Slashdot Mirror
Iran Shuts Down US Virtual Embassy
bonch writes "Less than 12 hours after the U.S. launched a virtual embassy for Iran, the Iranian government blocked access to the website, directing visitors to a government page proclaiming the site illegal. The White House condemned the move, calling Iran's internet policies 'an electronic curtain of surveillance and censorship around its people.'"
Yes but... how do you REALLY feel?
Hehehe, typo filled ranting aside, I agree completely. It seems beyond the average US citizen's mental grasp that there are people who would like to live peacefully whilst still being diametrically opposed to everything that the US stands for.
Rather ironic considering that the U.S. government is doing everything in its power to censor its _own_ people on the Internet.
Oh give it a rest you anonymous coward. I'm not American and I don't live in the USA, but if you hate the place so much go live in a *real* police state. Then you'll know what censorship really is. I guarantee you if Iran were to host an "eEmbassy" not only would the US government not block it, they'd have no means to do so other than the courts, and the courts would tell the government to piss off.
The White House condemned the move, calling Iran's internet policies 'an electronic curtain of surveillance and censorship around its people.
Really? REALLY? F*UCK YOU U.S. You are EVERYTHING that is wrong with the world. Go f*cking away and stop crying about people why just want to live their lifes peacefully. You worthless pieces of shit who attack other countries and everyone who doesn't like your limited religious views. You are the scumbag of earth. Go eat your shit. You want to know why we dont like you? BECAUSE YOU TRY TO TELL US WHAT TO DO TO, YOU STUPID SCUMBAGS.
Well, where to begin here?
1 - The US is "everything that's wrong with the world". Really? If the US dissapeared tomorrow, just what do you think would happen to the world? Honestly. Do you think the world would suddenly live in peace and harmony? Hint: The US has only been around under 300 years. Have a look at world history before that time. Let me know how great things were.
2 - "Go f*cking away and stop crying about people why just want to live their lifes peacefully." Right, the Islamic Republic of Iran just wants to live their lives peacefully. And they do nothing bad.... like, sponsor Hezbollah or ship weapons or participate in kidnappings. Nope, if the US went away, everything would be right as rain in Iran. Right?
3 - "You want to know why we dont like you?" Who is "we"? The entire rest of the planet? Your country? Your neighborhood? Some guy ranting on Slashdot?
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
for political reasons.
Unless it wanted to, of course.
but if you hate the place so much go live in a *real* police state.
"If it could be worse, then the current situation is objectively good..."
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
> Really? If the US dissapeared tomorrow, just what do you think would happen to the world?
Canada would slide south and we'd be that much closer to real Mexican food!
SOPA -> http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-11-17/news/30412322_1_ip-act-rogue-websites-sopa
Laundry list of past attempts -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_the_United_States
(CDA, COPA, DMCA, COPPA, CIPA, COICA, and my favorite named DOPA.)
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
What does any of that have to do with the Iranian government censoring a website? You actually believe that such an act of information control is in the best interests of the citizens of Iran?
No wonder you posted anonymously.
In a US prison rots Javed Iqbal. Who is Javed Iqbal? He is a satellite dish installer who let people see Al-Manar television. Al-Manar is associated with Hezbollah (which as Shia, are associated with Iran, and the US government constantly links Hezbollah and Iran in statements). So how is the US throwing people getting news from Iranian, and Iranian-allied sources good, yet Iran doing the same thing is "an electronic curtain of surveillance and censorship"?
2 - "Go f*cking away and stop crying about people why just want to live their lifes peacefully." Right, the Islamic Republic of Iran just wants to live their lives peacefully. And they do nothing bad.... like, sponsor Hezbollah or ship weapons or participate in kidnappings.
Strange. Just replace "Islamic Republic of Iran" with "USA" and the sarcastic statement would still be applicable
So, uh...what does any of that insane ranting have to do with the Iranian government censoring websites?
It is hard for the US to call out other countries on their censorship when the US government itself is pushing for censorship. Here is what the conversation looks like:
US: Hey, Iran! Stop blocking foreign websites!
Iran: We are just blocking websites that break our laws. You did the same thing when it came to copyright infringement!
US: Well that was different. Copyright infringement is theft!
Iran: Yeah well those foreign websites amounted to an attempt to coerce our citizens to rebel against the government! That is even worse!
US: Well uhh you see...you are doing it for political reasons, so that is bad!
Iran: Well what is up with your copyright lobbyists and the influence they wield over your congress and executive branch?
US: herp derp.
Palm trees and 8
So that's the newest "Blame Obama" thing? The president had nothing to do with it. Both versions (SOPA and PROTECTIP) were introduced by Republicans. Though both have co-sponsors from both parties. Pelosi and Biden have both said that the bills are a bad idea.
I guess everything that goes through Congress that conservatives don't like must have been pushed by Obama. Even though it's a Republican bill to begin with.
USA isn't as bad as X, therefore USA is good?
I hit my wife with an open hand...it's okay, 'though, because this guy I know hits his wife with a baton and at least I'm better than that.
I am an American and I live in the USA. Don't forget that "the courts" are also part of the government. The federal government often and egregiously oversteps the specific privileges granted to it by the constitution; the courts, supreme and otherwise, often allow this to happen. Our government, the judicial part of it included, have made great strides in the restriction of personal freedom, including the field of censorship.
Don't get me wrong, the USA is pretty cool, and our government is definitely an open-handed beater, but just because Iran's government sucks more, that doesn't mean that our government doesn't suck quite a bit on its own.
it is not the place of the US to incite rebellion in Iran
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
It is the place of the US to stand up for unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Straighten up your own act before whining about the rest of the world.
People still complain about the last time the US tried that. World War II, I think it was. Didn't last very long (although, who knows what would have happened if the Japanese had left well enough alone.)
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
"an electronic curtain of surveillance and censorship around its people." ... Kind of like what the government is doing here in the States? The Patriot Act just kicked it into overdrive. Bill of Rights? Think you have those natural rights? Your government has taken them away and will do terrible things to you if you exercise those rights.
How's that been working for you lately? Before answering, you should probably consult your Homeland Security Potential Terrorist Interaction Manual for the proper response, Citizen. Remember, the threats are amongst us.
...Steve
No, the poster is reacting to the idiocy of the post. In a world with Putin grabbing power in Russia, North Korea investing in nukes while its people starve, Iran's theocracy feverishly working on bombs, Syria slaughtering its citizens, etc, calling the US "everything that's wrong with the world" is so moronic that it evokes outrage.
I posted anonymously because, well mainly I don't care, but also unlike you I'm not looking for an ego boost.
The real question here is why the US thinks it can interfere in the running of any country it decides to.
If the Iranian government tried to set up a web site for US citizens to read propaganda from, how long do you think it would stay up?
This isn't about culture it's about hypocrisy.
I think you'd find that there are a lot of U.S. citizens that are pretty disgusted with the way our country is behaving right now, both domestically and globally, if you actually asked any of us about it. Do you think that we're all over here cheering this crap on or something? There's people protesting in almost every major city in this country right now.
Exactly. Because in the United States, if a jerk like you or me posts a critical comment on a site like Slashdot, the government will block the site entirely, and might even arrest and imprison us and our families! Truly we are, like, totally oppressed.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Press TV IS a web site set up for US citizens to read propaganda and it IS still up. You are an idiot.
Basically, forever.
Or do you really think we block al-Jazeera? Or any other Iranian site? Just checked, by the by, and the Iranian government's Ministry of Foreign Affairs website is available online from where I'm sitting (though I don't read Persian, much less speak it, so I have to depend on Google Translate).
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Yeah except you're incapable of wrapping your head around the idea that we DON'T think that was a good idea! It's like arguing with a religious zealot.
It's OK Bender, there's no such thing as 2.
No, just like the guy who can't grasp that the idea was bad, you've STILL got this idea that they have a right to an opinion on Iran because they live in the US.
And somebody, I *think* it was one of those naughty middle east countries, I can't quite remember which, has to pay for those twin towers! Right?
Over, and over, and over, and over again...
And now it's to the point where they think they can blatantly push their propaganda and nobody will call them on it. They just stand and crank the war-machine in plain view and we are supposed to go "hmm yeah, democracy and shit, we're awesome"?
It's OK Bender, there's no such thing as 2.
The Islamic Republic of Iran wouldn't exist without the US. Remember, we destroyed their democracy in 1953 because they were trying to nationalize their oil fields, and kick us out. British Petroleum began its life as Anglo-Iranian Oil, which was known as Anglo-Persian Oil before that. The company was literally founded on the outright theft of all of Iran's oil, along with a handful of American companies that got their cut after Operation Ajax was complete. We installed the Shah, he repressed and radicalized the population with our money and training, and then the people revolted, as they often do.
We helped Britain divide and administer their post-war winnings after WWII that largely has started all of this mess. (Do you think oil-rich Iraq was divided equally into Kurdish, Shiite, and Sunni populations by accident?) We backed Saddam to punish the newly independent Iran after they overthrew our Shah. We participated in the proxy wars which destroyed Afghanistan, Iraq, and Iran in the 80s. We allowed Pakistan to develop nuclear weapons -- as in, we certified them as nuclear free every year -- during the 80s in exchange for helping us smuggle weapons into Afghanistan. We backed Mubarak. We were pals with Gaddafi while he was torturing and murdering people because he was selling oil to us, but that was all the way back in 2009. We allow Turkey to murder and suppress Kurds at their whim because they are an ally. We didn't say much about Syria at first because it was one of our blacksites. We're still watching Bahrainis get murdered because we like the sitting government that allows our fleet that we use to project power into that Middle East to have a massive billion dollar operations base.
The US isn't the root of all evil, but in the modern Middle East, it's the root of most of it.
Functionally, companies in the United States block Al-Jazeera. I challenge you to actually watch their CNN-like feed on your local cable station. The best I can do is their half-hour daily news program broadcast alongside BBC America and (that wretched) RT News on KCET in Los Angeles; today I consider Al-Jazeera's reporting premeir among broadcast television.
We at slashdot all know it's easy to intercept and redirect DNS (unless you're in Sweden, those fine adopters of DNSSEC), or insert in a transparent Squid/whatev with a hosts file, but I'm confident at least they're probably not using Websense, years ago I installed the mod_geoip ruleset to deny access to daily updates for requests originating from embargoed nations.
Last time I was in Syria Facebook was blocked at the port 80 level. But ssh forwarding 3128 worked fine, hopefully no one was etherealing 53. Funny it took Syria three years to finally ban iPhones, I lost a brand-new 3G getting out of a taxi in Damascus... the one time I didn't photograph the license plate of the car I was getting into.
Seeing "Persian" instead of "Farsi" struck me as odd, but I suppose I'm the odd one.
calling the US "everything that's wrong with the world" is so moronic that it evokes outrage.
During WWII, we invested an awful lot of money to develop our own nukes; Money that no doubt could have been used to put food on people's tables. We still work "feverishly" on bombs, except now we've gone from trying to create the biggest bombs to the most precise ones, and we're arming our police departments with drones capable of launching missiles that can fire through your window while you're eating dinner, kill you, and leave everyone else at the table undisturbed. As a bonus, we've oblitherated the right to a trial, to face your accuser, and to have the facts presented against you, as well as to have it all made public. Our police and military can now do pretty much whatever they want, and if you so much as make a peep of protest, we'll send 1400 officers armed with tanks, assault rifles, and full military battle gear... to deal with 50 peaceful protesters, on public property, demonstrating because they are homeless. We're slaughtering our citizens too, having the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world. Just because their acts of inhumanity are public and ours are private doesn't mean they're any less cruel. We rail on and on about China's Firewall and their tightly controlled media, while we're busy deleting domains off the internet on every server we can get our hands on that disagrees with our political agenda and paying homage to news sources like Fox News. Our news sources only come from a small handful of corporations, and everything seen on our television carefully created to give the appearance of controversy and openness, when in fact there is very little of either given the amounts of money involved.
No sir, it doesn't evoke outrage... the amount of crap our country gets away with is inspirational to the countries you mention; They hope to wield as much wealth and influence as we do, they're just less transparent about it.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Just the one with the most prisoners. And legal bribery of your politicians. And more military than basically the world combined. Yeah, just your average modern utopia.
calling the US "everything that's wrong with the world" is so moronic that it evokes outrage.
The main difference between all of those countries doing wrong and the United States is that we do evil in other countries, and they do it within their own borders. That's doesn't make us better, it's just a reflection of our status as the world's only superpower and the relative health of our electoral system. We watched Syria and Egypt and Tunisia and Turkey murder for decades without saying much about it, because we found them useful. And back when we controlled Iran with a dictatorship, we shut down the free press just as we did after we invaded Iraq.
Hypocrisy is indeed what is wrong with the world. Grow the fuck up already.
Gitmo. Corporate p0wnership of your election process. Countrywide/BofA and the bank and wall street bailouts. Not one bailout bankster in jail. The clamp-down on the OWS movement, which is a fundamental free-speech issue.
There's 5 to get you started. The shutdown of the "virtual embassy" is small potatoes in comparison. It was also a really, REALLY dumb idea to begin with. After all, it would be easy enough for the Iranian authorities to track who accesses it, make a list, check it twice, find out who's been naughty ... same as the US has been doing for a couple of decades with Echelon..
Um....the CIA and British operatives worked together to make the coup happen. The British government was extremely unhappy that Iran had nationalized their oil production (nullifying the contracts they had). The Wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat) is a decent jumping off point on this one. A lot of what we see in the region is a legacy of British Imperialism and attempts by the CIA to control the political landscape. It's not very dissimilar to the CIA training and funding of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia to change the politics of that region (French Indochina) as well. We saw how that turned out...
This is not to say that we can excuse all actions by a people, but we would do well, I think, to consider the legacy of Old World Imperialists and the Super Powers when viewing the geopolitical landscape. Further, it is perhaps as unwise to consider a people synonymously with the actions of their government as it is to consider our own way of doing things--whichever way that is--as being necessarily superior to any others. Patriotism is a laudable trait. Nationalism is a fetish that the world could do without.
People care a lot more about $AWFUL_REALITY_SHOW than they do about foreign propaganda here, there is no need to block it.
I'd imagine the Iranian govn't wished they had a population that was sedate enough that they didn't have to block propaganda.
Just crank out another season of "Dirty Ice-trucker New Jersey Born Italian-American Hookers in Alaska", and everything will stay the same.
Sent from my PDP-11
The "Electronic Embassy" was "gamed" to begin with.
If you want goodwill on the path to normalizing, you don't do it by sidelining diplomatic channels and messaging unilaterally. That's hostility - not diplomacy.
If the US State Dept wanted full relations with Iran, they could open up shop tomorrow. But everyone there knows that Israel would cut off their lobby-enslaved testicles. The barriers to entry are US and Israeli.
The "Electronic Embassy" was created TO BE BLOCKED
Now, the "evil Iranian government" can be used to generate a thousand obfuscating talking points - and to frame Iran for "blocking dialogue" - when in fact, it is the US which has PERPETUALLY refused relations and negotiation.
This is a ruse. Iran is not some Western Asian version of North Korea, propagandized with some false lampoon of the US that dominates popular imagination.
As I indicated in the earlier story, there is little or nothing that Iranians need to know about the US, that they don't already know, either by watching satellite TV (which every Iranian has) or by calling their cousin in LA, which half of all Iranians have.
Iranians tend to be the most Amerophilic people you will encounter - but the US has been able to do extensive damage to that impression in the past few years. They seem to be on the path of eliminating all good graces.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
PROTECT IP Act was introduced by Patrick Leahy (D-VT)
I both agree and disagree with this. I do know a few U.S. citizens, and each of them are rather intelligent and understand what is happening with their country. But yes, the U.S. is an international bully as far as politics go. This has happened before with legalizing marijuana in Canada. The U.S. had no business sticking their hands in, yet they did anyways by effectively threatening to restrict trade with Canada if we did so. There is also the U.S. tradition of having a "war" around every 20 years. Please, stop dragging us into those "wars". I say "war" with quotes because it is not truly a war unless you conscript citizens, and turn your entire economy over to a war-time economy. A war is something with your entire country on the line, not a fight against terrorists from another country that your own government gave weapons in the first place.
Yeah, there's a lot of things going haywire in this country right now, but you know what? I feel pretty confident in saying that I feel safer and more free here than there in Persia. I've never been to the region, granted, but I'm a proud European born imperialist American who celebrates American hegemony. America is not everything that is wrong in this world as the first poster claims, pretty far from it. America has certainly failed a lot of tests, but then my Britain and my Germany have as well, so it's hard for me knock the US for being self interested and imperfect. I would hope that Americans would know about the dark past of Chiquita back when it was called United Fruit and called El Pulpo by the locals it fed on, but most likely don't just as they don't know about the horrible things American companies like Abercrombie & Fitch have done in Saipan. That said, the world is big, but not so big we can't easily find human rights violations committed in other countries by governments, private industries, and state run businesses.
But since we're going to claim in this thread that the US is inciting rebellion in Iran with this site, let's look at some of the horrible imperialistic things that the US has done using this virtual embassy. From a quick glance, there's:
1. A section explaining visas; how they work, what type there are, how to read one.
2. A section for document reqs for birth registration and a PPT application
3. A bookmark of links to various US cabinet and mission websites.
4. Instructions for renewal of passports
5. Information on how to study abroad in the US.
That's all pretty scary stuff, isn't it? There are a couple of things that challenge Iran's fundament human right to control what its residents see and read like annual reports on human rights, trafficking, country reports on terrorism, and an International Religious Freedom Report on Iran. There's also an Open Societies page that seems to paint the US as some kind of defender of women's rights, religious freedom, etc.
Yeah, America has its bad days. So does every other nation in the world that has aspired to be more than San Marino. I know, I know, I'm being unfair in ignoring that one time when San Marino violated its neutrality during WWI as a result of 10 partisans joining the Italian Army. The Virtual Embassy is a good endeavor.
Your rant might be a bit more meaningful if you weren't an AC. Every country does shit that looks bad depending on how you look at it. The EU loves to sit back and let the USA do all the dirty work and then bitch about it.
I won't say the U.S. is perfect, far from it. I wish we would pull all our troops and influence and aid out of the rest of the world and let them fend for themselves. But as soon as we did we would have dozens of Countries asking or begging for our support. So get the fuck off your high horse and quit insulting others from the safety of your anonymous hole.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
PROTECTIP was introduced by a Democrat
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
[citation needed.]
From http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/24/AR2006082401461.html, is this:
You wouldn't be a(nother) pro-American propagandist liar, would you? Yes, it looks like you are. Couldn't even get the year right on your dissemination, could you?
Before judging blindly, have the decency to look at the website : http://iran.usembassy.gov/
There seems to be some strange reflex that everything the US does, must be for some evil agenda.
I'm European , so i recognize the tone. However, our own leaders are just as bad ( if not worse ).
Slipping shoelaces ?
I think the complaint is that the US was involved in countless (well, about 175 by copy/pasting Wikipedia article starting here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_operations#1900.E2.80.931909, into text editor, counting lines, dividing by 2 due to double-spacing) military conflicts during the 20th century, but somehow managed to sit out of about half of each of the World Wars, as though they were either too insignificant, or perhaps not lopsided enough, or maybe sympathies with the other side were too strong (hi Prescott Bush).
Yeah, I think it's the hypocrisy that's the issue.
Sorry, this required a second reply.
Following quote from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Blitz.
US stayed out when Britain suffered this:
76 consecutive nights of bombing.
Now, compare to 9/11, and America's reaction and expectation that the entire world would jump immediately to their side, and ... well sometimes the gag reflex is hard to suppress.
Further case in point, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Blitz_(American_football).
Yes, it appears that an American football team, based in London, named themselves after the 76 nights of consecutive bombing.
How'd America like a European-style football (soccer) team based in NY naming itself the New York Nine Elevens? Boggles the mind.
I am a time traveler from the future and where I come from people understand that the internet is a place to get information designed specifically for you by the people you pay taxes to. Other governments are all bad, and we don't dare cross IP borders... especially since they implemented IP v1984 and all networks only have access to their own IP segments and all traffic on said segments route through a connection direct to the government run 'packet enhancer'. It's fun and safe!
slashdot wouldn't read the rest of my post if I didn't start with something punny...
And I don't blame Iran either. Iranian politics may range from backward through stupid to evil, but their jingoism is carefully stoked and fueled by the US, and this move is just the latest of that.
This wasn't diplomacy, and it wasn't an embassy, virtual or otherwise. An embassy's job is to interact and negotiate with the Iranian government on behalf of the US, not "inform" Iranian citizens of what the US government thinks about the Iranian government. Calling it an embassy is an insult.
Real diplomacy would require an actual conversation between US and Iranian leadership, with both sides coming to a table ready to make concessions and compromises. And setting up a real embassy would require sending a real ambassador to Iran. Doing either of these would require balls, both for the US and Iran. That'd be a courageous foreign policy. If the US were to propose this to Iran, it would likely be rejected (especially now), but making the offer at all would be radical progress.
Hear hear!
I looked at Wikipedia (as I agree the facts are important), and I'm wondering if there's a confluence of stories here.
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashcroft_v._Iqbal#Facts:
The Washington Post story I quoted said,
How close is Hicksville to Brooklyn? Here's what I found ( http://www.findlocalweather.com/forecast.php?forecast=pass&pass=distances&dpp=0&pands1x=Hicksville%2C+NY&pands2x=brooklyn%2C+ny&Find+distance=How+far+is+it%3F ):
It appears that Javed Iqbal is a rather common Pakistani name, so maybe the Wikipedia entry incorrectly conflates the two guys, only one being the satellite TV installer?
Fair enough, original post was incorrect, rotted in prison perhaps. However, original post was correct in the charges against some guy by that name. The guy hurling accusation of anti-American propaganda was wrong on that, and gave an example apparently of a different case.
Cheers
From http://iran.usembassy.gov/
"In democracies, respecting rights isn't a choice leaders make day-by-day, it is the reason they govern."
"When a government hides its work from public view, hands out jobs and money to political cronies, administers unequal justice, looks away as corrupt bureaucrats and businessmen enrich themselves at the people's expense, that government is failing its citizens," stated U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the opening of the multi-country Open Government Partnership (OGP) Forum last week.
-- Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
I would argue that the U.S. has already failed its citizens.
How about you don't lump us all together as imperialist, culture-bound yahoos?
I have lived in the US and I would never lump Americans together as imperialists. Actually, I wouldn't dream of lumping them together as *anything*. Not a clever thing to do with Americans.
OTOH, the US as a country - meaning the elected government - has imperialist policies and attitude, and has had them for a while now. It is up to US citizens to decide whether they care. In recent decades, the response has been underwhelming.
Gravitation is a theory, not a fact.
I personally think the whole thing with Iran stinks and smells like a CIA plant. look at Libya one of the first things the "rebels' did was set up a central bank, what kind of fucking rag tag bunch of freedom fighters rush to set up a central fricking bank before the firing is even halfway over? Not to mention watch the video of MoMo getting killed and nearly all his captors are wearing Qatar military uniforms and hey, guess who has a large base in Qatar? That would be the US military. Now there are 20,000 plus Russian stinger knockoff that old MoMo had bought in the hands of who the fuck knows, all because old MoMo threatened to sell his oil for gold instead of supporting the petro-dollar. Not saying MoMo wasn't a douche, but the whole thing smells like astroturf by the CIA using the Arab Springs as cover.
Sadly the USA has been the puppet of AIPAC and Israel for many years now thanks to what I call the "Jesus won't come back! Come back Jesus come back!" brigade that wouldn't care if we had to slaughter every brown person in the middle east to make Israel happy as long as there is a Jew in Zion.
So i'm sure we'll get lots more "teh evil Iranians want to kill us ZOMFG!" propaganda in the coming months, just as we saw that to this day something like 40% of US citizens think we attacked Iraq because of 9/11. The Jews don't like the idea of anyone else in the region having the bomb even thought they have dozens if not hundreds of them, but frankly after Iraq any country in that area that didn't kiss the US bankster and military ass would be nuts NOT to want a bomb, as its the only way to keep the warmongers in the halls of power from running you down.
final prediction? Now that we are pulling out if Iraq so we have the troops it'll be a toss up as to whether we go after Iran or Syria, neither country should be feeling too safe right now. Sadly the MSM has gotten so damned good at propaganda the POTUS could come out and say Iran caused 9/11 and many of the people would buy it without a second thought.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
What are the different competing mainstream political views in, ummm...., Malaysia? In China? What are the relative strengths of different opinions of the US among far-eastern Russians'? You probably don't know, most people in most countries probably don't know, and it's hardly surprising. I happen to have heard of Michele Bachmann, and of Fox News, and the tea partiers, and Sarah Palin and quite a few others and know a little of US politics.....but I'm an Economist-reading English speaker in a democratic country with a substantially free press and historical links to the US. I know more about US politics than politics in my neighbouring countries. Of course most people in most countries will have a simplified lumped-together view of the US, based on local and US media, the actions of its government, how US-associated products are advertised and perceived, and so on. He might be right, and remain right if he put any other country in that sentence instead of 'US'. Average citizens tend to have simplified views because there are many countries and foreign politics is just not that interesting...they have better things to do.
The clamp down on the OWS is not a free speech issue. The OWS protestors are welcome to show up every day and protest. They are just not allowed to camp out in public parks/someone else's property unless those places are designated for such activity/they have the permission of the owners. The clamp down occurred because the OWS "protestors" were for all intents and purposes living at those locations. The rest of your points have validity. Including about how stupid this website was in the first place.
Personally I love the quote from the website that sites Hillary Clinton (speaking as a member of the current Administration) saying that behaviors of the current Administration are a demonstration of the government failing its citizens.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
But as soon as we did we would have dozens of Countries asking or begging for our support.
Are you aiming for +5 Funny? Last time I saw this argument it was called the White Man's burden or something.
The fact that you're instead modded as +5 Insightful sickens me.
Don't quote me on this.
That reasoning of "they're not really Democrats" opens the way for counterargument in the same vein -- "Bush wasn't fiscally conservative, thus he's not a real Republican, so the party can't be tarnished by his actions." I doubt anyone on /. would accept that line of reasoning for the Bush example, so why pursue it here?
Anyway, I thought it prudent to point out the complicity of both sides, especially in response to a parent post that was factually inaccurate.
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll