Obama On Terrorism

[BushMasterBoy]

recently stated

[jhood001]

I'm thinking somebody on here needs to educate me regarding the allegedly evil and sinister Iran.

I personally think the notion is absolutely ridiculous and anyone that actually believes they would, let alone could do anything to the US homeland is simply buying into a massive lobbying effort by AIPAC and other more imperialistic minded lobbies. Regardless, maybe there is something I'm missing?

What is the basis for branding Iran as our new bogeyman?
What historical precedence is there for believing they have any hegemonic ambition whatsoever (within 200 years, please)?
What makes them more scary than the PRK?

Perhaps I'm missing something. And whether I disagree or agree with any evidence, or even opinions provided, I would still love to hear what some of us here think.

[Mazin]

Have you heard anything the Iranian President has said in the last couple years?

Have you heard of the "Great & little Satans"?

Just saying....

[Marlin]

Israel may deal with "I'm a nut job" long before he can do anything here.

I'm fairly sure the Massad could tell you how many times a day he picks his nose.

[BPTactical]

Sounds like somebody is setting the table for a semi auto and high cap mag ban.
Play on the peoples fears to further your agenda.
Classic Cloward and Piven.
"Never let a good crisis go to waste"








Again

[Bailey Guns]

I'm thinking somebody on here needs to educate me regarding the allegedly evil and sinister Iran.

I personally think the notion is absolutely ridiculous and anyone that actually believes they would, let alone could do anything to the US homeland is simply buying into a massive lobbying effort by AIPAC and other more imperialistic minded lobbies. Regardless, maybe there is something I'm missing?

What is the basis for branding Iran as our new bogeyman?
What historical precedence is there for believing they have any hegemonic ambition whatsoever (within 200 years, please)?
What makes them more scary than the PRK?

Perhaps I'm missing something. And whether I disagree or agree with any evidence, or even opinions provided, I would still love to hear what some of us here think.

Oh, yeah. You're missing something.

The whole issue of the dangers a nuclear Iran (and of course, a nuclear Korea in that region) poses to not just the US, but the middle east, Israel and many parts of the world has been discussed here and elsewhere, in the news, in books and many other venues ad-nauseum. If you haven't picked up on it before I doubt you'd pick up on it now.

Maybe you just disagree that it would be a problem, which is fine. But pretending that Iran hasn't been a problem for the US in the past is ridiculous.

And BTW... Iran has only been an Islamic state for about the last 30-ish years.

[Bailey Guns]

I just wanted to add that I'm not defending everything that's happened to Iran in the past whether it includes US involvement or not. But since the overthrow of the shah Iran has been nothing but a pain in the ass for most of the world.

[Hoosier]

The whole issue of the dangers a nuclear Iran (and of course, a nuclear Korea in that region) poses to not just the US

A nuclear Russia posed a danger to us as well. Mutually Assured Destruction works fine as a deterrent. I don't think that even if a nuke was smuggled in, we would have a hard time figuring out who did it.

http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/...7-722025.shtml

Maybe you just disagree that it would be a problem, which is fine. But pretending that Iran hasn't been a problem for the US in the past is ridiculous. And BTW... Iran has only been an Islamic state for about the last 30-ish years.

There's a handful of countries that are a problem for us, but what he asked is why they're being painted as the bogey man now? I mean, they held American captives for 400 days, they raided our embassy, they are a totalitarian theocracy -- it's all wrong, but I still don't see why we continue to have the level of saber rattling. We aren't capable of launching a ground invasion of Iran, so why bluster?

Their little President can talk all the shit he wants to. From their point of view we've spent the last 30 years shit talking them. Words here have very little meaning, just actions. I'm more concerned with them feeding military grade weapons to 3rd party nationals than I am about their nuclear program.

FWIW both the US and Israel very likely did strike Iran, via the Stuxnet worm, which they have confirmed did do fairly substantial damage to their effort to refine nuclear material. The net effect seems to have made them even more stubborn, they've said they're going to double the number of centrifuges now.

H.

[jhood001]

So we've got rhetoric and the 'it would be bad if they had nukes' argument. I'm dismissing the rhetoric flat out. If the nations of the world always reacted based on rhetoric, we would probably all be ash at this point.

While the reports on whether they're even pursuing nuclear weapons or are even close are pretty conflicting from what I've seen, let's say they did acquire them. What then?

Is Iran someone we consider to be just crazy enough to use them? And if so, what is that assumption based on?
Or is the real concern a matter of Iran then being able to better project their influence throughout the middle east with less options available to Israel and her allies to do something about it?

And I'm sorry to de-rail this thread. That statement from the White House stinks of being a part of the anti-gun movement. I personally don't think that Norway fool would have gotten 1/10 as far in the US as he did over there. Unless, of course, he was in some gun-free zone. Campus, etc. Imagine that.

[Bailey Guns]

There's a handful of countries that are a problem for us, but what he asked is why they're being painted as the bogey man now?

Painting Iran as a problem isn't something new. The fact that they're currently working on their nuclear arsenal and apparently have the capability to build nukes is the more recent issue.

They only developed that capability recently. Therefore nobody was realistically concerned about a nuclear Iran more than 10-15 years ago.

And sometimes, when a guy like Ahmadinejad threatens to "wipe Israel off the face of the earth", you need to believe that's exactly what he wants to do.