Posted on 06/26/2009 1:00:12 PM PDT by seanmerc
WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama had been playing his cards cautiously on the political turmoil in Iran -- until conservatives goaded him to escalate his rhetorical condemnation of the uprising.
Obama had tried to steer clear of any public comment about the disputed reelection of Prime Minister Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the massive protests by supporters of the opposition candidate and the government crackdown on the protesters.
At a news conference Tuesday, Obama caved in to those right-wing columnists and political hawks who wanted him to hit the Iranian mullahs harder.
These are the same critics who pushed the American people into the 7-year, no-win war with Iraq, a war of tremendous human cost that has wasted billions of dollars.
For example, former deputy defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, now a visiting scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, recently wrote: "Now is not the time for the president to dig in a neutral position. It is time to change course." Wolfowitz was one of the leading architects of the Bush administration’s drive to invade Iraq in 2003.
Hawkish columnist Charles Krauthammer recently scoffed at Obama for seeking a dialogue with the Iranian clerics, suggesting that Obama was "afraid of the head-breaking, women-shackling exporters of terror -- and the people in the street yearning to breathe free."
Oddly, in the middle of setting the scene for Obama to shift his views on Iran, the White House staff achieved new lows in its continuing campaign to manipulate the news media. Staffers had alerted Nico Pitney of the Huffington Post, a blogger in touch with protesters in Iran, the night before that he would be called on at the White House press conference.
And, lo, after Obama finished an opening statement to reporters about the Iranian struggle for freedom, he then sought out Pitney in the press corps.
"I know that there may actually be questions from people in Iran who are communicating through the Internet. Do you have a question?" Obama asked, with a straight face.
Pitney replied: "Yes, I did, I wanted to use this opportunity to ask you a question directly from an Iranian. We solicited questions last night from people who are still courageous enough to be communicating online, and one of them wanted to ask you this: Under which conditions would you accept the election of Ahmadinejad?"
In response, Obama said there were significant questions about the legitimacy of the Iranian election but that, "ultimately, this is up to the Iranian people to decide who their leadership is going to be and the structure of their government."
The stage craft was exquisite: Obama responding to a real live Iranian through a reporter at a White House news conference.
On Wednesday, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs defended the pre-selection of Pitney on the basis that the blogger had been in contact with Iranians in Iran. Furthermore, the White House didn’t ask Pitney to ask any specific question. Thus, while the questioner may have been planted at the news conference, his actual question was not, according to the Gibbs defense.
Relations between the U.S. and Iran have been at the razor’s edge since Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh nationalized Iran’s oil industry in 1953.
In response, the CIA deposed him and put the Shah back on the throne. The despised Ayatollah Khomeini followed him with his revolutionary students in 1979.
Under pressure, Obama has been upping his rhetoric while keeping open his options, which are very few in reality.
He said he was "appalled and outraged by the threats, beatings and imprisonments in the past few days" by the Iranian authorities. "Those who stand for justice are always on the right side of history," Obama told reporters.
The words "just" and "justice" have big meaning in the Koran.
He also described as heartbreaking the video of a 26-year-old Iranian woman shot on a Tehran street.
One thing is clear: We are witnessing a new chapter in Iranian history. Once the people hit the streets massively for days, it’s only a matter of time for revolutionary change.
no matter how much I brace for that picture, it fries my circuits for a minute...
YOU SWINE!!!!!!!! I just had eye surgery and then get this thrust at me full force.
lurking mode;
I Knew this was inevitable...
So wrong, omg my eyes
Um, check again. I’m not the poster of the pic!!!
omg
Oh, argh. You messed up my ping page again! Thank goodness no one posted a photo of HT in a bikini.
AHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!
LOL...sorry.
This witch will OUT LIVE all of us...UGH!!
OMG! I thought I was in hell there for a second...
Why didn’t Obomba pick Helen for press secretary?
I thight the graphic scenes were going to be pictures from Iran;this is much worse!OOOWWWW my eyes are burning!It hurts!
He wanted a woman for press secretary, so Gibbs got the nod.
Hellen the Harpy weighs in on Hussein.
That giant picture is the epitome of the word “hag”: look at the wispy, disheveled hair, colorless and wrinkled skin, lifeless eyes, claw-like hands, fang-like teeth, sagging jowls, and the evil smile.
Thank goodness it’s Friday. After examining her so closely, I need a stiff drink!
Well, you did give a warning.
Would WV have ever elected her? As it as, we are all stuck with her.
I have seen the some gruesome and disgusting things in my life.
But this....This is the cause of my nightmares!
Yet she is stranglely alluring.... J/K
Yup, Hell-In.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhh! I’m blind!
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