Middle East News
Mar 25, 2007, 15:11 GMT
Iran says all British detainees in good health (Roundup)
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Older Talkback
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'Read my earlier comments on debt levels in the US, you moron. Debt per person in the US is $166,000. Add up your family's portion of the debt! A family of four owes $664,000. That's probably more than the debt on your house!
'
What this idiot is doing is trying t persuade other idiots that ALL debt in the USA is public. If my next door neighbor has a mortgage it doesn't mean I have to pay it. Again, home ownership is a sign of strength, not weakness.
This is so typical of you. when your argument gets squashed you just toss the same argument out.
In the early 1300’s, an English scholar called William of Occam, stated a principle which is known throughout the scientific community as ‘Occam’s Razor’, i.e., 'entities must not unnecessarily be multiplied', which is now taken to mean, that the simplest theory to fit the facts will be the nearest to reality.
All of the intricate political analysis i.e. who did what, and who said that, is not worth the pixels on the screen. For the reason that it tends to obscure real reasons and intentions.
It is all very simple .. for any action take a look at the seed .. and from there one understands what the fruit will be. So far its been a road strewn with hard and bitter lemons.
One may not invade a country and drive people from their homes and ancestral lands .. rape and kill the daughters and sodomise the sons .. without there be a backlash.
One may not ethnically cleanse a peoples without there will be a backlash .. there is no doubt in my mind that the Palestinian peoples have a moral and ethical responsibility to resist the invader .. they have done their duty to date.
In this thread that has been the usual canard about 70 sloe eyed virgins and cowardly suicide bombers .. It is par for the course that the controlling entity will attempt to denigrate the oppressed and cast aspersions on the legitimate resistance of the peoples so oppressed.
The Western Main Stream Media is Jewish controlled so do not expect to find any ears of corn in the dung heap .. For example .. the so called suicide bombers .. imagine a peoples who are trying to resist the invader .. they are faced with long range ordinance .. fighter bombers .. illegal weaponry and an Invader who is so bestial that they will shoot your child in the head without compunction as part of the genocidal plan.
Each and every single one of us may understand the truth by looking inside ones own heart and standing in the shoes of a Palestinian. When there is nothing left to resist the invader with except ones own body as the weapon against the invader .. tell me does the appellation suicide bomber really match the reality?
We have had all of the Hollywood 'Saving Private Ryan' and the Jessica Lynch nonsense .. Fairy tales for the weak minded .. because the military does not give a shit about how many die just as long as they can keep the individual enthralled with the screaming and the dying .. and in ignorance of the game plan.
They are not suicide bombers they are Martyrs for their Nation as they legitimately resist the invader .. The road to Tehran starts in Jerusalem and Tel-Aviv. The Gate to World War 3 is the gate to Dimona.
'By their fruits ye shall know them'
Jesus .. The Sermon on the Mount.
When the Jewish/Palestinian problem is attended by truth and justice then we may expect a release from the Zionist mindset with its attendant Zionist lies and bestiality that has cost untold millions of lives. Iraq has taken a king hit to the tune of 1 million innocent lives .. delivered by the American and British Huns in an illegal invasion.
And the Axis of Evil is going to do it all over .. and over and over .. Persia next .. but Persia will break the back of the monsters.
================================
For The Fallen
With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.
Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.
They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
Laurence Binyon (1869-1943)
==============================================
Muhh hu ha ha ha! Hypocrites!!
'Most people have completely overlooked the fact that Iran is now selling oil in Euros thanks to the US govt cutting off bank transactions in dollars. Thus, demand for dollars will begin to fall and push up interest rates in the US. '
Most of you nitwits who push this argument have completely overlooked the fact that you could buy oil in Euros for years, you can buy Canadian oil in Canadian dollars... This is one of the inherent fallacies of the 'dollar hegemony' argument. Have you ever used a credit card to buy something from another country in a different currency? Did you need to hold large currency reserves in order to do it? Did you need to pay your credit card company back in US dollars? No, you didn't. The loosening of international banking regulations in the '80s made dollar hegemony a thing of the past. (It was deliberately traded in for 'Banking hegemony' so as not to be tied to oil or any other single commodity, smaller piece of the bigger pie, a lot more stable.)
'No other country currently sells oil in Euros. '
You can buy oil in any blasted currency you wish.... seamlessly.
'The US is doomed on this chess piece move! I love it. What a joke.'
It seems that is all you really care about... (certainly not objective truth) Calling the USA 'doomed.'
Isn't knee jerk wishing for someone else's destruction inherently bigoted? No wonder you cant think straight about otherwise straight forward economical paradigms... You are overruled by your bigotry.
Fruitcake Ali: First off, I don't need to work. Second, I wouldn't work for an obviously insane person as yourself. Third, unlike you, I like to work, even if I don't have to. Fourth, If I were to hire an idiot like you, which I doubt seriously, it wouldn't be to clean beachfront property. I think you would be best suited for cleaning toilets, and picking up dog shit. Give it up, ALI-POOP! You are just too mental, and insignificant for further discussion.
What was the topic of discussion again?
So this is the point where “Blue lady goes and cherry picks the points she would like to respond to and ignores the totality of what was said….
Weren’t you going to come up with a couple of names and quotes to bolster your slew argument?
“'Iraq’s American-backed attempted invasion of Iran for 8 years in the 1980s was identical [to Iraq's independent invasion of Kuwait,”
Iraq was not goaded into that war by the USA. Yes we backed them against what we saw as the bigger enemy but we did not push Saddam into war with Iran.
“The 'international community' I refer to is the hundred-some signitaries of the united nations, and in particular the members of the elite U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL...”
The same ones who have demand that Iran stop it’s enrichment because of previous violations of the NPT? The same ones who Saddam broke 17 approved (not vetoed) resolutions from? This “international community”, are they the same ones allowing a genocide in Sudan? Allowed a genocide in Rwanda? Declared Saddam’s Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds an “act of genocide” and by UN charter “genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.”…
Is that the “Elite” Un security council? The one that China is using to block action in Darfur to protect its oil leases in the Sudan? The one that France used to protect TotalFina’s oil leases in Iraq? The one that Russia is using to protect its arms contracts with Iran?
Is there such a thing as an “elete” whore house? Probably, but Ill bet real whores do less damage then this “elete” international community that you seem to insist that we defer to.
“You know, the source of legal and moral authority from which American foreign policy derives it's theoretical & legal intervention mandate”
The constitution?
“Some think abortion, homosexuality, and racial integration are morally suspect; others think that capital punishment, meat-eating and SUV's are morally suspect. Whatever. It's all subjective”
That whole, “whatever, its all subjective” thing…. That is fine if you are not simply using it to confirm your prejudices. I notice you use the British spelling of certain words. Are you one of those people who immediately sides with whomever is doing your nation the most harm at any given moment and somehow think that makes them enlightened?
“The U.N. was a (highly flawed) attempt at international democracy; but when American authorities encountered majority opposition to a pet project, they abandoned that attempt at democracy, in favour of unilateral force.”
Again, Acts of genocide have to be acted against in the UN charter. Saddam ignored 17 UN resolutions.
“Nope, he was merely an ex-terrorist and murderous dictator who rose to power through assassination and purges, who idolized Stalin and openly endorsed the very same totalitarian repressions considered so unattractive about cold war Communist regimes.”
Oh well… We should have let the poor dear be then…
“As for his military excesses, they were done with the full (if passive) understanding of none other than Donald Rumsfeld at the time...”
So, had we done something to stop him then you wouldn’t have moaned on about sovereign states and moral equivalence? Yeah… Ill bet. There are lots of miserable SOBs in the world that humanity would be better off without. I am sure Rummy passively understands that as well.
“America sponsored the open and illegal violation of one nation's sovereignty of another,”
That is just wrong. “Sponsored”? Wrong.
Main Entry: 1spon·sor
Pronunciation: 'spän(t)-s&r
Function: noun
a person or an organization that pays for or plans and carries out a project or activity
No, did we handle it as well as we might have? Should we not (Along with the French, Germans, British, Chinese, Russians and others) sold him weapons? Who knows, but we were not a sponsor of Saddams war on Iran.
“Of COURSE terrorism is illegal; as are unilateral 'pre-emptive' invasions outside U.N mandate.”
AAAh, the moral equivalence never ends…
“The fact that it is turning out to be a fully counterproductive and cost-intesive enterprise seems to have come as quite a shock to it's architects,”
They didn’t listen to me. Bottom line, do you compound an error by making a bigger error? (Pulling out and leaving a vacuum in the dead center of the Middle East? Whatever the case was previously, We are there. We are very there… At this point we need to be asking what do we do to fix the situation. I humbly submit, leaving Iraq to the Saddamites and shiia death squads to fight a sunni/Shiite Iranian/Saudi proxy war will make the killing fields of Cambodia look like a Sunday school picnic,
“WW1 was about powerful…”
Man, you had a real Marxist for a history teacher, didn’t you…
“No one nation ever gets to control the international environment for long,”
Just ask the UK… The previous superpower… The one that left a mess in Israel, Afghanistan, Iraq, ect, for the new superpower to clean up.
“Just because many Iraqis hated Saddam is no guarantee that they necessarily embrace every facet of America's version of democracy, or the many economic & political strings attached to it.”
No, but considering they voted in higher percentages then the UK has ever seen I would say that many of them DO want self determination and freedom from theocratic thugs.
“I merely point up the hypocracy in the methods of certain powers to remake the world in their own image, by force”
No… You merely rise to the defense of whomever is doing you the dirtiest with lame moral equivalence arguments in order to demonstrate that you are morally superior to we Neanderthals that still see some things as “wrong”. We certainly are not making a Jeffersonian democracy in Iraq. (undoubtedly what you were referring to, despite this being about the Iranians taking British hostages) Perhaps if we had insisted on that there would have been less trouble.
“The project is doomed to fail, for the same reason Britain's power monopoly declined.”
The analogy is not comparable. The UK had colonies that existed to funnel wealth back to the mother country. The USA has charity cases that serve to draw wealth away. Want to see what happens if we cut them off?
“Iran's current government is most undesireable. There are a great many Iranians who dislike it, at home & abroad. ”
Well maybe it is time they got together and spelled that out to the Iranian government.
“it would have been much more convenient if the militant right wing movement had not swept to popularity in Iran,”
What isn’t our fault in your eyes?
“Where was I? Oh yes...Get used to it.”
Constantly blaming the USA for other peoples bad decisions? We ARE used to it.
“(sigh)Par or better with the RUSSIAN arsenel, throughout.”
That is just incorrect. No matter how many times you repeat it, it is still incorrect. The USSR had more warheads with more megatons then we did. Russia has more then we do. (Nothing to do with the sailors being kidnapped, then or now, but whatever)
“Obviously, America would never allow herself to be outclassed in terms of strategic nuclear arsenel (of all things!) by any other major player.”
No, but it came to the point where enough was enough.
“So if we can put sophistry aside, my point was that America's attempts to retain control over the world's nuclear arsenel”
AAAh, so we control the Soviets nuclear arsenal? Could you make less sense?
“coupled with her aggressive and fully unilateralist military posture, makes her position hypocritical.”
So to be “fair” everyone should have an atomic bomb? Pretty brain dead… I hope you are good looking with logic skills like that.
“Yes, indeed - they have yet to reach superpower status - That requires nuclear weapons.”
Look at the partial list of Iranian terrorism I posted. Can you imagine what they would do with an atomic bomb? I live in New York city. An atomic bomb blast the equivalent of Nagasaki here would kill about 6 million people. Now imagine what the retaliation would look like. (And the frantic protests from your “international community”.) This is what you are tacitly endorsing, be it here or London, or Tel Aviv.
“Again, ideology and regional popular priorities are subjective.”
Please… When your mind is so “open” everything falls out.
“Yes - but mainly regionally,”
So that makes it OK?
“Hizbollah has a regional agenda which has little or nothing to do with America per se”
So that makes it OK? How do you explain the Argentina bombings then?
“They share a hatred of American foreign policy and intervention,”
They hate us because we are dirty kauffer. They hate us because our success underlines their failure and they need a scapegoat for that. They hate us because they can channel hate into power and power into money and vice versa. They hate us because they hate.
“but are essentially pursuing different goals.”
An Islamic caliphate… Same goal, slightly different flags.
“What was the topic of discussion again?”
How I squandered half a days work… Something about sailors and madmen...
It was about a bunch of British MOD pork pasties for the Zionist game plan ..
The road to Tehran started in Jerusalem and Tel-Aviv. The Gate to World War 3 is the gate to Dimona.
How many Angels can stand on the head of a pin ? What a bunch of tossers.
We have been have been carefully skirting around the screaming and the dying .. we have been skirting around the probable use of Nuclear Weapons against a country that does not have any .. The same kind of cowardly yellow belly attack that was made on Iraq.
How many nations that surround Iran are going to get the fall out from radio-activity? How many innocent Persians will die in such an attack .. Do ya call that collateral damage? It sounds better than massacring innocents? .. that way no one has to feel guilty about the blood on the money.
As I have previously said .. a bunch of tin plated armchair generals who have no concept of what they are advocating. Untermensch! totally devoid of any morals .. excuse me whilst I go to the bathroom to puke.
Wow, lots of comments, almost too many!
I like Ivor and Blue Lady. You guys got it right! Great comments!
As for the other weenies, you crack me up as to the level of your ignorance.
What part of Debt dont you understand? The US sits on $50 trillion in debt obligations of which it only reports about $9 Trillion. The rest are Social Security and Medicare obligations. Even the reported $9 Trillion translates into $30,000 per person. The key concept you weenies cant get through your thick skulls is that it cant be repaid!
The rest of the world recognizes this. The world recognizes that the US govt will inflate it away. That's where the weakening dollar comes in. That's the only direction to make the system work. Of course, in the meantime, the US govt will want higher oil prices to keep the dollar afloat. You weenies dont seem to comprehend the connection. But, it's there! As oil prices rise, so does the dollar.
Now, Iran is starting a trend of not selling oil in dollars. This doesnt bode well for the US financial debacle. Combine this with amazing oil production declines in the US, and whamo, you have conflict in the Middle East!
Best wishes to the smart people!
As for Iran, so far, they're holding their ground. You've got to take your hat off to them for having the balls to do it! Not many countries dare stand up to either the US or UK. You've got to hand it to them!
The end result is likely higher oil prices! Go oil, go!
Comical Ali
Hey Veteran! Hope you're enjoying all the fun!
No matter, your children will clean my beach front property, since you're too old! Let's see. When the dollar devalues to a tenth of its current amount, hmm, I'll buy several beach front properties!
Go oil go! I need those beach front properties!
Lol!
Comical Ali
Comical Ali, Ivor, and Blue Lady: The Three Stooges! HA HA HA HA HA HA HO HO HO HO HO
Good argument. You sure put me in MY place.
So this is the point where “Blue lady goes and cherry picks the points she would like to respond to and ignores the totality of what was said….
(Shrug) . I gave you an aweful lot. If you want more, there’s more. You appear to have an rather more emotional investment in this issue than I do. This is only the latest chapter in a long sad history, and in the final analysis, history won’t care in the long run. Might as well be objective in one’s assessments.
As to picking and choosing; yep, pretty much. (-:
‘Iraq’s American-backed attempted invasion of Iran for 8 years in the 1980s was identical [to Iraq's independent invasion of Kuwait,’
”Iraq was not goaded into that war by the USA. Yes we backed them against what we saw as the bigger enemy but we did not push Saddam into war with Iran.”
I never said they were goaded into that war by the U.S.; only that Americas’ tacit and practical condemnation of such acts of territorial aggression is flexible according to national interest, rather than ‘ideologically inviolate’. lol
“The 'international community' I refer to is the hundred-some signitaries of the united nations, and in particular the members of the elite U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL...”
This “international community”, are they the same ones allowing a genocide in Sudan? Allowed a genocide in Rwanda?
Why, yes! (And it’s not ‘they’, it’s ‘we’, since U.S. is also neglecting to intervene there in favour of other priorities just like all the others).
'The same ones who have demand that Iran stop it’s enrichment ….? The same ones who Saddam broke 17 approved (not vetoed) resolutions from?Declared Saddam’s Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds an “act of genocide” and by UN charter “genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.”…[etc etc etc]
Yup! That’s the one.
'Is that the “Elite” Un security council? The one that China is using ….
The one that France used….
The one that Russia is using to protect its arms contracts with Iran? [etc etc etc]'
That’s right, the security council veto that attempts to ensure that none of the major powers (the elite) have to follow the rules that they set for the lesser powers.
”Is there such a thing as an “elete” whore house? Probably, but Ill bet real whores do less damage then this “elete” international community that you seem to insist that we defer to. “
I don’t insist on that you defer to the international community. Only that it’s hypocritical to condemn certain countries for not doing so, when America sees no need to. (-:
“You know, the source of legal and moral authority from which American foreign policy derives it's theoretical & legal intervention mandate”
The constitution?
lol U.N. Mandate – You know, the process intended in theory to introduce some level of democratic recourse over the morass of self-interested & pragmatic national post-war tribes that inhabit the earth?
“Some think abortion, homosexuality, and racial integration are morally suspect; others think that capital punishment, meat-eating and SUV's are morally suspect. Whatever. It's all subjective”
That whole, “whatever, its all subjective” thing…. That is fine if you are not simply using it to confirm your prejudices. I notice you use the British spelling of certain words. Are you one of those people who immediately sides with whomever is doing your nation the most harm at any given moment and somehow think that makes them enlightened?
Nice deflection. (-:
(like my nationality –which isn’t British, btw – has anything to do with the validity of my arguments)
'The U.N. was a (highly flawed) attempt at international democracy; but when American authorities encountered majority opposition to a pet project, they abandoned that attempt at democracy, in favour of unilateral force.”
Again, Acts of genocide have to be acted against in the UN charter. Saddam ignored 17 UN resolutions.'
(Shrug) Sure he did; and so did America in not preventing his invasion of Iraq. lol
The point is, America (like most other superpowers) only enforces the laws or curtails the infractions when it’s in the national interest (or the interest of the influential elite who make the policy). Just like everyone else.
“Nope, he was merely an ex-terrorist and murderous dictator who rose to power through assassination and purges, who idolized Stalin and openly endorsed the very same totalitarian repressions considered so unattractive about cold war Communist regimes.”
Oh well… We should have let the poor dear be then…'
I’m not sure what you’re getting at here.
America endorsed Saddam Hussein at one time, then condemned him when it suited them, and neither the character of his regime or his personal brutality were any different the second time around. (Hence the charge of hypocracy & inconsistency).
As with Bin Laden, it’s not his tactics or brutality that they object to, but the fact that they are applied to America rather than her enemies.
“As for his military excesses, they were done with the full (if passive) understanding of none other than Donald Rumsfeld at the time...”
So, had we done something to stop him then you wouldn’t have moaned on about sovereign states and moral equivalence? Yeah… Ill bet. “
I had no problem with U.N. intervention in the Invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
That’s what the U.N is there for: To prevent any nation from invading another, or from engaging in open warfare unless directly attacked. Same with Korea, and other similar examples. I also supported the U.N resolution regarding the invasion of Afghanistan. There are a number of other such interventions which I would like to have seen implemented, but only under a U.N. mandate.
Unilateral invasions by (any) individual aggressors, or cartels of aggressors, are something else.
So (hopefully I won’t have to repeat this again), decide on the rules and live by them. If it was illegal to invade Kuwait without a U.N mandate, it was illegal to invade Iran (and Iraq) without one.
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