Letters to the Editor
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Best way to tie down Iran:
Pull US troops out. Let Iran take over Iraq. Let Iranian soldiers and Marines ride herd on the Iraqi insurgents.
Two mints in one!
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Not a gaffe; a new Republican talking point
(I'm copying my own comment here from another Salon blog -- hope that's playing by the rules!)
On NPR this evening, Matthew Continetti of The Weekly Standard (house organ of Moonies and the Washington Republicans) insisted that it was not a gaffe or even a misstatement, because, he claimed, there was solid proof going back many years to back up the connection between Al Qaida and Iran's ayatollahs. You can hear the piece at
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88689984
There's no transcript yet, but I've taken the liberty to transcribe it myself -- enjoy:
Continetti: "McCain's statement that Iran is aiding Sunni terrorists has been treated as a gaffe in the media, but I think it isn't a gaffe. I think if you look at the 9-11 Commission, I think if you look at the Washington Post's own reporting on some things that Major General William B. Cauldwell has said, there IS a pattern of Iranian assistance to Al Qaida -- not just since the Iraq War began but even in the 1990s. We can't forget that Imad Muniyah, the terrorist who was recently killed in Syria, was allied with the Iranians, and of course also helped Al Qaida when it was becoming an organization."
Robert Siegel: "He was Lebanese."
Continetti: "He was Lebanese."
Siegel: "So you think he believed it, you think he meant it when he said it."
Continetti: "McCain believed it, and I think the facts, under strict scrutiny, bear him out."
Siegel: "Matt Continetti, E.J. Dionne, thanks so much."
End of story. No follow-up. Amazing.
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If Mayor McCheese McCain
Thinks Iraq is a quagmire, try Iran, it'll be a mullah driven madhouse, a mile a minute, fanatic fueled, ultra-high octane, descent into hell. And I say, anybody who spoils for it, deserves to burn and be consumed in it.
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McCain
He is already continuing the same idiotic rhetoric that the Bush administration started after 9/11. How many wars are our boys and girls of this country supposed to fight? Is Condoleeza Rice trying to foster any allies like Colin Powell tried to do, before Dick Cheney and his cronies cut him out of the loop? Heaven help us all. We are heading for Armegeddon.
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what they all know
now is that the american people are so fundamentally uneducated about the history, philosophy, religion, and division of the middle east that they need not worry about the veracity of what they say.
most americans can't even distinguish between protestant and catholic much less sunni and shiite. the idea that some of us might be horrified that a potential future leader of the "free world" could be so moronically wrong about a "foreign religion" is absurd.
we aren't smart enough to deserve smart leaders. we are getting exactly what we asked for - morons who make us feel better about ourselves. sooner or later the rest of the world is going to get tired of our shit and make us take it.
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Iran
will not be the easy target that these repulsives think it will be, but then thinking has never been a strong point with these people, Iraq and its people gave up very quickly, but Iran will retaliate, just look at the 8 year war they fought with Iraq, there will be enormous consequences for the US if it goes ahead with this folly, and it could feasibly be the end of the US as we know it, Iranians are as patriotic/nationalistic as Americans are, if not more so, they are richer and are better trained, than Iraq, they have the firepower to cause the US so much misery , and yes I think it could start a regional war which would then draw in Syria, Lebanon, Palestine etc. this would of course then bring Israel into a war as well as the rest of the middle east, oil fields would burn right across the gulf, the US would be in a recession as never seen before, and Bush’co would retire to his livestock-less ranch and wonder why no one else could see his vision, but then visions are what alcoholics and drug abusers have, informed common sense is what the rest of us have.
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Retarded article
Dear Joe,
Once again I am amazed that you would put out such a retarded article based on one or two sound bites, true or untrue. The US can't even finish the 2 wars we are currently in so why would you think we would start a third war? There isn't going to be any war with Iran unless e.g. Iran sinks one of our ships in international waters without provocation. So why talk about war with Iran like it's inevitable?
While you're daydreaming, put something out there that says Obama is going to run a third-party candidacy if HRC steals the nomination. And this, of course, will put McCain in the WH.
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McCain and Company Don't Have to Think
They have the cross wrapped in the flag. With that magical combo they can start as many wars as they like. That they may not be able to win a single one won't matter, because if they were to take us into Iran we'd be like a one-armed paperhanger for an indefinite period and there'd be no time for anyone to think about anything even slightly less important than simply surviving.
McCain and Co. labor under a delusion which, if it could be attributed to something like Alzheimer's, might at least allow us to restrain them. Hell, already Osama Bin Laden is attempting to broker the election by invoking the same sort of "Chaos Principle" the neocons have (according to Rush Limbaugh anyway), employed to extend the Democratic nomination battle. Since Bin Laden is similar to McCain (and if so, then not dissimilar to Hillary Clinton in some respects), the only worthy path is one which extends conflict out beyond the horizon. They all play into each others' hands and make each other complete because they are essentially the same. The fact that McCain is so painfully ignorant of his middle eastern counterparts is not nearly as big a concern as the potential catastrophe (or, as Duh-byah called it, perhaps a "catostrophic success", his follow up to his grand "Mission Accomplished" debacle) which would ensue.
I continue to believe either Democratic candidate could upend McCain in the general, and by the time one of them actually gets the nod in August, they will likely have exposed every one of each others' skeletons-in-the-closet, so there won't be anything of substance for the Republican catapult to launch. The Upright Spike of 2009 only exists in the remote possibility of McCain actually being elected.
We can still prevent this.