France Alarmed at Obama's Iranian Capitulation

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
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[quote]UtahLama wrote:

Those are pics of the “government leaders” they are elected by the Ayatollahs if I am not mistaken.
[/quote]

Actually, it is more complex than that.

First of all, you have to dispel the typically Western notion that actual democracy means “pro-Western”. Ghaza strip elections and Egypt have shown that you end up with Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood respectively, not to mentioned the AKP in Turkey whose ascent to power was caused by increased democratization through the loosening of military control over the civilian government.

Secondly, Iran has outside trappings of democracy - presidential and parliament elections with allowed parties that are actually parts of the government/security apparatus fighting for power, with the final outcome far from certain, although subject to the final approval of the clerical council, which again is not so straightforward. Lot’s of wrangling and backroom deals with open and not-so-open political warfare through the media, judicial system and straight up brute force used by the religious police. Think USSR mixed with Putin’s Russia.

Confusing ye succinct overview:

For example, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s party, everyone’s favorite boogeyman from a couple of years ago, was defeated in partially-rigged elections - the big thing is that they we’re allowed to lose, unlike the elections before that which sparked the Green Revolution.

So to think that they are a monolithic group of crazies ruled by an insane despot, no.

482

[quote]Bismark wrote:

Wishing for the political dissolution of the state of Israel=/=genocide. Jews live in Iran, enjoy de jure protection, and have representation in the Iranian parliament.[/quote]

Also, not so simple. The public opinion across all levels of society in Iran is generally hostile to Israel (or as they call it “the Zionist state”), with Netanyahu being the main boogeyman.

I’ve never had a problem with my American accent in Iran - on the contrary, people tend to become even more friendlier. However, Iranians tend to freak out when they hear my German surname, believing it might be Jewish.

I’ve seen two open synagogues for that matter, but I believe life for Jews in Iran is difficult, due to the hostile public opinion.

However, I would venture out to say that you may experience more anti-semitism in a suburb of Marseille, Paris or Brussels than in Iran.

Don’t forget that you cannot enter Saudi Arabia as a Jew, for example.

484

figured as much.

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[quote]loppar wrote:

[quote]UtahLama wrote:

[quote]loppar wrote:

[quote]Aggv wrote:

It’s obvious to rational minded people, but i would love to hear the explanation from those who defend the god king obama at all cost. That cost will be Israel the second Iran has the ability [/quote]

Ok, here’s a question - Assad is a dictator, a mass murderer with chemical weapons and has no qualms about using it which he has shown by gassing his own people.

He’s a sworn enemy of Israel, his anti-Israel rhetoric before the Syrian war was full of bluster and threats about “destroying the zionist state”.

Yet, he hasn’t attacked Israel. Now why is that?[/quote]

No nukes?[/quote]

No. He wants to stay alive as long as possible, like all dictators do. Martyrdom is not appealing when you’re in charge.

Same thing with the people running Iran. Ruthless dictators are not prone to collective suicide.

[/quote]

except for the giant elephant in the room, which is the fact that it would be exponentially more difficult to destroy Iran than Syria. Asaad is fully aware of the fact that if he were to attack Israel, they would have no chance. You’re going to run into problems attacking Iran

486

Well it would appear that Iran’s real power is not pleased with the upcoming deal.

487

[quote]Aggv wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]Aggv wrote:
Why are Iran’s nuclear facilities buried in a fortified bunker under a mountain if it was for peaceful energy production? [/quote]

Cause it’s not? Everybody knows what Iran wants in the end. [/quote]

It’s obvious to rational minded people, but i would love to hear the explanation from those who defend the god king obama at all cost. That cost will be Israel the second Iran has the ability [/quote]

I would say the result is predictable, so they really don’t have to say it. Don’t you?
It’s the same pattern.
You’ll get a ‘blame Bush’ for starting an unjust war with Iraq. Some obscure fine print from an obscure ‘offical’ document demonstrating some point, partially or not relevant. Some berating for not have intimate knowledge of the same document or body of documents spelling out some treaty or some agreement some where from some one. More berating by the fact that you do not hold some advance position in the government knowing all the little details that, if you did, would show that the apparent nincompoopary of the administration’s actions are in fact perfectly rational and if your were smart enough, you would know that. Toss in a few words that people only use preparing for the SAT. Mix it up, put some dressing on it, declare victory, make sure that everybody respects your genius and viola, you have your defense of the administration.

The fact of the matter is, though that there really maybe, outside of full scale war, no way to prevent Iran from getting the bomb. And I don’t think, including my self, that we could justify a full scale war just to prevent Iran from developing a bomb that they may never use. The diplomacy angle seems to be admitting that we really cannot stop them so we might as well try to delay the inevitable.
I don’t like this angle. I think heavy sanctions, with military action designed to take out as many facilities as possible is the most effective way to slow down and perhaps stop Iran’s weapons program.
These radicals do not respond well to a plethora of positive options. The respond to having someone step on their neck and give them very few options, where the only positive one is an abandonment of the program. To treat them as if they are normal, reasonable people is a mistake. They don’t see it as any sort of mutual respect, they look at is a weakness to exploit. Historically, in this region of the world, the only time we get a result we like is after tons of pressure per squire centimeter.

Right now, we are stuck with the terminally stupid when it comes to foreign policy in this region. It’s kind of like a prison rape, there’s nothing you can do, all you can do is sit there an take it and hope it ends soon. And cleaning up the mess and dealing with the scars will take a lifetime to over come.

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[quote]Aggv wrote:

except for the giant elephant in the room, which is the fact that it would be exponentially more difficult to destroy Iran than Syria. Asaad is fully aware of the fact that if he were to attack Israel, they would have no chance. You’re going to run into problems attacking Iran

[/quote]

Nope, it’s same thing from a standpoint of a dictatorial regime.

First of all, the reality of “destroying” a country. Syria as a geographical entity and country is ravaged by war, with hundreds of thousands of dead.

The Syrian regime on the other hand is not destroyed. Assad still holds sway over his motley forces and can inflict a lot of hurt on a wide array of islamist Saudi funded militias (including ISIS) and the largely fictional FSA (created for the Western militia), not to mention millions of Syrians.
So an incompetent murderer, son of a semi competent murderer is (still) holding his own - which means that the previously mentioned self preservation instinct still works, even among his “side” and Alawites in general, who know they are facing very gruesome deaths if they lose.

So, “destroying” a country is not such an easy proposition - Iran is almost ten times bigger in terms of population and not nearly as homogenous as portrayed in the media.

So the regime, the guardian council and the security apparatus know that a direct confrontation with a Saudi coalition (including other Gulf feudal states and the clueless West which would provide the bulk of the forces/cost) would be messy, and that there is a small and not negligible possibility that they personally and their kids who act and behave exactly like spoiled rich kids in the West may end up unceremoniously tortured and killed. Foreign intervention, internal political strife, sectarian war - the options are numerous.

That’s why they won’t choose the irrational scenario usually attributed to them in the media.

However, the recent Putin’s publicity stunt with his SAM-diplomacy (he had the same gambit with Greece) is very dangerous. Why?

Iran was forced to capitulate in Lausanne because the regime couldn’t see any way out - slow economic collapse due to sanctions, increased costs of external political adventures… So the opted for the barely face saving framework of a deal.

Now, Putin sends a message that he is ready to cause trouble for the US and Iran desperately hopes that behind the S-300 deal is a small chance for some kind of economic relief through Russia/China axis, which would mean the collapse of the 5+1 negotiating group, therefore alleviating the economic pressure and buying them some maneuver time.

Therefore, they immediately upped the ante with the ayatollah’s message, hoping to get a better deal in the final negotiations, hoping on Russia.

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[quote]pat wrote:
[

I would say the result is predictable, so they really don’t have to say it. Don’t you?
It’s the same pattern.
You’ll get a ‘blame Bush’ for starting an unjust war with Iraq. Some obscure fine print from an obscure ‘offical’ document demonstrating some point, partially or not relevant. Some berating for not have intimate knowledge of the same document or body of documents spelling out some treaty or some agreement some where from some one. More berating by the fact that you do not hold some advance position in the government knowing all the little details that, if you did, would show that the apparent nincompoopary of the administration’s actions are in fact perfectly rational and if your were smart enough, you would know that. Toss in a few words that people only use preparing for the SAT. Mix it up, put some dressing on it, declare victory, make sure that everybody respects your genius and viola, you have your defense of the administration.

[/quote]

Actually, Stewart is amazingly on the mark with his breakdown.

490

[quote]loppar wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
[

I would say the result is predictable, so they really don’t have to say it. Don’t you?
It’s the same pattern.
You’ll get a ‘blame Bush’ for starting an unjust war with Iraq. Some obscure fine print from an obscure ‘offical’ document demonstrating some point, partially or not relevant. Some berating for not have intimate knowledge of the same document or body of documents spelling out some treaty or some agreement some where from some one. More berating by the fact that you do not hold some advance position in the government knowing all the little details that, if you did, would show that the apparent nincompoopary of the administration’s actions are in fact perfectly rational and if your were smart enough, you would know that. Toss in a few words that people only use preparing for the SAT. Mix it up, put some dressing on it, declare victory, make sure that everybody respects your genius and viola, you have your defense of the administration.

[/quote]

Actually, Stewart is amazingly on the mark with his breakdown.

Fuck, that was funny. And yes, right on target.

491

[quote]pat wrote:

I would say the result is predictable, so they really don’t have to say it. Don’t you?
It’s the same pattern.
You’ll get a ‘blame Bush’ for starting an unjust war with Iraq. Some obscure fine print from an obscure ‘offical’ document demonstrating some point, partially or not relevant. Some berating for not have intimate knowledge of the same document or body of documents spelling out some treaty or some agreement some where from some one. More berating by the fact that you do not hold some advance position in the government knowing all the little details that, if you did, would show that the apparent nincompoopary of the administration’s actions are in fact perfectly rational and if your were smart enough, you would know that. Toss in a few words that people only use preparing for the SAT. Mix it up, put some dressing on it, declare victory, make sure that everybody respects your genius and viola, you have your defense of the administration. [/quote]

Yes, I should issue a mea culpa for having expected posters in a thread about Iran and the bomb to be familiar with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, basic nuclear strategy, and the introductory science of nuclear materials. None of those things really have anything to do with the topic at hand.

As smh23 pointed out, when it comes to foreign policy in PWI, "The knowledge-to-vociferous-declamation ratio is quark-small, and knowledge – serious reading about, say, both nuclear diplomacy and internal Iranian politics (how many people are in here telling us all about what the Iranians are and want and fear and aspire to, without ever having read a single word about domestic politics in Iran) – happens to be even more important than usual in a thread like this.

Americans tend to believe that they can understand foreign affairs, diplomacy, world history by way of analogies to summer barbecues, or restaurant etiquette, or mutton busting. They are wrong."

492

[quote]Varqanir wrote:

[quote]loppar wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
[

I would say the result is predictable, so they really don’t have to say it. Don’t you?
It’s the same pattern.
You’ll get a ‘blame Bush’ for starting an unjust war with Iraq. Some obscure fine print from an obscure ‘offical’ document demonstrating some point, partially or not relevant. Some berating for not have intimate knowledge of the same document or body of documents spelling out some treaty or some agreement some where from some one. More berating by the fact that you do not hold some advance position in the government knowing all the little details that, if you did, would show that the apparent nincompoopary of the administration’s actions are in fact perfectly rational and if your were smart enough, you would know that. Toss in a few words that people only use preparing for the SAT. Mix it up, put some dressing on it, declare victory, make sure that everybody respects your genius and viola, you have your defense of the administration.

[/quote]

Actually, Stewart is amazingly on the mark with his breakdown.

Fuck, that was funny. And yes, right on target.
[/quote]
Yeah, I cannot support Cheney. He grates my nerves. His commentary and analysis of a situation is at best ineffective.

493

This is an interesting analysis by a Saudi A-rab…

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[quote]pat wrote:
This is an interesting analysis by a Saudi A-rab…

[/quote]

I wonder if the president reads CNN online?

And I wonder if he gives a flying fuck what they think of what he is doing.

495

[quote]UtahLama wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
This is an interesting analysis by a Saudi A-rab…

[/quote]

I wonder if the president reads CNN online?

And I wonder if he gives a flying fuck what they think of what he is doing.[/quote]

I would assume he reads CNN, considering it’s a proxy for the democratic party.

497

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
This is an interesting analysis by a Saudi A-rab…

[/quote]

You can dismiss this guy with a mere roll of the eyes and a casual “He probably hasn’t even read the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” line.[/quote]

Clearly he failed advanced PolySci 5010

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[quote]UtahLama wrote:

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
This is an interesting analysis by a Saudi A-rab…

[/quote]

You can dismiss this guy with a mere roll of the eyes and a casual “He probably hasn’t even read the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” line.[/quote]

Clearly he failed advanced PolySci 5010[/quote]

No, but you can dismiss him because he is a “privately-funded” shill for Saudi interests who writes things like “I have been fortunate enough to gauge the intentions of those in [the Saudi Arabian] government with regards to their human rights obligations and can confidently say that this process is being taken more seriously the [sic] ever” (Huffpost). This about one of the planet’s unqualifiedly worst human rights abusers.

Which is why he spent much of that editorial whining about how Obama isn’t saying nice enough things about the Arab Gulf states. Most tellingly, this: “the fear is that as long as Iran abides by any agreement that might come into force later this year, the U.S. will negate, downplay, or simply ignore those Iranian actions that the Arab world considers as direct threats.” In other words, his fear is that the Iranians will comply with the deal, which is bad for him because he doesn’t want the United States warming to a regional competitor. This is perfectly legitimate – from a Saudi perspective. What we want is for Iran to give up its nuclear program.

Edited.

499

Ok what about the latest?

The US is sending the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt to stop Iran from arming the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Great, what if Iran opens up with a supersonic SS-N-22 Moskit cruise missile? What then?

Here’s a cool story I found about a guy from Colorado who’s volunteered to fight along side the Peshmerga against ISIS.

500

[quote]Gkhan wrote:
Ok what about the latest?

The US is sending the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt to stop Iran from arming the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Great, what if Iran opens up with a supersonic SS-N-22 Moskit cruise missile? What then? [/quote]

Welp, den Ah gess dat’d meen everbuddy dat thanks dem Eye-ranians is stoopid an crayzy wud be vindimacated.

An iffn dey don’t, den Ah gess it’d meen dat dey ain’t. Purdy simple.

[quote]Here’s a cool story I found about a guy from Colorado who’s volunteered to fight along side the Peshmerga against ISIS.

http://www.mrctv.org/blog/colorado-biker-earns-isis-bounty-his-head-they-call-him-necromancer?utm_campaign=naytev&utm_content=5535ab1ce4b0e579f091c945#.co85yc:ZC85 [/quote]

Now, THAT’s what I’m talking about. Awesome.