Ok, is it me or are there a lot of threads today about war with Iran?

It's making me nervous.

nothing to aleviate any worry on the subject. Both mentioned Iran as a "good" reason to keep on in Iraq. Apparently the French foreign minister is also sounding the warning bells to/about Iran. Be nervous. Be very nervous.

is Kouchner sounding the bells to? I hypothesize it's us? Warning to President Numnuts: We're on to you . . . fuck up and screw us out of more oil - and we really will be friends in the future - with the Intelligent Democratic President in 2008.

with Cheney about Iran. That scares me all by itself.

It would be insane to do it, but they are.

They NEED IT! Their GUT IS GOING WITH THIS....They need it to scare folks into voing for them again.

It's all just Marketing...to these folks. Our Bombs are paid for by our tax dollars and just sitting their going to waste. To the Bill Kristol's and Kagans...it means we USE it BEFORE WE DIFUSE IT!

It's that MACHO "BALLS" THING! By folks who never served A DAY in the MILITARY! But, they sit on their butts in a THINK TANK and Postulize what WAR GAMES are ALL ABOUT...and our Military (with some exceptions) seems to LOVE the TANKIES in their UNDERWEAR! The "ground grunts" who are serving might have a few questions...but they are convient in their "offing" by "IED's" if not outright FRAGGING!

http://www.booktv.org/program.aspx?ProgramId=8605&SectionName=&PlayMedia=No


The Iranian Time Bomb: The Mullah Zealots' Quest for Destruction
Bookmark Program



Author: Michael Ledeen

Upcoming Schedule
Monday, September 17, at 5:30 AM
About the Program
Michael Ledeen argues that Iran is a threat to the United States and Israel and suggests ways to counter the threat without using military means. Commentary is provided by Cliff May and former CIA director James Woolsey.
About the Author
Michael Ledeen is the author of "The War Against the The Terror Masters" and "D'Annunzio." He is a Freedom Scholar with the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.




FOX News Assists White House With PR Blitz For Iran War

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEa3BSc233U

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118900783153718172.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

'The Iranian Time Bomb'
By Michael A. Ledeen
September 7, 2007
Chapter One: The Torture Masters
"At the very least, you could have given me a glass of water. Animals are slaughtered more humanely than this." --Atefeh Rajabi, sixteen years of age, about to be hanged for "adultery," August 15, 2004

"Absolutely, we do have political prisoners. There are those who are in prison for their beliefs." --"Reformist" president Mohammed Khatami, April 28, 2004


Courtesy St. Martin's Press
In the months following his successful revolution against the shah, the Ayatollah Khomeini consolidated his domestic power through the use of four basic techniques:

–The first, common to all modern fascist movements, was the constant mobilization of the masses. The mobilization exploited the symbols and doctrines of Islamic fundamentalism, and the techniques of twentieth-century mass movements, from monster rallies, constant incitement to hatred of the revolution's "satanic" enemies (of which the United States and Israel were the prime examplars), and, once Saddam attacked and the bloody Iran-Iraq war began, constant reference to martyrdom. A fountain in downtown Tehran was stocked with red liquid, to represent the blood of the martyrs;

–Second, the regime devoted constant attention to the needs of the most impoverished sectors of the society. In a sort of Shi'ite version of Robin Hood, money, food, and housing were seized from the old elites and redistributed to the very poor. Khomeini even exempted the poor from paying taxes, and they were provided with free transportation. The regime's largesse was extended to workers as well, especially those in the oil fields, whose salaries were quickly and dramatically increased. This ensured the loyalty of the lower classes, and kept the well-to-do constantly concerned about their own well being;

–Third, total, uncompromising war against anything having to do with the West. As the Taliban would famously do in Afghanistan after the defeat of the Red Army, Khomeini banned music. Western books were removed from the schools and often burned. Above all, a strict segregation of the sexes was imposed throughout the educational system; women would no longer be permitted to teach boys, and the women were subjected to the humiliations described earlier: polygamy was reinstituted (with the additional fillip that "temporary marriages"–perhaps long enough for an afternoon tryst–were legalized, in order to finesse charges of adultery), along with the veil, and divorce initiated by women was made far more difficult;

–Fourth was the use of the judicial system as an instrument of terror. As so often happens at moments of dramatic change, the institution was marked by the ghoulish personality of its first leader, the Ayatollah Khalkhali. He had two nicknames, "the butcher of Kurdistan," and the "cat killer." The first was earned in a murderous campaign against the Kurds in mid-1979. Khalkhali had hundreds of them lined up and executed by firing squads en masse. The second derived from rumors that the man was literally mad, and relieved his mental torment by strangling and dismembering cats. He treated his human victims with the same compulsive violence; a year and a half after the seizure of power, he told an interviewer that he had probably ordered the execution of four or five hundred "sinners." In the first seven months of Khomeini's rule, the revolutionary tribunals killed off more than six hundred people, including many who had wielded great power under the old regime.

This method of seizing and maintaining power has subsequently been used as a template for the export of the revolution. The mullahs have attempted to export the revolution to many countries, from Saudi Arabia to Bosnia, each time using a mixture of religious proselytizing and terror. By and large, these efforts have failed, but the one great foreign success of the Islamic Republic –the creation of Hezbollah in Lebanon–clearly follows the revolutionary model. Hezbollah is at once a political party, a philanthropic organization that pays particular attention to the poor, and the world's most lethal terrorist organization. In its domain in southern Lebanon, the "party of Allah" enforces the rules of a Khomeini-style theocratic state, and enthusiastically spreads the faith by preaching, paying and bullying the populace. These practices are well known in Lebanon, and they are spreading. Iran's strategic siamese twin, Syria, recently approved Shi'ite proselytizing, and the Iranians quickly sent mullahs to preach the virtues of Khomeinism, sweetening the prospects of eternal salvation with cash grants of ten thousand dollars per convert.