T1B

Jsc810 wrote:Damn, history in the making while we watch. Seems like if the Ayatollah issues a fatwa against his own regime, something big is about to happen.

This is a good thing, isn't it?

Jsc810 wrote:
This is a good thing, isn't it?

War Wagon wrote:

Jsc810 wrote:Damn, history in the making while we watch. Seems like if the Ayatollah issues a fatwa against his own regime, something big is about to happen.

This is a good thing, isn't it?

Don't ask me, I don't know yet.

I'm going to wet my finger and see which way the wind blows first.

POTUS

Blueblood wrote: I'm going with a guy that lost his colostomy bag.

Mikey wrote:

War Wagon wrote:

Jsc810 wrote:Damn, history in the making while we watch. Seems like if the Ayatollah issues a fatwa against his own regime, something big is about to happen.

This is a good thing, isn't it?

Don't ask me, I don't know yet.

I'm going to wet my finger and see which way the wind blows first.

POTUS

So, you would expect the President to somehow step into the middle of this and do....

what?

Obama Frees Iranian Terror Masters
The release of the Irbil Five is a continuation of a shameful policy.

By Andrew C. McCarthy

There are a few things you need to know about President Obama’s shameful release on Thursday of the “Irbil Five” — Quds Force commanders from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) who were coordinating terrorist attacks in Iraq that have killed hundreds — yes, hundreds — of American soldiers and Marines.

First, of the 4,322 Americans killed in combat in Iraq since 2003, 10 percent of them (i.e., more than 400) have been murdered by a single type of weapon alone, a weapon that is supplied by Iran for the singular purpose of murdering Americans. As Steve Schippert explains at NRO’s military blog, the Tank, the weapon is “the EFP (Explosively Formed Penetrator), designed by Iran’s IRGC specifically to penetrate the armor of the M1 Abrams main battle tank and, consequently, everything else deployed in the field.” Understand: This does not mean Iran has killed only 400 Americans in Iraq. The number killed and wounded at the mullahs’ direction is far higher than that — likely multiples of that — when factoring in the IRGC’s other tactics, such as the mustering of Hezbollah-style Shiite terror cells.

Second, President Bush and our armed forces steadfastly refused demands by Iran and Iraq’s Maliki government for the release of the Irbil Five because Iran was continuing to coordinate terrorist operations against American forces in Iraq (and to aid Taliban operations against American forces in Afghanistan). Freeing the Quds operatives obviously would return the most effective, dedicated terrorist trainers to their grisly business.

Third, Obama’s decision to release the five terror-masters comes while the Iranian regime (a) is still conducting operations against Americans in Iraq, even as we are in the process of withdrawing, and (b) is clearly working to replicate its Lebanon model in Iraq: establishing a Shiite terror network, loyal to Iran, as added pressure on the pliant Maliki to understand who is boss once the Americans leave. As the New York Times reports, Gen. Ray Odierno, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, put it this way less than two weeks ago:

Iran is still supporting, funding, training surrogates who operate inside of Iraq — flat out. . . . They have not stopped. And I don’t think they will stop. I think they will continue to do that because they are also concerned, in my opinion, [about] where Iraq is headed. They want to try to gain influence here, and they will continue to do that. I think many of the attacks in Baghdad are from individuals that have been, in fact, funded or trained by the Iranians.

Fourth, President Obama’s release of the Quds terrorists is a natural continuation of his administration’s stunningly irresponsible policy of bartering terrorist prisoners for hostages. As I detailed here on June 24, Obama has already released a leader of the Iran-backed Asaib al-Haq terror network in Iraq, a jihadist who is among those responsible for the 2007 murders of five American troops in Karbala. While the release was ludicrously portrayed as an effort to further “Iraqi reconciliation” (as if that would be a valid reason to spring a terrorist who had killed Americans), it was in actuality a naïve attempt to secure the reciprocal release of five British hostages — and a predictably disastrous one: The terror network released only the corpses of two of the hostages, threatening to kill the remaining three (and who knows whether they still are alive?) unless other terror leaders were released.

Michael Ledeen has reported that the release of the Irbil Five is part of the price Iran has demanded for its release in May of the freelance journalist Roxana Saberi. Again, that’s only part of the price: Iran also has demanded the release of hundreds of its other terror facilitators in our custody. Expect to see Obama accommodate this demand, too, in the weeks ahead.


Finally, when it comes to Iran, it has become increasingly apparent that President Obama wants the mullahs to win. What you need to know is that Barack Obama is a wolf in “pragmatist” clothing: Beneath the easy smile and above-it-all manner — the “neutral” doing his best to weigh competing claims — is a radical leftist wedded to a Manichean vision that depicts American imperialism as the primary evil in the world.

You may not have wanted to addle your brain over his tutelage in Hawaii by the Communist Frank Marshall Davis, nor his tracing of Davis’s career steps to Chicago, where he seamlessly eased into the orbit of Arafat apologist Rashid Khalidi, anti-American terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, and Maoist “educator” Michael Klonsky — all while imbibing 20 years’ worth of Jeremiah Wright’s Marxist “black liberation theology.” But this neo-Communist well from which Obama drew holds that the world order is a maze of injustice, racism, and repression. Its unified theory for navigating the maze is: “United States = culprit.” Its default position is that tyrants are preferable as long as they are anti-American, and that while terrorist methods may be regrettable, their root cause is always American provocation — that is, the terrorists have a point.

In Iran, it is no longer enough for a rickety regime, whose anti-American vitriol is its only vital sign, to rig the “democratic” process. This time, blatant electoral fraud was also required to mulct victory for the mullahs’ candidate. The chicanery ignited a popular revolt. But the brutal regime guessed right: The new American president would be supportive. So sympathetic is Obama to the mullahs’ grievances — so hostile to what he, like the regime, sees as America’s arrogant militarism — that he could be depended on to go as far as politics allowed to help the regime ride out the storm.

And so he has. Right now, politics will allow quite a lot: With unemployment creeping toward 10 percent, the auto industry nationalized, the stimulus revealed as history’s biggest redistribution racket (so far), and Democrats bent on heaping ruinous carbon taxes and socialized medicine atop an economy already crushed by tens of trillions in unfunded welfare-state liabilities, Iran is barely on anyone’s radar screen.

So Obama is pouring it on while his trusty media idles. When they are not looking the other way from the carnage in Iran’s streets, they are dutifully reporting — as the AP did — that the Irbil Five are mere “diplomats.” Obama frees a terrorist with the blood of American troops on his hands, and the press yawns. Senators Jeff Sessions and Jon Kyl press for answers about the release of the terrorist and Obama’s abandonment of a decades-old American policy against trading terrorists for hostages, and the silence is deafening.

Except in Tehran, where the mullahs are hearing exactly what they’ve banked on hearing.

Jsc810 wrote:Ayatollah Montazeri issued a fatwa

Mikey wrote:So, you would expect the President to somehow step into the middle of this and do....

what?

Throw his weight behind our guy?

JMak wrote:Hopefully Obama can avoid legitimzing the mullahs and their guy, Amad-whatever, again.

BSmack wrote: This is the time for the President to channel the spirit of Calvin Coolidge and do nothing

War Wagon wrote:Interesting that zero mainstream media outlets are reporting about this, isn't it?

Martyred wrote:
All major MSM outlets are majority Jewish owned. Take it up with them.

Dr_Phibes wrote:That article comes from MEMRI, you'll be hard pressed to find any of the heavy hitters re-printing their stuff after CNN got burned broadcasting their stories.

ouch

LTS TRN 2 wrote:Wrong, Ziodog! The translations have always been slanted and skewed. What..are you surprised?

Diogenes wrote:Al Phibezeera

BSmack wrote:The LAST thing we need in Iran is the perception that the United States is meddling in the internal politics of Iran. Things are progressing rather nicely as evidenced by this most recent fatwa. It is only a matter of time before the Islamic Republic of Iran is either overthrown or fundamentally changed in such a way that it bears almost no resemblance to its current self. This is the time for the President to channel the spirit of Calvin Coolidge and do nothing that would interrupt this inevitable process.

JMak wrote:

BSmack wrote:The LAST thing we need in Iran is the perception that the United States is meddling in the internal politics of Iran. Things are progressing rather nicely as evidenced by this most recent fatwa. It is only a matter of time before the Islamic Republic of Iran is either overthrown or fundamentally changed in such a way that it bears almost no resemblance to its current self. This is the time for the President to channel the spirit of Calvin Coolidge and do nothing that would interrupt this inevitable process.

Hey, useful idiot...the mullahs and their lapdogs will whine that the US is meddling even when Obama says he's not going to meddle. The point is that pro-democracy Iranians are seeking a supportive US and Europe, to know that we won't abandon their aspirations for democracy in the name of regional stability which really means appeasing regional dictators.

BSmack wrote:I'm sure the average Iranian is just begging for a chance to like like the average Iraqi.

JMak wrote:

BSmack wrote:I'm sure the average Iranian is just begging for a chance to like like the average Iraqi.

Wanna try that one, again? Your boy, Obama, thumbed his nose at pro-democracy Iranians by stating that the US wouldn't interfere. Of course, after the fact, Obama then tries to claim credit for the pro-democracy uprising.

BSmack wrote:At best that is a prevarication, at worst a flat out lie. In any case you fail to show where this great throng of Iranians demanding US invasion, occupation and reconstruction might be.

JMak wrote:

BSmack wrote:At best that is a prevarication, at worst a flat out lie. In any case you fail to show where this great throng of Iranians demanding US invasion, occupation and reconstruction might be.

Where did I suggst that Iranians want US invasion, occupation, and reconstruction? Or are you, again, simply making shit up because you cannot and will not actually discuss substantive issues?

BSmack wrote:Do you not understand that if we pledge our support to any pro-democracy group in Iran that said group will be perceived, rightly or wrongly as an American pawn? Furthermore, if we make a pledge to said group and they suffer defeat, then what? Do we stand by and watch them get slaughtered like we did when the Iraqi Shias revolted in 1991? Of course not. And that means invasion, regime change, occupation and reconstruction. Either that is your long term desire or you are an incompetent who does not understand the ramifications of the policy you advocate for. Take your pick.

JMak wrote:

BSmack wrote:Do you not understand that if we pledge our support to any pro-democracy group in Iran that said group will be perceived, rightly or wrongly as an American pawn? Furthermore, if we make a pledge to said group and they suffer defeat, then what? Do we stand by and watch them get slaughtered like we did when the Iraqi Shias revolted in 1991? Of course not. And that means invasion, regime change, occupation and reconstruction. Either that is your long term desire or you are an incompetent who does not understand the ramifications of the policy you advocate for. Take your pick.

No, I'm not persuaded that our pledge of support translates to invasion, occupation, and reconstruction.

As well, why are you so sure that we wouldn't just stand by? I certainly didn't see you people clamoring for the US to defend the shia. I certainly don't see you people advocating military invasion, occupation, and Reconstruction throughout Africa despite decades of genocide there. In fact, I am wholly convinced that you people would stand by and watch pro-democracy Iranians get slaughtered. You've done it throughout the last few decades in places all over the world.

Lastly, why do you believe that a pledge of support can only take the form as a promise of military action by the US? Are you just too stupid to engage your brain and consider how else the US might pressure the Iranian regime, moron?

BSmack wrote:Then that pledge is, to quote John Nance Garner, "not worth a bucket of warm piss".

It is not our job to tell Iranians what kind of government they should have. Our interest in Iran is to have a government friendly to our interests.

Go for it. Tell me how the US can pressure Iran. It's not like we haven't already withdrawn diplomatic recognition, aided an invasion of Iran, boycotted Iranian oil and frozen Iranian assets.

JMak wrote:

BSmack wrote:Then that pledge is, to quote John Nance Garner, "not worth a bucket of warm piss".

Riiight. Because expressing your support for a pro-democracy movement necessarily means military force. What kind of idiot are you?

It is not our job to tell Iranians what kind of government they should have. Our interest in Iran is to have a government friendly to our interests.

There you go...the stale stability argument that leaves dictators in place so long as we can propser. I thought you fools frowned on that during the Reagan administration? I guess with your boy in office it's back to business as usual, huh?

Go for it. Tell me how the US can pressure Iran. It's not like we haven't already withdrawn diplomatic recognition, aided an invasion of Iran, boycotted Iranian oil and frozen Iranian assets.

Hey, I thought it was you liberals that were all about all of the diplomatic tools...I love how you change your colors so rapidly once you realize that carping from the sidelines ain't governing. Pathetic.

LTS TRN 2 wrote:...instructed to desist such tedious patter...

Martyred wrote:

LTS TRN 2 wrote:...instructed to desist such tedious patter...

Why do you do this? Why do you type in this dull-witted manner that you believe makes you appear clever or even lyrical?

Spit the fucking marbles out of your mouth, Shakesqueer, and just get to the point. You do have a point, do you not?