Comments on: It’s Not a “Debate”, Mr. President. It’s a Slaughter and You’re Helping It Happen

By: Jimmie

Jimmie — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 20:30:44 +0000

Again, doing a small amount of research on my blog (putting the word "genocide" in the little green search box, for instance) would have given you the answer.

And again, you'd be wrong. Do you have nothing better to do than troll?

By: Joe

Joe — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 20:27:32 +0000

Jimmie, I guess you would rather prefer our soldiers to go there and hit the population with our weapons. Were have you been when the mass murderers in the Balkan were active, what did you do to protect Nigerian people, I guess because Obama was not president then it wasn’t worth mentioning it. To bad ….otherwise you could have blamed him for that too ….

By: fireweednectar

fireweednectar — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 23:58:36 +0000

You know what, Matt? I'm originally from the Middle East and I have heard the same sh*t as what you said from so many others that I simply can't pass this entry without saying: We are sick and tired of being treated as if we are too stupid to want freedom like you have. Wanting to make control of your own destiny doesn't come with European DNA, so stop acting as if we all (and Americans) love Obama so much we could never believe he did something bad.

As for Obama "finally" saying something negative–the damage has been done. The message has been passed to the regime that he is willing to allow barbarism for the opportunity to kiss their arses–only he was forced to do otherwise.

Iranians ASKED for help–in more ways than one.

IRANIANS asked for help.

By: Jimmie

Jimmie — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 12:25:09 +0000

fostert – You really do need to get your own blog.

By: fostert

fostert — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 04:20:03 +0000

And look, our decision to not invest in Iran's resources only means one thing: other people get the prize. Russia and China already have big investments there. And India is trying to get in. Good for them, they were smart. Imagine if we owned some of those resources. Oops, can't do that. It's illegal for us. We have embargoes that other countries will ignore. So tell me why being unable to own Iran's resources is good for us. Russia can own them, and so can China. But our oil companies can't. Sorry. It's the biggest remaining reserves of oil and gas in the world, and you conservatives want to prevent our oil companies from getting to it. What the hell are you thinking?

By: fostert

fostert — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 03:59:29 +0000

"So what what the hell are you even talking about?"

Let's make this a little clearer. Turkey buys oil from Iran, refines it, and then sells it to everyone. But they have to sell back whatever Iran wants in refined products. Turkey will continue to do so because they make money off it. Imagine to outroar from conservatives if we suggested that an oil company stop doing business with a nasty country. Like say, Burma. I've suggested that to conservatives, and Jimmie too. Shot down, of course. Of course, I never thought that any oil embargo would possibly work. And Jimmie pointed that at too. In this case, you need Turkey to go along, and they won't do it unless we bail out their water projects, which are running over budget. Even then, we'll still have to give them a few more AWACS and a bunch of stealth fighters. If not, they can shut down our command and control systems for the entire Middle East. Want to try that? I'm guessing not.

By: fostert

fostert — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 03:39:48 +0000

Before we even get into any arguments of policy, what's this "selling oil to Iran" stuff? Iran buys no oil. They sell it. They buy refined petroleum products like gasoline and heating oil. And they do that because Russia and China haven't finished the refineries yet. Iran has the third largest oil reserves and the first largest natural gas reserves. They don't have particularly good infrastructure, but many countries are willing to pitch in on that. So what what the hell are you even talking about?

As for the "revolution" well it's not a revolution, it's a call for evolution. And it's a good one and might succeed. We'll see. Jimmie and I are both old enough to remember the last revolution in Iran. But I'm guessing he didn't have the refugees sleeping in the living room like I did. Seriously, that was the norm for a while when the Shah went down. Refugees in the living room. The neighbors across the street were Iranian, and they asked us to help out. So we did. But this has eerie similarities. It will take a year, but I think they will succeed. Yes, people will get killed. I really don't like that kind of thing, but it does happen in evolutions. But understand that the structure will remain, but the power will shift. Rafsanjani will change it. And he has more power than anyone. Even the clerics need an economy, and Rafsanjani runs it. Give him some time to work it out. If he can't, the people will deal with it. Give them some time to do it.

By: EricH

EricH — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 11:05:09 +0000

I'd guess 3-5 years is the time frame we're talking about to bring refineries on line; more money could shorten that up a bit, but probably not to less than 2 years.