Hard News: Lying liars again
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What's a bet their 'financial advisory services' is a front for getting you to buy into their managed fund?
As for Iran, I really can't see military action by the US against them. It breaks the mold of requiring a 30:1 advantage in force. Desperate sabre rattling to distract from the real cockup that is Iraq.
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merc,
A Limited Nuclear Strike however...
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LOL Peter, that's class. I did think it odd that Iranian weapons would have english markings but the non-gregorian calendar system pickup takes the cake. Unless Iran does a roaring trade selling weapons to english speaking countries I couldn't think of any reason you'd put most of the key details about the weapon in a language most of your soldiers can't speak or read. I guess the fact the measurements are in *metric* would be enough to convince any god-fearing american that the weapons must have been made by someone evil, though.
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Hmmmm..Two US carrier groups in the region and Newsweek reporting a third is to be sent.
That is an awful lot of firepower...I certainly hope it is only sabre rattling.
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Austria must be due an ACLM or two soon too:
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There is some speculation that the intent of the powerpoint show in Baghdad was as much to rack up pressure on the various Shi'ite groups that the "surge" is aimed at (or at least the 'rogue elements' in those various Maliki supporting groups!), as to confront Iran.
This link is interesting in that regard.
In a nutshell: The Iran-weapons show was part of American pressure to make sure the Iraqi government agrees to include Shiite targets as well as Sunni targets in the new security plan.
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Does anyone else find it absolutely astounding that these presentations look and feel so so SO similar to Colin Powell's 'Mobile Chemical Weapons Labs' report to the U.N before the invasion of Iraq?
And I can't help but wonder, with NZ's political system continually picking up more and more of America's tactics and structures (the shift from party to personal focus etc), will we ever be the subjects of this kind of manipulation? Or is it already happening?
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they also represent propaganda about 'the treatment of the marsh arabs' publicised in 2002. lots of meaningless satellite photos of "sand where happy arabs used to pont".
even my 2nd year uni students at monash were picking holes in that particular bullshit.
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doh. resemble* propaganda... you get the picture.
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Pace has repeated his refusal to follow the line, can you imagine the emails and calls flying from Pennsylvania Avenue to the man.
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Well Ahmadinejad didn't deny the allegation, fairly significant since he's not known for subtlty, and Pace is just refering to his own knowledge - he's not denying that there could be a connection to elements in the Iranian govt. He might very well change his mind.
And whatever the past, evidence of possible Iranian spoiling in Iraq should be looked at seriuosly by everyone no matter their view point on the war. If Iran is meddling in this fashion then it sure isn't aimed at promoting democracy.
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neil, democracy isn't the only or most effective method of governance in the world. this dogmatic preoccupation with 'democracy at any cost' is getting ordinary people brutally killed.
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Well didn't deny the allegation
uhhh. Iran has denied the allegation several times. Here is one from Ahmadinejad himself, since thats what you wanted.
I'm bemused by the concept that the US Chief of Staff is being kept that far out of the loop. Perhaps Hershey was right, and there is a rebellion behind the doors at the Pentagon, if that's your argument.
Having made the statement now...twice...any restating when he returns to DC need to be taken with a large grain of cynicism
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merc,
Democracy or Death!
USA + 200 year old democracy
IRAN - 10,000? year culture
USA to Iran, you will be democratized or you will die trying! Sigh, and Neil, what possible further spoiling of Iraq could Iran achieve that USA hasn't already? -
And its the democratically elected parties in Iraq that virtually everybody agrees are the ones that Iran is allied with...it's the old argument, raised upon the invasion, that America will not like the regional stance any democracy in Iraq would take, and so it is.
That coupled with the fact that Iran is one of the few nations in the Middle East that can make any claim to being a functioning democracy.
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If by democracy, Neil, you mean majority rule, that was the fatal flaw in the neo-con vision for Iraq from the start. The oppressed majority of Shi'ites in Iraq really don't have anywhere else to look for friends- in a middle-east overheated with militant monotheisms. The Iranians are hardly opposed to the SIRC.
It's worth remembering that Iran is also a democracy- one of very few more-or-less genuinely democratic countries in the region- and with a very large population of young people, growing up with (relatively new) democratic expectations. -
Sorry Simon for the appearance of an echo!
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Simon, Ahmadinejad did not deny the allegations, to quote from the article you linked to:
The Iranian president refused to address directly the United States accusation that the weapon made by Iran have killed Americans but said the Americans were trying to find a scapegoat.
Pace did not make the statement twice - you’ve just read 2 different accounts of the same press conference. He's not necessarily out of the loop, he's just saying that at present he can't make that claim. It will be interesting to see how his views develop.
I'm not necessarily convinced that this comes from high up in the Iranian govt., I'll wait for further evidence, but we do know reasonably sophisticated Iranian weaponry is getting into Iraq. Either no one in the Iranian govt. knows about this or someone does. I find it hard to believe that no one does.
Che, I disagree with your view on democracy but using it as a starting point - do you think that Iran's meddling is aimed at creating one of those other, better, forms of governance you talk of? (What's killing ordinary people in Iraq now are ethnic militias whose primary purpose is to prevent democracy from happening).
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neil, using loaded language won't make your POV more correct.
iran's meddling
and the ethnic militia line are simply ways to detract from the collosal screw up that is the invasion of iraq.
i believe the counterpoint to "iranian meddling" is "US guidance".
frankly, if iranian democracy was installed in iraq, as flawed and human-rights-dodgy as i've heard it is, then it's a damn sight better than the completely useless and corrupt efforts of the americans.
and if it means that "the civil war we always knew was going to happen" is halted before it escalates further, then that is also a good result.
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I'm not necessarily convinced that this comes from high up in the Iranian govt., I'll wait for further evidence, but we do know reasonably sophisticated Iranian weaponry is getting into Iraq. Either no one in the Iranian govt. knows about this or someone does. I find it hard to believe that no one does.
Clearly there are Iranian weapons in use in Iraq - it would be surprising if there weren't. But nearly everything about this particular presentation stinks, and these people have long since drained any reservoir of trust they once had.
Meanwhile, the US position is completely chaotic. They're trying to assemble a Sunni support base in surrounding countries while they talk up a Shia government in Iraq, while they blame the violence there on a neighbouring Shia government when they're not blaming it on a Sunni Islamist group. It's lunatic.
Your patience in these people is touching Neil, but they really are not fit to govern.
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Hey was that company anything to do with retirement services or the like? I just had a call from a company claiming to be conducting a survey with a prize for participating of $500 in petrol vouchers. Now for one I'd really like to know how they got my unlisted, no directory access phone number. But you see as a teacher with a student loan I can't afford to buy my own home with it's aligned chunk of debt, so they weren't interested in me.
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Your patience in these people is touching Neil, but they really are not fit to govern.
And with all due respect, Russell, what the fuck are the Democrats doing to prove theiy're competent to be a loyal opposition, let alone take over the executive? I suspect your average Iraqi would be muttering 'a plague on both your houses'.
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or that oldy but goody
may the fleas of a thousand camels infest your loincloth
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RB, I agree that the trustworthiness of the Bush admin is severely tarnished and that any intelligence about Iranian activities should be treated with some skepticism. Also that the US is now faced with trying to square the circle in Iraq.
But that does not mean that the problems with Iran are just the figments of Bush's warmongering imagination. It's worth considering what Iran is up to in its own right.
Here's Obama back in 2004 -
Obama would consider missile strikes on Iran
I tend to agree with his position - a military strike could be a necessary last resort, the problem then being how to work out when every other option has been well and truly exhausted. That's difficult to do when dealing with governments like that of Iran - it appears fractured, is less than democratic and lacks transparency.
But for what it's worth I doubt that it will come to that and if it did then I would prefer it to happen in about 2 years time.
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