Any rational adult can see that it would be foolish to help make the situation in Iran any more unstable by ratcheting up the rhetoric coming from the White House.

And also, if the best argument you can come up with is that the President needs to make more forceful public statements, then you are clearly scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of being the loyal opposition.

The Republicans, when they are out of power, make these nonsense arguments just for the sake of arguing. And when the Democrats are out of power, they offer no opposition at all. The two corporate parties have long since become parodies of themselves. Why anyone still votes for either of them at this point is beyond me.

And why we haven't taken to the streets (like the people of Iran) to force a real change in our own electoral system is also beyond me.

This was a nice selection, with a couple of things I'd never heard of before, so thanks for it.

But in the future, if you do this kind of thing again, would it be too much trouble to have links? Yes, we can all Google this stuff, but that's just adding an unnecessary step. Thanks!

This is all well and good, a well-written article about a much-maligned but noble concept. But of course the protestors in Iran are not fighting for some kind of religious freedom or secular state.

The tendency on the internet (and here at Salon) has been to try and turn these protestors into heroes ("watching the scenes of bravery and brutality"), but I have to say that the candidate they are supposedly fighting to see win, and his ideas, are not really worth all of this violence (and now death).

So, before we continue to canonize these people and their cause and try and shoehorn them into the annals of the Official Struggle for Democracy, let's remember that if Mousavi was installed into office tomorrow the day-to-day life for most Iranians would not change one iota. Mousavi is a reformist, not a revolutionary, and these protests are about a stolen election, not a radical revolution in Iranian culture.

When and if the people of Iran want a secular state, then we ought to be there to support them however we can. But the 1979 revolution showed that they wanted a theocracy, and I don't think this current crowd of protestors wants to change that.

In perusing many of these comments, I have to say how dumbfounded I am struck by how much small-mindedness there is on this issue, especially here at supposedly liberal Salon.

Changing this one line in the Constitution has nothing to do with Arnold or with Henry Kissinger, and opening up the dialogue about this long-term idea has nothing to do with appeasing the birthers. This issue existed long before them, and will continue to exist long after they are gone.

By continuing to limit the Presidency to mainly the natural-born, we are spitting on the graves of every immigrant who came through Ellis Island. And, in a sense, we are going against the supposed ideal of the free market and open competition which even many of the Democrats here at Salon claim to believe in. I imagine most of you, being computer-literate, are advocates of a free market when it comes to ideas and the internet. Why then, would so many of you be against a free market in our Presidential elections? Of course, most of you are partisans for one party (and the two-party system), and if so, the thought of having truly free and fair elections is already foreign (pun intended) to you.

I am saddened by the fact that so many of you can't seem to see beyond the 2012 election, or are making such a broad and fundamental issue all about one or two famous immigrants you don't want to see become President. The big picture, the long view on this issue, is that it is hypocritical at best and racist at worst to trumpet our own freedoms and liberties every July 4, to wax poetic about taking the tired, the poor, the hungry, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, and to then deny those masses the opportunity to rise to the highest position of power in our supposed democracy.

When so many of you are so willing to reject the ideals of true democracy because of the current political winds (and one specific governor you don't want to see become elected), then you are no better, in my eyes, than those who advocated torture in the name of protection, and war in the name of pre-emption.

It is no wonder our government abandons the principles, the ideals, of freedom whenever it can - just look at how eager so many of you are to do the same.