep mum on political protests in Iran.

I don't say this to defend Obama. I say it because it is plainly obvious to the most casual observer, and anyone who says he has a grasp of the situation and claims otherwise, like a Krauthammer, or especially a Michael Ledeen, is simply lying.

And people are foolish if they don't realize how much 1953 is still in the mind of modern day Persians.

[JoeChalupa]

What this is about with regards to Obama is that it is the job of the opposition to oppose, so obviously any response he makes should be criticized as the wrong one. It's not the job of the Republican Party to make a Democratic President look good (though they might end up doing so unwittingly).

That is why I like Joe Scarborough and other conservatives who don't think that it is the job of the opposition to oppose everything a member of the other party proposes.

[MannyIsGod]

So what are the facts? Enlighten us.

The facts? Moussaive is not pro Israel as you somehow managed to believe. He's not anti nuclear program as you somehow think. He's not anything you've made him out to be. Those are the facts.

You have no understanding what this is about and who the people are supporting it. Not everyone wants to be America, Darrin.

[Extra Stout]

To spell it out for the uninitiated, the moment an American President opens his mouth in support of the protesters, the mullahs can just say, "Ah, see, they are simply puppets of the Americans, just like in 1953," and the protest movement will lose support.

[Extra Stout]

So what are the facts? Enlighten us.

Oh, please. The history behind what has been going on has been spelled out over and over again in this very thread. The facts simply bounce off your thick head because you don't want to hear them.

"I've made up my mind -- don't confuse me with the facts!!!"

[JoeChalupa]

To spell it out for the uninitiated, the moment an American President opens his mouth in support of the protesters, the mullahs can just say, "Ah, see, they are simply puppets of the Americans, just like in 1953," and the protest movement will lose support.

I concur.

[MannyIsGod]

You're like Manny, only with a thesaurus. Fancy words don't always help an argument. Neither do insults.

But your obvious lack of correct information does, right? I mean as long as you keep posting articles you agree with (how you agree with something when you don't understand it is beyond me) then you're obviously winning the argument no matter how many people tell you that you're wrong.


Did you see the Supreme Leader's speech this morning? Did you see him try to paint the reformists as American backed? Do you realize how much more effective that would have been had Obama said the wrong things?

Do you not ing realize how destructive that could be to the movement in Iran given the history of American meddling?

[MannyIsGod]

To spell it out for the uninitiated, the moment an American President opens his mouth in support of the protesters, the mullahs can just say, "Ah, see, they are simply puppets of the Americans, just like in 1953," and the protest movement will lose support.

They didn't even wait for him to do it. The er did it this morning in his speech. He managed to spend enough time talking about America to even talk about Waco and Clinton.