“As long President Bush stands with the Iranian people, the Iranian people will stand with him.”

Persian Mirror ^ | May 22 | Slater Bakhtavar

[Horkster]

Wow, I just can't wait to see this report on the 6 o'clock news tonight. Interesting post. Go people of Iran!

[Sthitch]

Well of course they like him, he is a religious zealot just like they are, and I am sure that he bribed them somehow. /sarcasm

[areafiftyone]

Part of the answer may be that Iran is changing at such a rapid rate that the media has had a difficult time reporting and/or understanding the situation inside the country

I would say that the reason is the media doesn't want to report anything that is pro-Bush. But the minute some anti-Bush protesting goes on anywhere in the world the media is there faster than lightning!

[Khashayar]

what?

[Sthitch]

The "/sarcasm" means the end of my sarcasm.

[Tax-chick]

He was making a joke, imagining what Democrats and other enemies of President Bush would say.

[areafiftyone]

He was being sarcastic. That is the way the Liberal Media and the Liberal Bush haters think!

[Luddite Patent Counsel]

Gee, I wonder what they think of Mr. Carter, the guy who made their present government possible?

[reagan_fanatic]

The problem for the American (and Israeli) side is the headlong rush by Iran's mullahs to develop a nuclear bomb. Such a development would destroy any plan to carefully cultivate the democracy movement in Iran since it would undoubtedly lead to military action by the Western powers.

[USAFJeeper]

I may be completely wrong but weren't the Persian peoples more democratic in the way back days? I mean centuries ago. And nowhere near as "religious" as the rest of the Middle East.

I really need to get a good history book to read again :)

[TAdams8591]

Good news. Hoping and praying Iran has a peaceful regime change to democracy.

My brother always said computers would be more likely to help freedom than to hurt it. This article provides some MORE good evidence for his prediction.

[Sax]

My father's ex-business partner was Iranian. Good man, and very displeased with the political problems his country has endured.

Do you suppose that by pursuing nukes, Iran's current leaders are purposely trying to draw hostile political (or militaristic) action against themselves as a method of tightening their grip on power? (That tactic has been used so many times, it's like a bad cliche, but it works.)

[reagan_fanatic]

Do you suppose that by pursuing nukes, Iran's current leaders are purposely trying to draw hostile political (or militaristic) action against themselves as a method of tightening their grip on power?

Despots need external boogiemen to rally their countrymen to their side and to direct attention away from their own failings and abuses of their own people. The mullahs are no different in that respect from Josef Stalin, Hitler, Fidel Castro or Kim Jong-Il. Each one needed foreign enemies to consolidate and maintain their grip on power.

I would suspect that the mullahs would be quite pleased by an attack on their nuclear facilities by the U.S. or Israel.

[Sax]

..and the new kid on the block, Chavez. He's following the 'Despots for Dummies' book to the letter.

[DuncanWaring]

A directory of Iranian Media Sites including those referenced transmitting out of LA.

[justa-hairyape]

The Persians spread out and conquered the Eastern Mediterranean region before the Greeks came into world power under Alexander the Great. Before Alexanders time the Persians actually did attack the Greeks however. Supposedly Alexander was dishing out some revenge for the earlier Persian attacks when he took Persia. The reason Alexander attacked, absorbed and virtually destroyed the Phoenician culture, was that the Phoenician Fleet was loyal to the Persians. I think Persia had conquered Phoencia earlier but had not destroyed Phoenica. So in a sense, the Persians were much more civil then the Greeks were under Alexander the Great. Alexander the Greek introduced the world to mass casualties and genocide on scales that were unheard of before hand. All of this occurred before the establishment of modern religions (one god). Back then people believed in multiple gods. God of Lighting, God of the Rain, etc. etc..

[texasflower]

You need to read this article carefully, since your comment on the journalist protest thread last night indicates an unawareness of the true situation in Iran.

I think you will find this interesting and this article is very much in line with everything else that has come out of Iran for quite awhile now.

[PzLdr]

The trouble between Greece and Persia started when the Ionian Greek city states, which were part of the Persian Empire rebelled. They first petitioned Sparta (unsuccessfully) and then Athens (successfully) to intervene in what the Persians (and the Spartans) saw as an internal matter for the Persian Empire to resolve. The revolt was crushed. But Athens' stupidity focused the attention of the Persians to the west. The invasion followed.

[kenavi]

Do you suppose that by pursuing nukes, Iran's current leaders are purposely trying to draw hostile political (or militaristic) action against themselves as a method of tightening their grip on power?

Per Abbas Milani, all Iranians support getting the Bomb, because they remember that when Hussein attacked them with poison gas, the world did nothing.

However, when his survey asked young Iranians if they supported the bomb, even if that meant keeping the mullahs in power, they said "No".

Milani's conclusion: The best way to harness Iran's nuclear ambitions is for U.S. to concentrate attention on supporting the democrats in Iran, who are many, and who were actually behind the 1979 revolution until it was hijacked by the fanatics. (Having Carter as the U.S. President didn't help of course.)

Another interesting conclusion: today's Mullahs are not willing to die for their beliefs, they only want power. My inference: U.S. should threaten them personally if they develop bomb before democracy.