and immediately thought what's Bush gone and done now.

I feel feel far far better about you going to Iran than Afganistan SP. Wish I could come too. Just make sure you tell us all about it when you get back.

Carib

SP--

Do you expect that your going there will put you under closer scrutiny by various alphabet agencies?

of avoiding speech like the comment above on my website. I have a lot of respect for the Iranian and other Shi'a peoples, but there are also a lot of policies and practices of the Iranians and other Shi'a that I disgree with greatly. I do not gratuitously throw them in your face, nor do I wish to have them thrown in mine. I believe the best way to move forward towards peace is to start from a position of mutual respect. Fair enough?

that you object to specifically?

I really could not make out from your comment whether you were objecting to my calling down divine blessing upon the Shia, or to my cursing of Israeli and American warmongers, or both. It just isn't clear.

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I myself chose to interpret your appellation "American and Israeli warmongers" as "those Americans and Israelis who are warmongers".

But it can be misread as the more global and bigoted "Americans and Israelis, who are warmongers" - which I ruled out because it would be a particularly ironic thing to post on this American site which I as a non-American feel doesn't remotely fit the "warmonger" mold.

as well as you did. I completely agree.

was the wicked, evil, perverted warmongers of Israel and the USA!

The use of the genitive gives the sense who belong to, not who collectively constitute the entire populations of the mentioned countries.

Even during World War II, such a phrase used with respect to Germany and Japan would not have been understood to refer to the entire populations of those countries, but to their leaderships only.

If I had said the wicked, evil, perverted warmongers of Iran, would anyone have read that as my meaning that all Iranians are warmongers? No, I don't think so. So, I do not buy that the global reading arises from any inexactitude of phrasing. I have a different theory about that...

It is, in fact, revealing that the global reading suggests itself specifically in the cases of Israel and the USA. Perhaps some people are uncomfortably aware of just how much warmongering Israel and the USA has been indulging in, and of just how much at least passive support there exists in those two countries for that warmongering. And aware of how just how little popular enthusiasm there is for warmongering in Iran, by comparison.

In other words, the more global reading of my phrase subconsciously suggests itself because it touches a nerve by being too close to the truth for comfort.

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we should balance your statement with

God damn the perverted, evil warmongers of the Iranian Shia as well.

The point being that neither Christian, Jew, or Muslim that loves war is true to the faith.

I did inhale.

of Iran desire war, nor are they planning to launch one.

Certainly not a war of aggression, nor a 'pre-emptive' or 'first strike' act of military aggression.

Would that the same could be said of the current American and Israeli leaderships!

Hence, I do not need to balance my statement.

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Not only do they not want war, they also deny it ever happened. Who among us is not convinced? Pragmatism is clearly the way into the future.

Ahmadinejad is not Iran. Nor is it even clear what precisely he said, since he doesn't speak in English but in Farsi. Nor is it clear that he really denies the Holocaust, as against holding merely that if the Holocaust happened in Europe, then the Jews should have been given land in Europe in compensation, not in Palestine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel

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defending Ahmed-i-Nejad and the feelings you are feeling are the same one's I felt when I read your initial comment. So, can you chill the rhetoric, please?

Understand, that is. For one thing I didn't defend Ahmadinejad, but sought to be more accurate in presenting his views. And I distinguished between him on the one hand, and the Iranian regime and Iran as a country on the other. Your comment suggests that I have not made similar distinctions in the contexts of America and Israel. I reject that suggestion utterly. Anybody reading my comments on this forum fairly will find within them no aspersions cast upon the ordinary American and Israeli citizenry as wholes, despite the incontestably high percentage of those citizenries which continue to support US and Israeli international policies and actions despite the manifest wickedness thereof.

Let's get our cards on the table, shall we?

The Iranian government is not the bad guy in this situation. The US and Israeli governments are the bad guys. The narratives of the US and Israeli governments in this situation are radically evil and false. That of the Iranian government in this situation is essentially good and true. There is no moral equivalence here. Israel and the United States are wrong, and desire an outcome that is violent and unjust. Iran desires an outcome that is peaceful and just.

Those Westerners still clinging even to remnants of the US/Israeli narrative need to disavow and disown it completely. It is a sick, evil distortion of the truth perpetrated by sick evil creatures like the sitting US Vice-President and his acolytes. He and his PNAC and AIPAC buddies and fellow-travelers are the bad guys.

Iran hasn't invaded/bombed scores of countries since World War II, dropping millions of tons of explosives on civilians, organizing death-squads, assassinations and illegal regime-changes time and time again. No, that's the USA. Unless people wake up and smell the coffee, which is that the United States has been, and continues to be, and threatens to be once again with respect to Iran the world's leading rogue state, then ordinary Westerners need to be shocked by the truth into banishing the bad guys for good.

The inflammatory, warmongering rhetoric is not mine. It's that of the US and Israeli governments. For which I rightly and passionately denounce them.

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going to make me like you more? How about I rub it in your face that the way your co-religionists treat women is barbaric? How about I rub it in your face that a select few of your co-religionists have perverted a beautiful, egalitarian and amazing religion into a faith dedicated to killing innocents?

Does that help? Does that get us anywhere? Does that aid us in communication? Does that make anything better or does it just make each of us angrier at each other until our own personal tribalisms take over and we begin to despise each other, simply because you are who you are and I am who I am?

How, Stunster, does that help the situation? How does that make it any better?

Again, all I asked for you to do was to take other people's feelings into consideration and tone down the rhetoric. I didn't try to muzzle you or anything like that. I just wanted you to show respect and have an open mind about us the same way we have an open mind and respect about you.

Is that too much to ask?

a Shia I think it would be perfectly legitimate, indeed, it would be helpful for you to condemn barbaric treatment of women and attempts to target innocents by my co-religionists. Though I'd have to say that women's rights are much better upheld in Iran than in, say, the Arabian peninsula where the US supports the various local corrupt monarchies.

As it happens, I am not a Shia Muslim, but a Roman Catholic (of mixed European nationality). But if you want to condemn barbaric behavior by Roman Catholics too, that's fine with me, even though my priest uncle is the retired head of the Vatican Archives.

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and one of those little events that can bring one face to face with one's own subconscious beliefs to great profit.

Did anyone else (besides myself, and presumably SPK) assume stunster was either Muslim or Arab?

If so, sit with that for a second, as I am, and examine that assumption. There are real insights into oneself and one's thought processes to be gained from this.

Did anyone else (besides myself, and presumably SPK) assume stunster was either Muslim or Arab?

I think that he didn't fix the machine translations from Arabic or didn't provide own translations. Thus I assumed that he doesn't comprehend well or at all Arabic; or he slacks:-) I got impression that he has contacts/ affiliates in Lebanon but there is some distance/ he is not one of them. The contacts speak Arabic but who knows their background. Christians and foreigners there speak Arabic too.

I don't remember that there was information about the internal conflicts/supporters in Lebanon provided by Stunster.

This was my impression, not investigation. My impression might have missed something because I was not concentrating on Stunster's background.

-- Happy fishing in ocean of noise!

here. Like ozone.

-- Happy fishing in ocean of noise!

You seem to be having some difficulty here... first you say:

Neither the people nor the leaders of Iran want war

then, two replies later:

Ahmadinejad is not Iran.

And again:

Anybody reading my comments on this forum fairly will find within them no aspersions cast upon the ordinary American and Israeli citizenry as wholes

Contrast that statement with the previous signature on your postings:

According to your president, we want to kill you because you're free. Not true. We want to kill you because you're stupid enough to believe his crap.

No, I believe what we have is something more than just anger - many among us are angry. What it appears to me to be is rage. And hatred. Pure, unmitigated hatred and rage against anything and anyone American or Israeli. And, if thats true, then this forum is only going to feed those fires, friend.

You can reason, and excuse, and link all you want, but your point has been made now - your colors are showing, and they're all red.

You quote three statements of mine:

Neither the people nor the leaders of Iran want war

Ahmadinejad is not Iran.

Anybody reading my comments on this forum fairly will find within them no aspersions cast upon the ordinary American and Israeli citizenry as wholes

Yes, and? They're all true!

The next thing you quote is a signature:

According to your president, we want to kill you because you're free. Not true. We want to kill you because you're stupid enough to believe his crap.

That's just a bit of black humor aimed at ridiculing the 40% or so of American voters who still support/believe Bush's idiotic rhetoric and policies surrounding the 'War on Terror'.

As for rage, well, I'm tempted to say that people who are not outraged by this Administration haven't been paying attention. But obviously that wouldn't apply to you.

However, put yourself in the shoes of an Iranian who is contemplating the desire evident among neocons for bombing Iran and for fomenting MEK and other terrorist acts aimed at destabilizing Iran. Imagine an Iranian contemplating that prospect, and reminding himself of US support for the coup against Mossadegh, US decades-long support for the Shah and his torturers, US support for Saddam Hussein during his war against Iran, and reminding himself of how popular were Ike and Reagan, as presidents go, during the relevant years.

Now imagine the level of rage and desire for retaliatory violence that would result in America if equivalent acts and policies had been inflicted on America by Iran. How safe would it then be for an Iranian to walk into a 7-11 in Kansas and ask, why do you hate us?

By contrast, I'm sure Messrs Kelley will have a very nice welcome in Iran.

So please don't lecture me about rage.

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May God bless loving Americans and Jews working to promote understanding and peaceful solutions to this conflict.

You may find it hard to believe, but those people do exist.

I wonder, if the Shia possessed the weaponry the US and Israel now have, would they be merciful and allow us to continue to exist?

I did inhale.

if she would be my uncle? :D

bump his ass along the ground too.

And it might be a negative answer when a girl in Lapland says during the summer that let's meet again when the sun goes down.

I try to translate a Finnish adage:
"If a cow had wheels, it would be a milktruck"

-- Happy fishing in ocean of noise!

they'd be pigeons."

However, warmongers are warmongers, regardless of the stripe.

I detest my own and I detest those of other countries as well.

Many liberals fail to recognize that there is an element, certainly not all, nor even a majority, among Muslims that do wish to see Israel destroyed. Some of them feel the same way about the United States.

Some of these people actively work toward acquisition of nuclear weapons.

Some Americans still think these peace loving folks in spite of what happened on 9-11 (and before 9-11, during the Clinton administration when they unsuccessfully tried to topple these same buildings).

My experience in federal prison living alongside a few of these ass-holes suggests something entirely different. I have seen the evil in their eyes and it's real. (One bald-headed Iranian with a long grey beard comes to mind. I can't remember his name. He spent every waking moment recruiting American blacks and teaching them hatred.)

Know this when you you pick up your son or your daughter, or hug your mom. Some of these guys wish them dead and the only reason they haven't killed them is because to date they haven't had the capability.

On the other hand I have met peace loving Persians--intelligent, thoughtful, caring people that have as much in common with their leaders as I do mine--they look and sound alike. They breathe the same air and share some of the same customs. The similarites end there.

I did inhale.

My experience in federal prison living alongside a few of these ass-holes suggests something entirely different. I have seen the evil in their eyes and it's real. (One bald-headed Iranian with a long grey beard comes to mind. I can't remember his name.

And how did he end to a normal prison?

-- Happy fishing in ocean of noise!

a faith-based initiative.

I was sent to high security federal joints, full of dangerous people.

Where do you think they send terrorists?

Course they got kind of quiet around me and my kind. I have hell remembering I'm trying to be like Jesus around motherfs like that. Sometimes before I even know it there's a couple of master locks in my socks.

Mind you, this was before bush and Guantanamo bay.

I did inhale.

attack somebody?

And I suspect that they would prefer to nuke Saudi-Arabia first.

-- Happy fishing in ocean of noise!

that has a member of the Al-Sadr brigade for a neighbor.

Good old Khoemeni was also a Shi-ite. Wonderful fellow.

I did inhale.

Were you thinking that none of us writhe under the knowledge that this is being done in our name?

The entire netroots effort, largely misunderstood as Democratic support, is in fact a grassroots rejection of the de facto replacement of the American foundational principle of "government by the people, for the people" with concentration of power in the hands of a tiny ruling elite (an elite that merely grew the neocons in vats known as "think tanks" to use as "convenient idiots") whose goals no longer even remotely align with those of the bulk of the populace who they manipulate and hold in contempt.

In your statements against unjust and illegal war waged against Islam in an attempt to extend American hegemony - broadly speaking, at least in my own case you're preaching to the choir already.

Perhaps you could rethink whether there truly are any additional benefits gained by scourging it as well.

I didn't follow:

Only 35% of these are GOP, so that means only 8% of Republicans have passports

Aren't members of the Grand Old Party (GOP) Republicans?

Marvellous that the two of you can travel to so many places. I look forward to reading your adventures in foreign lands--the quality of the weblogs and videos just keep improving.

you need the full quote for it to make sense:

I have also researched on google and found that only 22% of Americans have passports. Only 35% of these are GOP, so that means only 8% of Republicans have passports

"these" in the second sentence refers to "americans." it still doesn't completely make sense, but it's not quite as contradictory as it seems when you only quote the second sentence.

the logic goes like this:

(1) 22% of all americans (of all political parties) have passports

(2) 35% of all americans are republicans/GOP

(3) 22% of that 35% equals 8%, so only 8% of GOP have passports

step 3 doesn't really work. the 8% represents the percentage of americans who are both GOP and passport holders. presumably the proportion of GOP members who have passports is 22%, roughly in the same proportion of the rest of the country

that may or may not be true. maybe GOP get their passports less often than the overall u.s. population. but in order to derive one % from the other, you need to make some assumption as to how the numbers apply within a given political party. or, you can just get more data and do a study of just GOP members rates of holding passports.

with some fancy Farsi writing on them? T-shirts?

If you meet some Jews there, take pictures to shock more people.

-- Happy fishing in ocean of noise!

in a nation that we're told is the new Nazi Germany under the new Adolf Hitler. I'd love to hear their response.

He probably doesn't even have his own t-shirt or lunchbox yet.

no lunchbox but t-shirts and thongs and stuff :D

And as the Beacon of Truth and Light (tm), I think summary judgement is in order. (But he may settle for royalty payments)

Ahmadinejad seriously? Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is the Supreme and absolute ruler of Iran. He doesn't get as much press and isn't as vocal, but he definitely makes all decisions. Iran is a pretend democracy and that wild and crazy guy would soon shut up if Khamenei told him to stick a sock in his mouth.

Iran is a pretend democracy

As against 'real' American democracy? In Iran, religious leaders have the most dominating influence on politics. In America, it's wealthy business people.

Bush lost the popular vote in 2000 by over 500,000 nationally, taking just 47.9%. Ahmadinejad won the popular vote with 61.69% in the second round of the 2005 election.

Ahmadinejad's numbers, in fact, beat out just about every Western leader currently in office.

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Saddam had 100%

that Ahmadinejad's numbers are not genuine?

Let me remind you that he beat the highly established Iranian political heavyweight, Rafsanjani. He would definitely have created a major rumpus if the vote count was really fraudulent.

There is not one serious scholar who questions that Ahmadinejad won Iran's 2005 elections fair and square.

To compare his victory to Hussein's indicates to me that you need to grow up a bit more.

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is that you are arguing apples to oranges as far as comparing democracy ideals and examples between the US and Iran. Where our democracy has taken shots from this administration and corporate America, we have the ability to peacefully enact a change. Iran's young population pretty much have to wait for the hard core to die or go for flat out violent disobediance. The elections numbers mean nothing when the playing field isn't open to all[Iran and Iraq]. Save the insults, they are wasted.

In these times you have to be an optimist to open your eyes when you awake in the morning. ~ Carl Sandburg

there were adequate public funding for political forces who want a fundamental change of the American socio-economic system away from its domination by wealthy corporate interests, you'd have a point.

Today's young Americans will be long dead, I fear, by the time peaceful change makes it the case that those interests have ceased to dominate the US political scene.

But good luck in your determination to assert your democratic rights in the face of the corporate lobbies.

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I have more than enough determination and optimism left to realize all things in time. I have no doubt it will happen before Iranians have anything resembling democratic rights.

...power over who can and can't stand as a candidate, that's an example of less than perfect democracy. If one sifts the available candidates enough, one could probably get a plurality of votes for a corned beef sandwich, to borrow and mangle a famous literary device.

When the links between institutions are set up the way that they are in Iran, it's potentially a real problem for democratic expression. Per wikipedia:

The Supreme Leader is elected by the Assembly of Experts and serves for life. However according to the constitution the assembly is in charge of overseeing the Leader to comply with his legal duties and has the power to dismiss and replace him at any time. Although the members of the Assembly of Experts are elected by public vote, the Guardian Council (which is appointed by the Supreme Leader) vets the candidates before the election. Many political analysts believe this creates an obvious closed loop of power and many prominent Iranian reformists have voiced their opposition to the current election laws (including Abdollah Noori) but have not been able to bring any changes to the law.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

They're the people who finance campaigns, plus the 118 people who control the mainstream media.

I didn't say Iran was a perfect democracy. I asked what people are comparing it to.

That is a question it would do some good to think about while the Bush Administration violates 750 laws, engages in warrantless wiretappings, and practices secret rendition of prisoners to any number of its highly undemocratic allies.

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Like the 171,000 who donated $200 or more to John Kerry? Or the 161,000 who donated $200 or more to Bush? Even when one starts looking at the very high concentration of donation monies possible with 527s (top 25 individual donors account for 31% of total donation value, presuming all their 527 donations went exclusively to the Presidential campaign, which they likely didn't), it's still a pretty diverse and varied group that finance campaigns (that top 25 donors accounts for 11% of the money). [those interested can take a poke around opensecrets.org for more data]

As to the degree of mainstream media control over voting, I gotta say their influence seems to have some real limits, given that they themselves are subject to such vocal criticism (except when they say something that someone agrees with, of course). Colour me a skeptic - I tend to think most of my fellow citizens can filter out much of the media influence on the landscape in making their electoral choices.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

It's the daily lobbying which goes on in between elections, and massively favors wealthy interests.

Of course, from my political standpoint, the likes of Kerry, Biden, Hilary Clinton & Co, are part of the problem, not the solution.

The range of 'mainstream' American political discourse is unbelievably narrow. On Iraq, on support for Israel, on free trade, on pandering to Wall Street, etc. It's massively pro-capitalist in essence, and pro-US militarism. Real radicals have next to no chance of having a competitive election in the US.

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...in Iran, who have absolutely no chance of having any role in the election at all, given that the Council of Guardians won't let them stand as candidates. The fact that the American public doesn't agree with your political standpoint and conducts its discourse in a narrow range doesn't mean that the system's fundamentally undemocratic, among other things it can just mean that they don't agree.

Near as I can tell there were 74 Presidential candidates in the 2004 cycle - sounds to me like the people donating money to campaign and the guys that "control" mainstream media are a pretty imperfect version to the Council of Guardians.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

that I stated that Iran's political system is more democratic overall than America's.

I merely denied, and continue to deny, that America's is significantly more democratic than Iran's.

Both systems effectively exclude 'radical' challenges.

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more fluff to your sophistry. You strike me as the type of person that has a very hard time admitting any error in any case. I know someone with a similar affliction.

so your obvious emotional need for me to be wrong isn't sufficient reason for me to admit one.

Your charge of sophistry is also pathetic.

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...there's real potential for you as a political appointee in this administration's Department of State.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

When I need lessons in diplomacy or civility from you, I'll let you know.

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Matey.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

you wrong.

----

Democracy definition: Rule by the people

Theocracy definition: to rule by priestly or a religious body wielding political and civil power

Oligarchy: Rule by a few

Autocracy: held by a single individual.

Please put Iran’s form of government where you believe it best fits.

Say what you like about your own country, but it presently does separate state from religion. And citizens in the United States can legally dissent. Iran puts journalists, and scholars into jail for writing and voicing their opinions.

Iran is a Persian Shiite country that is trying to be a leader in the Middle East. There just aren’t democracies in the Middle East. Most are not ‘Constitutional’ monarchies like the UK, but several are Sunni combinations of Autocracies, Oligarchies and Monarchies. Iraq is presently a Shiite theocracy. Only Lebanon had a democracy with Shiite Hizbullah's political and military wings within its democracy.

If Hassan Nasarallah separates the Shiite religion from the state should he decide to become part of the Lebanese government, then he has my admiration. If however, he introduces religion into the state, then he has replaced what could have been the first country (ruled by the people) in the Middle East with yet another from of government that isn't a democracy.

-----

I'm trying to see where we are in agreement and where it is we differ.

comment the other night while debating Christopher Hitchens. Hitchens said Iran's a theocracy. Maher replied, "So is America!" It brought the house down and Hitchens proceeded to give the middle finger to the audience.

Ok, down to business...

Egypt also jails scholars and journalists. Egypt is the biggest recipient of US aid. That's just one example. I could give a number of others.

Now Iran's current regime doesn't come remotely close to the numbers of jailed, tortured scholars and journalists who have met their fate under the auspices of governments heavily backed by the US over the last 50 years.

So, to answer your question more directly, it's not adequate to compare what goes on within US territory with what goes on within Iranian territory, in my view, because one would be comparing a country with what has been and continues to be an empire.

Far more journalists and scholars have had their rights violated by the US-controlled empire since 1979 than by post-1979 Iran.

Of course, prior to 1979, Iran was itself part of that empire. Which is why there was a revolution in Iran that year.

So, we differ on the correct terms of a genuinely enlightening comparison.

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that the two of us are in agreement with, there is no basis for further discussion.

Agreement in principle is basic to dispute resolution. When two parties cannot agree to something as elementary as definitions, talks inevitably will break down.

If there is no consensus regarding definitions of the types of government that I mentioned, it isn't possible to procede to details that affect the definitions. I.e., You did not offer any amendments to the definitions of democracy, theocracy, oligarchy or autocracy. Fundamentals first, details later.

for 'empire', but I think that's the term most relevant to the discussion.

Were the British or French empires 'democratic'?

The young British historian Niall Ferguson, for example, had no doubts.

"The United States," he said, "is an empire in every sense but one, and that one sense is that it doesn't recognise itself as such."

He called it "an empire in denial."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3430199.stm

Niall Ferguson (b. April 18, 1964 in Glasgow, Scotland) is a well-known and widely published British historian of modern imperialism. He is the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, a Senior Research Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford University and a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution, Stanford University.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niall_Ferguson

So, you see, it's not a question of us disagreeing on definitions, but on which terms need to be included in your list.

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How does empire relate to Iran's form of government? Please clarify the elements you include to classify Iran's government as an empire? The only connection I can make is that Iran's history comes from the Persian Empire.

I actually like you a lot. You're also Canadian, which helps.

But you, like others on this forum, obviously have a soft spot for American-style 'liberal democracy'. Comparatively speaking, of course. One could fairly describe you as fundamentally, at base, an apologist for American-style 'liberal democracy'--at least as compared to, say, Ahmadinejad's Iran.

I don't have such a comparative soft spot. Why not?

Because America's 'liberal democracy' has allied itself in one way or another with illegal coups, illegal invasions, illegal bombings, illegal assassinations, illegal wars, illegal occupations, and tyranny of all stripes, from Saddam Hussein to Pol Pot, from Pinochet to the Shah of Iran.

The victims of these policies and alliances implemented by American 'liberal democracy' over the last several decades, and still continuing on a daily basis, number literally in the millions, and are almost exclusively brown-skinned. Or were, before death turned them into mere clumps of skull and bone.

In addition to all the 'political' victims of American-style liberal democracy are all the tens of millions of victims of the rapacious capitalism which has been sponsored by that same American 'liberal democracy'.

Ahmadinejad and the post-1979 Iranian leadership don't come close to the human rights violations perpetrated by or on behalf of US imperialism, masquerading as 'liberal democracy', 'free markets', and so forth.

So, I ally myself with those foreign faces and minds and hearts (including Ahmadinejad's) which cry, in essence, "Fuck American-style liberal democracy. Fuck the Western abettors of US imperialism, masking itself as 'liberalism' and 'democracy'. Fuck the apologists for US imperialism, spouting their hypocritical crap about freedom and democratic institutions. Fuck the whole fucking lot of you.

Yes, I proudly ally myself with that visceral cry--the cry of the victims, the cry of the oppressed.

I fully---and let there be no mistake about this---completely join myself with the following wish aimed at all those who desire to glory in, or defend, the supposed moral superiority of American-style 'liberal democracy':

May your face be rubbed in the rotting flesh of the millions of victims of US imperialism, sponsored by America's liberal democracy. Forever. All of the victims--Salvadoran and Chilean; Indonesian and Vietnamese: Afghan and Iraqi: Uzbek and Iranian; Palestinian and Lebanese; Mozambican and Angolan; Egyptian and Saudi and Panamanian and Guatemalan and Pakistani and Cambodian. Et cetera.
Yeah, unendingly.

May their stench fuck up your day, every day, for all eternity.

Don't plead innocence. Don't say, 'Lord, I didn't know'. You did know, but deep down you did not care. So fuck right off.

I ally myself with that wish because they wilfully refuse the light that would enable them to see how well deserved is this wish.

Possibly, or probably, this post will result in my banning from this forum.

But, in the immortal words of Rhett Butler, frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.

There are better things to do with my time than debate with unwitting apologists for monstrous evil. America has been an agent of monstrous evil for decades, and the unwitting apologists thereof genuinely need to have their faces rubbed in the millions of corpses which that evil had wrought, rather than be 'respectfully debated'.

I'm still detecting a bit of hostility here.

There are better things to do with my time than debate with unwitting apologists for monstrous evil. America has been an agent of monstrous evil for decades, and the unwitting apologists thereof genuinely need to have their faces rubbed in the millions of corpses which that evil had wrought, rather than be 'respectfully debated'.

oh give me a break, it isn't a debate when all you will do stunster is listen to is your own hate filled beliefs. You are firm in your stance as Rumsfeld....which says more about you then us. You asssume that we agree with the US stance even tho there is no one here agreeing with the US foreign policy in the ME. As far as banning we have been a hell of a lot more patient than other forums, you took that as a okay to be as obnoxious as you have found americans to be. We have tried to understand your position and tried to get you to work within our system and all you have done is be insulting to our intelligence and being. Everyone is free to think as they wish, but not you or any one else will be allowed to abuse this forum or its members. Bringing up banning is just a weak excuse and cop-out for not being able to advance your own political beliefs. Or is this just one of those "good bye cruel world post" ala dkos? If you want your membership ended, I'll be glad to click the blocked button.

In these times you have to be an optimist to open your eyes when you awake in the morning. ~ Carl Sandburg

Here's the argument...

The claim is made that Iran has a worse respect for human rights than America.

To which my reply is not that Iran has a very good human rights record, but that American imperialistic policies and actions have a far worse, far greater detrimental impact on human rights, including killing people, than anything Iran has done since the 1979 revolution.

It appears that pointing this out is taken a sign as a hostility. Yup, guilty as charged. I am hostile to a) US imperialism, and b) people who try to defend it, excuse it, minimize it, euphemize it, ignore it or pretend it's not real and deadly. And so I think it would be a good idea if they had their noses rubbed in the rotting corpses of US imperialism's victims.

To take just one example, the invasion and occupation by America of Iraq has proved to be a monstrous crime against humanity, detailed exhaustively in the archives of http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Is it supposed to be an adequate response to pointing out that America has perpetrated this horror that at least in America one can criticize it but Iran's press is controlled, is it? Gimme a break indeed!

Unfortunately the truth is that the American press is also controlled, mostly by a small number of capitalist corporations, and the US press was used by the Administratation to present a series of lies and distortions to the public in the lead-up to the war so as to 'justify' the US war criminals' planned actions . This is also amply documented at the above link. And it worked, since polls showed majority US public support for the war at its outset and initial stages.

And that whole situation is ongoing, though public support has dropped off somewhat.

That is the reality wrought by America's liberal democracy. Iran's failures on human rights are not even in the same league.

implemented by successive elected US administrations.

Yes, I hate it. Loathe and detest it.

I also hate, loathe and detest the fact that the American public keeps on electing implementers, enablers, facilitators and supporters of such monstrously evil policy.

So if you're trying to shame me about my hatred for these things, shame on you.

The editors aren't planning on "banning" you. Better to let your words speak for themselves. If you want to abandon this joint, well, the exit is wide open. Perhaps you and bernadene can take turns leaving forever.

- Rick
_{"Free your mind, and your ass will follow" - George Clinton}

...with the downtrodden what exactly have you done, other than say "fuck" a lot? You want to make a difference? Advance an argument - a good argument founded in fact, not one that's abusive to other members and not one that stands rhetorically as a statement of belief, but rather one that is richly buttressed by agreed facts and that actually leads people who don't already agree with you and aren't adherents to a "rapacious america" ideology to think about things they haven't previously. If you want the outlet of just saying "fuck" a lot at things that piss you off while not bothering to make an argument, by all means go to town (and god knows we all need that outlet every once in a while), but don't try to dress it up as something more. I'm predisposed to considering this stuff - I've seen the human detritus of decades of shitty policy in the Middle East and Southeast Asia with my own eyes and I'm far more familiar than the average guy with the seamy mechanics of covert action - and you haven't yet put forth a cogent argument that engages even me.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

Former University of Toronto freed from jail

`Persistent' pressure from Ottawa led to Canadian's release, MacKay says
Aug. 31, 2006
STEVE RENNIE STAFF REPORTER

----

Your response did not address my message, but attacked me instead in a a hateful manner that is truly offensive with its profanity.

I suppose Canadians should be deeply gratified that the Iranian government has temporarily freed one of our citizens? Iran reserved the right to bring him to trial at a later date for being a spy. For four months he’s been held in solitary confinement with no charges laid, and no access to a lawyer. Previously Iran beat to death another of our citizens--she was a reporter making it justiiable in their eyes? Her words were her only crime.

What a deeply admirable government you have chosen to defend. NOT!

Civil rights is something I value, it must not be to you because you support a government that makes a joke out of their attempt to represent themself as a democracy. You do appear to react to words with a similar mentality that your cherished Iranian government does.

The question is not about 'defending' the Iranian regime's human rights record. The question is about comparing it with the US one. For that, some history is needed---the history of US support for Iraq under Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, for example.

FACT: America's liberal democracy has facilitated monstrous evil. Under Bush, it suited them to change tack. See http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/ for the horrifying results.

So when people suggest America's liberal democracy not as bad as Iran, I say, no, it's way, way worse...

The true Iraq appeasers

By Peter W. Galbraith | August 31, 2006

IN HIS MOST recent justification of his Pentagon stewardship, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld reached back to the 1930s, comparing the Bush administration's critics to those who, like US Ambassador to Britain Joseph P. Kennedy, favored appeasing Adolf Hitler. Rumsfeld avoided a more recent comparison: the appeasement of Saddam Hussein by the Reagan and first Bush administrations. The reasons for selectivity are obvious, since so many of Hussein's appeasers in the 1980s were principals in the 2003 Iraq war, including Rumsfeld.

In 1983, President Reagan initiated a strategic opening to Iraq, then in the third year of a war of attrition with neighboring Iran. Although Iraq had started the war with a blitzkrieg attack in 1980, the tide had turned by 1982 in favor of much larger Iran, and the Reagan administration was afraid Iraq might actually lose. Reagan chose Rumsfeld as his emissary to Hussein, whom he visited in December 1983 and March 1984. Inconveniently, Iraq had begun to use chemical weapons against Iran in November 1983, the first sustained use of poison gas since a 1925 treaty banning that.

Rumsfeld never mentioned this blatant violation of international law to Hussein, instead focusing on shared hostility toward Iran and an oil pipeline through Jordan. Rumsfeld apparently did mention it to Tariq Aziz, Iraq's foreign minister, but by not raising the issue with the paramount leader he signaled that good relations were more important to the United States than the use of poison gas.

This message was reinforced by US conduct after the Rumsfeld missions. The Reagan administration offered Hussein financial credits that eventually made Iraq the third-largest recipient of US assistance. It normalized diplomatic relations and, most significantly, began providing Iraq with battlefield intelligence. Iraq used this information to target Iranian troops with chemical weapons. And when Iraq turned its chemical weapons on the Kurds in 1988, killing 5,000 in the town of Halabja, the Reagan administration sought to obscure responsibility by falsely suggesting Iran was also responsible.

On Aug. 25, 1988 -- five days after the Iran-Iraq War ended -- Iraq attacked 48 Kurdish villages more than 100 miles from Iran. Within days, the US Senate passed legislation, sponsored by Claiborne Pell, Democrat of Rhode Island, to end US financial support for Hussein and to impose trade sanctions. To enhance the prospects that Reagan would sign his legislation, Pell sent me to Eastern Turkey to interview Kurdish survivors who had fled across the border. As it turned out, the Reagan administration agreed that Iraq had gassed the Kurds, but strongly opposed sanctions, or even cutting off financial assistance. Colin Powell, then the national security adviser, coordinated the Reagan administration's opposition.

The Pell bill died at the end of the congressional session in 1988, in spite of heroic efforts by Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts to force it through by holding up a raft of administration nominations.

The next year, President George H.W. Bush's administration actually doubled US financial credits for Iraq. A week before Hussein invaded Kuwait, the administration vociferously opposed legislation that would have conditioned US assistance to Iraq on a commitment not to use chemical weapons and to stop the genocide against the Kurds. At the time, Dick Cheney, now vice president, was secretary of defense and a statutory member of the National Security Council that reviewed Iraq policy. By all accounts, he supported the administration's appeasement policy.

In 2003, Cheney, Powell, and Rumsfeld all cited Hussein's use of chemical weapons 15 years before as a rationale for war. But at the time Hussein was actually doing the gassing -- including of his own people -- they considered his use of chemical weapons a second-tier issue.

The Reagan and first Bush administrations believed that Hussein could be a strategic partner to the United States, a counterweight to Iran, a force for moderation in the region, and possibly help in the Arab-Israel peace process. That was, of course, an illusion. A ruthless dictator who launched an attack on his neighbor, Iran, who used chemical weapons, and who committed genocide against his own Kurds was never likely to be a reliable American ally. Hussein, having watched the United States gloss over his crimes in the Iran war and at home, concluded he could get away with invading Kuwait.

It was a costly error for him, for his country, and eventually for the United States, which now has the largest part of its military bogged down in the Iraqi quagmire. Meanwhile the architects of the earlier appeasement policy now maintain the illusion that they have a path to victory, if only their critics would shut up.

We all know and deplore that the United States has violated other Sovereign nations, toppled governments, ordered assassinations. The press usually reports every one they discover. It's close to impossible to hide violations of law in democracies because a free press exposes and tears countries to shreds for every violation they make. Chops them up into tiny little pieces making it difficult to put Humpty Dumpty together again. (pretense of innocence by the guilty) even if they aren't brought to court--they are tried in the court of human opinion about justice.

You made absolutely no mention of things Iran dones and continues to do to its citizens. There is quite a long list in addition to the two I mentioned in my link. Do two wrongs make a right? By copying transgressions that the United States has made, does that make it okay for Iran to do likewise?

Not in my book it doesn't. So far all you have shown is you're blind to horrendous acts that Iran perpetrates, but very alert to every one that your country makes. Some perspective is in order don't you think?

I hope my reply doesn't upset you, because I'm not sure my patience wouldn't be exhausted if there was a repetition of profanity on your part.

The victims of US support for evil regimes can read about it in the American press, provided they're not dead. How consoling!

The issue, as a I stated before, is not whether Iran has a great human rights record, but rather the comparison of the impact on human rights of Iranian policy with the impact on human rights with US policy, worldwide, since 1979.

You're not seriously suggesting that the US record is better, are you?

The biggest recipients of US foreign aid have been Egypt and Israel, whose jails are filled with thousands and thousands of political prisoners, not to mention being guilty of things like illegal occupation, assassination, torture, war crimes, and so on.

The US cozied up to Uzbekistan too. Checked out Uzbekistan's human rights record lately?

See also, US support for Saudi Arabia. Maybe you can drive around Riyadh and ask about human rights there. Oh wait....

I'm not blind to Iran's violations of human rights, but it is a more democratic place than Saudi Arabia. Women can drive public buses in Iran too.

The worst human rights violations often occur in wars and airstrikes.

Count them up, since 1979. The US started several wars since then, and supported the one Iraq launched against Iran. Iran started none. A greater tonnage of bombs have been dropped on Iraq by the US than by Iran during its 1980-88 war with Iraq, with greater civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure.

See also, the US's use of depleted uranium and its impact on people's human rights.

There's really no doubt, US policy is way worse than Iranian policy with respect to its global impact on human rights. But it's too unpalatable fact for some people, and so instead of doing everything possible to ensure that Bush and Co are seen as the grotesque evildoers they are, they try to score points against Ahmadinejad, 'cos that's easier than facing up squarely to the fact that in excess of 100,000 Iraqis and Afghans are not dead because of the decisions taken by Iranian politicians, but because of decisions taken by Western politicians. With many more jailed, tortured, made homeless, etc.

This is such an uncomfortable truth that it needs soothing by pointing to the greater press freedom and fewer political arrests within the territory of the US compared to Iran's territory. That makes Westerners feel a bit better about things, a bit more civilized, tolerant, and sensible than those mad Iranian mullahs. It enables us to not understand that the maddest mullahs of all were elected to the presidency of the United States, and (indirectly) to the Prime Ministerhip of the United Kingdom.

Have you seen the video of British soldiers joyfully beating and kicking Iraqi youths in Basra?

That is Western democracy at work. Compared to that, Iran, though far from perfect, isn't all that bad.

My response simply points out that the analogy that you attempt to make between the Iranian Council of Guardians and the American folks who finance campaigns and control American mainstream media is flawed.

The fact that one system excludes radical challengers as a matter of law and policy while the other actually gives money to candidates that hop over a pretty low set of bars (getting $5,000 in donations from folks in 20 states) given the scale of the task speaks volumes to me about whether one is significantly more democratic than the other.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

<My response simply points out that the analogy that you attempt to make between the Iranian Council of Guardians and the American folks who finance campaigns and control American mainstream media is flawed.

It doesn't 'point it out'. It attempts to argue that that's the case.

Big difference!

It's the effect which is the object of my analogy. Effective exclusion and narrowness of political discourse. The effect is quite real in both countries, and you were, and are implying that it's not analogous. Separate issue, on which I continue to disagree with you!

But by introducing and focusing on the role of the Council of Guardians in the first place, you were making it look as if I had been denying that the exclusionary and narrowing effect also exists in Iran. Why, otherwise, go to the bother of pointing out a mechanism for such an effect in Iran?

Brought to you by, the Administration's Office of the Vice-President Neo-Conservative Scrotum Relief Initiative.

...interpreted. In Iran the narrowness is unambiguously due to the deliberate actions of an institution that runs oversight on who is and isn't allowed to run. In the United States even the existence of the effect is somewhat arguable (you say political discourse is narrow - I see myriad candidates from all over the spectrum, and that doesn't even start factoring in all the guys that ran in the primaries) and if it is so limiting, it seems to be far more about folks deciding that the appetite of the electorate for anything different is very small. In my view that ain't due to an undemocratic system, it's due to the fact that the candidates and the political operatives don't have any balls.

As to the focus on the Council of Guardians - in a discussion of whether the form of democracy practiced in Iran is "a pretend democracy" against "real" democracy as practiced in the United States, I shouldn't focus on what I think is the most undemocratic element of the Iranian system? When you go on to assert that America has an analogous system, I shouldn't challenge that? The only thing that would make one believe that you deny any exclusionary and narrowing effect in Iran is your silence on the issue. If you want to make your argument, by all means make your argument, but don't assert that your silence on an issue means that your views have been mischaracterized while the other guy makes his argument.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

EOM