Obama: “Iran Has a Right to Be Nuclear”
Well, there you have it folks – it’s settled. Not only is Obama expected to give a speech where he said he will reach out to the Muslim world, Thursday, in Cairo, Egypt, but he is also stating that Iran may have a right to nuclear power.
President Barack Obama suggested that Iran may have some right to nuclear energy _ provided it proves by the end of the year that its aspirations are peaceful.
In a BBC interview broadcast Tuesday, he also restated plans to pursue direct diplomacy with Tehran to encourage it set aside any ambitions for nuclear weapons it might harbor.
Iran has insisted its nuclear program is aimed at generating electricity. But the U.S. and other Western governments accuse Tehran of seeking atomic weapons.
“What I do believe is that Iran has legitimate energy concerns, legitimate aspirations,” Obama said, adding that the international community also “has a very real interest” in preventing a nuclear arms race.
The president has indicated a willingness to seek deeper international sanctions against Tehran if it does not respond positively to U.S. attempts to open negotiations on its nuclear program. Obama has said Tehran has until the end of the year to show it wants to engage with Washington.
“Although I don’t want to put artificial time tables on that process, we do want to make sure that, by the end of this year, we’ve actually seen a serious process move forward. And I think that we can measure whether or not the Iranians are serious,” Obama said.
Iran is now a friend and ally!?, never-mind Ahmadinejad’s incendiary remarks during the UN race summit or his previous statements about the West and Israel, they do mean well and really only want nukes for energy purposes. A third world country always wants to go right to nuclear energy not start with the basics./sarc!
President pantywaist sure is giving us change – sometimes I’m not sure if he is doing this on purpose or not but it sure is starting to look suspicious. I’m sure Obama’s scary, hollow rhetoric will really make those Iranian leaders shake in their boots!
I also noted above that Obama is reaching out to the Muslim world. I have to question why his administration continues to reach out to Muslims and not the Arab world. The Arab world is much greater and encompasses the entire region, whereas Muslims do make up a majority, they are not the only citizens living there. Israeli’s are still considered Arab and there are other individuals who do not technically classify themselves as Muslim. Please pay attention to his words. Obama stated that he does not want any further settlement in Israel and Netanyahu has fervently disagreed with such remarks and requests, while Obama tries to make amends (which I think are completely unnecessary for what the Muslim world has done not only to Israel, but to us, to Europe, etc.) with those trying to destroy the West.
So long to our one and only ally in the Middle East, Israel. I’m sure Netanyahu is taking notes as well as umbrage at Obama’s words and actions. He knows that the U.S. is no longer supporting Israel the way we used to. At some point this probably has to happen, but not when you have all these rogue countries acting up, one of which is Israel’s prime enemy, who has called for the extinction of Jews on multiple occasions.
A couple of other random notes/thoughts:
Iran can have “nuclear power” (so says Obama) but the United States when it comes to energy policy, cannot…
Iran needs nuclear power when it already sits on tons of oil?
Liberals are congenitally incapable of comprehending the fact that there are some people on this Earth who are unreasonable and with whom you cannot negotiate and reasonably expect to achieve anything but your own defeat. Barack Obama is the leader of this chronically naive cadre. He is incapable of comprehending the truth about people like Kim Jong Il and Ahmadinejad.
Liberals, or at least Democrats, will hopefully, one day face the fact that not everyone on this earth is good and decent. Human nature can be very dark at times – but it is only through that darkness that anybody truly knows light. It’s important and imperative to separate the two.
International Community Feeling the Hope and Change; Serbs Protest Biden’s Visit and Say: “Go Home Nazi Scum.”
Many Serbs share the same sentiments of the Serb Nationalistsbecause of Biden’s past actions, his son’s comments that called Serbs thugs and other slurs that Biden has used when referring to their country/region.
Earlier this week Biden made a gaffe about the VP bunker, in which I also disclosed that his past words would come back to haunt him during his visit to the Balkans – and it has!
Serb ultra-nationalist lawmakers held up insulting signs in parliament Wednesday as US Vice President Joe Biden, considered a strong backer of Kosovo independence, arrived in Belgrade.
“Biden, you Nazi scum, go home,” said the posters brandished by opposition Radical Party deputies during the live national broadcast of a parliament sitting which coincided with the start of Biden’s visit.
The Radicals, who occupy around a fifth of places in the 250-seat assembly, then pasted the signs which also labelled Biden a “fascist” on a notice board and hallway.
Why Does Obama Smile When Speaking With Dictators?
I found this write-up very interesting and it made for a good read ~ enjoy!
The picture of the president of the United States smiling broadly as he met President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela startled me. Our president is a nice guy. Chavez is anything but.
The State Department maintains that Chávez has attacked democratic traditions and has put Venezuelan democracy on life support with unchecked concentration of power, political persecution, and intimidation. Foreign Affairs magazine says that Chávez is a power-hungry dictator with autocratic and megalomaniacal tendencies whose authoritarian vision and policies are a serious threat to his people. In testimony before the US Senate, the South American project director for the Center for Strategic International Studies said that Chavez’s government engages in “arresting opposition leaders, torturing some members of the opposition (according to human rights organizations) and encouraging, if not directing, its squads of Bolivarian Circles to beat up members of Congress and intimidate voters-all with impunity.”
In spite of a presidential term limit of six years, Chávez has suggested that he would like to remain in power for 25 years. Hmmm. An autocratic dictator who abuses human rights and undermines democracy being warmly embraced by the American president. There’s something wrong with that picture.
Then there was the incident of President Barack Obama seeming to bow before King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia at the G-20 summit in London. The president’s people denied it was a bow, but it certainly was a sign of great deference from the American president to the dictator of a country who just six weeks ago sentenced a 75-year-old woman to 40 lashes for having been secluded with her nephew after he delivered bread to her home. This is the same Abdullah whom, when asked why Saudi Arabia prohibits the public practice of religions other than Islam, said, “It is absurd to impose on an individual or a society rights that are alien to its beliefs or principles.”
Obama is also pursuing a renewed relationship with Cuba, a country which engages in systemic human rights abuses, including torture, arbitrary imprisonment, unfair trials and extrajudicial executions. Censorship is so extensive that Cubans face five-year prison sentences for connecting to the Internet illegally. And not only is emigration illegal, but even discussing it carries a six-month prison sentence.
Not only do we have this latest exchange with Hugo Chavez, and Obama taking a beating by Ortega and other Latin American leaders, but Fidel Castro is now calling Obama a liar in a round-about way and Iran’s Ahmadinejad is insulted and upset that Obama skipped the racism summit at the U.N.
Is it sinking in that dictators will yank your chain and use you as they have used everyone else, including their own, for their power, control and gain? These men have a history of abuse, hate, violence, you name it – it’s not going to change overnight for one man because his ego makes him believe it’s so.
Nothing anyone does will ever please these guys… They will always find an excuse to hate.
Obama: “It Was Only a Handshake.”
As we see here it was not just a handshake, it was a casual conversation with a man whom only a couple years ago called us an evil imperialist and had a seething hate towards the United States. This is perfect for the idealists who believe in Utopia and that all men are kind-hearted and value peace and equality, however, that is just not reality and meetings like this are detrimental to us as a nation. This was a casual meeting with no real understanding of what was said between the two (obviously no preconditions). Read more
U.S. Reporters Jailed in Iran and North Korea
This is a little ironic after the recent CIA Gitmo “torture” memo release.
North Korea has incarcerated two female journalists from the United States. Laura Ling and Euna Lee visited North Korea in hopes to interview defectors. They flew into Seoul and held meetings there for the beginning of their trip. They flew to Yanji, a small Chinese city over the border of North Korea after their sessions were complete. The women were advised not to leave the small city or else face possible incrimination by North Korea. Rather than heed the warning, the women crossed the Tumen River, in which reports after which are varying. One report states that the women were taken into custody because they would not stop filming, while another one states they were pursued back across the frozen river onto Chinese soil where they were brought back to North Korea.
The women have been jailed in North Korea for over a month now, while the Obama administration states it is trying to free them through diplomacy. I’m curious as to why none of us here have really heard anything about this? Nobody on the outside knows how the women are doing and Kim Jong Il is unlikely to release them anytime soon because of what U.S. captives mean for his country (usually money and food to continue to subsist on) and due to the grudge he is holding against the U.N. and the West for their reaction to his missile launch.
Kim Jong Il no has a lot of leverage against the United States and these two women will merely be pawns in this game. I hope that the “diplomacy” style does not wind up like Carter’s 444 day escapade.
Either way, within 24 hours Ms Ling and Ms Lee were taken in separate vehicles to Pyongyang for questioning. A week later it was announced that they would be put on trial.
Conviction for illegal entry carries up to three years in prison; the more serious crimes of espionage or “hostility toward North Korean people” are punishable by five to ten years.
The US State Department has said that it is making every diplomatic effort to free the two women and Mr Gore is said to have contacted Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State, to ask for her assistance. The US has no embassy in North Korea but a representative of the Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang is said to have seen the journalists at the end of last month.
Koh Yu Hwan, a professor at Dongguk University in Seoul, said that Pyongyang was unlikely to release the journalists soon. Having two Americans was like having a “piece of rice cake rolling in for free”, he said.
“They’re going to make maximum use of this for multiple purposes. Rather than a trial by a criminal code, it will be a political trial.”
Iran has also taken a U.S.-Iranian journalist prisoner and has officially sentenced her to 8 years in prison based on charges of espionage.
Roxana Saberi, a 31-year-old Iranian-American journalist, was convicted of spying and sentenced to eight years in prison on Saturday by Iran’s Revolutionary Court.
Ms. Saberi, a former American beauty queen, has been in detention in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison since Jan. 31. She was charged with espionage earlier this month and tried this week behind closed doors.
The truth behind why she was detained in the first place is very disconnected with myriad reasons, which can only be expected by another “state”-run government much like North Korea.
This makes me wonder if Obama’s new call of diplomacy and negotiatons with hostile nations will still consider no pre-conditions…
“Ms Saberi has been sentenced to eight years in jail and I am going to appeal,” her lawyer Abdolsamad Khoramshahi told AFP. Under Iranian law, the verdict can be appealed within 20 days.
The case against Saberi, who has both US and Iranian nationality, has raised deep concerns in Washington and among rights groups.
She was initially reported to have been detained for buying alcohol, an illegal act in the Islamic republic.
The ISNA news agency, quoting an unnamed judiciary source, confirmed that a revolutionary court had sentenced Saberi for espionage — a charge that could have risked the death sentence. No date was given for the verdict.
“Roxana said in court that her earlier confessions were not true and she told me she had been tricked into believing that she would be released if she cooperated,” her father Reza Saberi told AFP.
“Her denial is documented in her case but apparently they did not pay attention to it,” he added, without saying when he had spoken to his daughter.
“We are very shocked and we were not expecting it. We were hoping for six months and then clemency.”
The court ruling comes despite calls by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for Saberi’s release and President Barack Obama’s diplomatic overtures to Iran after three decades of ruptured ties.
[...]
Last month, Saberi’s parents — who came to Iran to pursue her case and have visited her at least twice — appealed to Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for her release, saying she was in a “dangerous” mental state.
Her mental state must be an indication of the wonderful treatment in Iran and the fact that no other countries use cruel and unusual punishment like the United States right? At least we make sure that our methods meet protocol standards and we only persecute real criminals and terrorists unlike others.
Clinton said she had delivered a letter to Iranian officials on March 31, seeking Saberi’s release and making appeals on behalf of two other US citizens.
Robert Levinson, a former FBI agent, vanished on the Gulf island of Kish two years ago, and student Esha Momeni has been prevented from leaving Iran despite being released from jail last year.
After three decades of severed ties, the Obama administration has called for dialogue with Tehran over its controversial nuclear drive, which Western powers fear could be a cover for efforts to build an atomic bomb.
So we are to believe that Iran does not have bad intentions with their nuclear facilities whilst they kill and capture U.S. citizens, whom we conveniently do not hear much about from our own media propagandists?
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