Iran. It's a done deal

Politics International Politics
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Sigh.
poster: ABC
fred smith :YOU SAID XYZ! CAN YOU PROVE XYZ?
poster:Actually, I didn’t say XYZ, I said ABC. Here’s more proof for ABC
fred smith: AHA!! YOU CAN"T DEFEND XYZ!! YOU MUST ADMIT YOU ARE TOTALLY WRONG ABOUT XYZ!!!
poster: No, because if you read my original post, I didn’t say XYZ, I said ABC, and gave evidence for that.
fred smith: Looks like a lot of backtracking on XYZ to me.

[[quote]YES!!! The US funded actors and plotted coups. But did this happen in a vacuum? Were there any other actors funding agents as well? The issue is whether the US involvement was key or instrumental to overthrowing any of the various regimes. The strongest case is in Guatemala with Arbenz, and no I don’t believe that two banana companies could subvert/influence entire US military/diplomatic strategy. [/quote]

Uh, fred, there’s a reason the American interventions in Central America and the Caribbean in the 1900s to 1930s are called the Banana Wars, and I’m sure you are familiar with the term “Banana Republic”- you, like me, are old enough to know it wasn’t just a clothing store.

The two companies didn’t influence the entire US military /diplomatic structure- they didn’t have any influence on US policy toward Germany for example (unlike during the later US/EU trade dispute, also sometimes jokingly referred to as the Banana Wars.)
The reason Dole and United Fruit were so influential in Central America is that
a) there were no counter-balancing US interests.
b) both companies were heavy lobbyists on this particular issue.
c) it lined up with other US corporate and political stands: keeping Communism out of Latin America; ensuring wages were kept low for American companies; ensuring US companies were able to extract resources without worrying about high local taxes or threats of nationalisation.

Exactly- like Iran in Lebanon, Yemen , and Syria. I, for one, haven’t argued against that in anything I’ve said.

MikeN said:

Indeed, when it comes to international politics, the man’s almost totally a simple-minded ideologue- still, even a blind pig etc.

My reply was specifically directed to agentsmith’s contention that I was ignorant of, or turning a blind eye to, previous instances of dastardly CIA interference- which ruffled my feathers a bit, since I was out marching holding signs saying "US OUT OF [fill in the blank] " while he was still in diapers. :raspberry:

Actually, fred, I agree with almost everything you said in there with two caveats- US bombing in Cambodia had a tremendous death toll (though not as bad as the Khmer Rouge, certainly) and the death toll in Cuba wasn’t that great, though more than in Chile -about 9,000 compared to about 3,000, if I recall the best figures.

Well, I believe we’ve had this discussion about 10,000 times- reading your last quote was deja vu all over again.
The point of this thread was discussing the Iran nuclear agreement, and my post specifically was saying to agentsmith- is it something about the name?- that he was being overly paranoid in imagining the whole thing was a cunning US plot to overthrow the mullahs. That, while, to quote someone

this is NOT the main purpose of the current agreement. End of involvement in this.

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[quote=“agentsmith”]
So out of the blue the US decides to make a deal with Iran[/quote]

Wiki:[quote] Negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 began in 2006, [/quote]

Cause while they think negotiations are the best way to prevent Iran from getting Da Bomb, they still don’t like Assad, Hezbullah, or Hamas?

Because they have a President who doesn’t strongly support Israel’s policies, and in fact is pissed off- probably much more than he allows to show - at the pipsqueak leader of some some tiny foreign country who comes to America, lectures the American President to his face, and works with his political opponents to not only thwart his policies but tries to get him defeated in his re-election bid. Just a guess.

“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?”- John Maynard Keynes.

The facts are that the US has a different administration which is much more reluctant to use force in the ME ( with the exception of drones, which are cheap and don’t lead to US casualties)’ is willing to reach a deal with Iran, and which would like to see Israel deal with the Palestinian problem on a much softer base- two-state system, dismantling settlements etc.

If you believe spies infiltrating via NGOs can cause a revolution, let me quote fred smith at you

speaking of blind pigs and acorns.

Um, are you aware the Bretton Woods system collapsed in 1971?- at least use 'Neo-liberalism" or “The New World Order”.
And if lifting sanctions would hurt Russia’s economy so much, why have they been one of the main actors- along with China- opposing sanctions and demanding their immediate lifting?

Ya think? Bibi and Obambi have different strategeries on how to deal with Iran- stop the presses!

Certainly part of it.

Between the smith brothers, I feel like I’m in an old Stealer’s Wheel song: Stuck in the Middle

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MikeN:

80,000 dead in Cuba. Quite a bit more than 10,000. Compare Chile with Cuba. Any socioeconomic indicators that you want. Which is the failed state? Which respects human rights? Which has given its people hope/future? Which is attacked again and again by the human rights brigade? Pinochet in Chile not Castro in Cuba, right?

As to Iran, yes, you can point to a statement made here and there but what is the overall context of this debate? Is not the intent to blame the US NOT the USSR NOT the Iranians/Iranian government for actions taken or not taken?

Aren’t you and others really suggesting that the Iranians are either too stupid or too infantile to recognize machinations? That they are easily led by the nose? That a suitcase of cash is enough to subvert their entire political process? But then, does one imagine that NO similar actions are being taken with lobbyists in the US? Do you think that Iran does NOT have lobbyists in the US working to lobby key influencers and decision-makers on US Iran policy? strategy? So we remain talking about a coup in 1953 (by my check that was 62 years ago) that the US hoped to influence but was ultimately responsible for less than 5% 2% 0.75% of the actual outcome? Meanwhile, just a year or so ago, the Iranians who tried to assassinate George HW Bush also attempted to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the US, no? So why are we talking about 1953 and not Iran’s actions NOW? or 20 years ago? THIS is the issue that I have and to suggest that Iran is either some passive play thing strikes me as being the ultimate form of racist white supremacist imperialist colonialist stance or an unblemished innocent is ridiculous. AGAIN!!! I KNOW!!! you have made qualifying statements but look at the issue and how it is being discussed. The qualifiers are made in passing. They are not real. They are mouthed perfunctorily and pro forma otherwise they would be central to the thread and to the debate in general. NO?

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As to just how it was done…

washingtonexaminer.com/state … le/2592732

[quote]The State Department admitted Wednesday that a 2013 press briefing video was purposefully altered to remove a portion of a discussion about the Iran nuclear talks, after an unknown State Department official asked that it be edited out.

Spokesman John Kirby’s announcement contradicted the position held by the department for the last three weeks, during which officials said the video was missing because of a “glitch.”

But Kirby said officials didn’t know who asked for the video to be edited, and said the department is unlikely to investigate further into who wanted the video to be edited.[/quote]

Their story seems to be giving way. I have a feeling when the full truth finally comes out it will be very ugly.

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Lies all the way down…

[quote]Responding to questions at an Aug. 4 press conference about a $400
million payment delivered in cash to the Iranian government, Obama said,
“[T]he reason that we had to give them cash is precisely because we are
so strict in maintaining sanctions and we do not have a banking
relationship with Iran that we couldn’t send them a check and we could
not wire the money.”

But a Treasury Department spokesman acknowledged on Saturday that on
at least two occasions, the U.S. did make payments to the Iranian
government via wire transfer. [/quote]

Illegitimate transcactions, however, are best done in cash.

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The most transparent administration in history…

[quote]The White House issued a veto threat Wednesday against a House bill that would require the federal government to publicly report all assets
held by Iran’s top leaders, calling the measure “onerous.”

The administration said…[/quote] lots of laughably lame excuses follow.

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A reminder of one of the reasons the election went the way it did:

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New evidence coming to light about just what was going on:

Most transparent administration in history my ass.

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How the deal was done:

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The art of the undone deal:

It’s chaos, I tell you. Simply chaos. The man’s a bull in a China shop. Iran shop. Whatever.

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Well, Netanyahu is happy about it so i guess we’d all be antisemitic if we criticized the un-dealing.

Also, why is Netanyahu’s name on autocorrect? I was about to give up any hope of spelling his name correctly, but autocorrect came to the rescue. Surprised to see his name here, not all world leader’s names show up.

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Netanyahu: “Oh, that was easier than I thought.”

Will be interesting to see how the relationship with Russia will change if they start military operations against Iran.

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It’s rumored they already have and didn’t tell anyone.

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I doubt that very much, the route (if they are considering a route) I would guess would be for a Revolution, where Iranians get to choose their leadership.

I watched trumps speech, it seemed to me that was what he was not very subtly hinting at, praising Irans rich history and saying the people of Iran have been hostages for 40 years.

No further comment from me except things are more unstable now than they were yesterday.

Reactions are always interesting. Worldwide pretty much every country condemns the move, Israel of course doesn’t and no surprise nor does Saudi Arabia. In the US, all Democrats of course condemn the move, on the Republican side, I expected the globalists to condomn the move, but Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney did the opposite, I’m expecting John McCain to criticize it. One exception interesting John Kasich, interesting because he used to be fully opposed to it.

https://twitter.com/JohnKasich/status/993918724074819584

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Like this?

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Under the deal, the “highly trained” inspectors are not allowed to be from United States, the UK, Germany, France or Canada. Let me guess. They can be from China and Russia or undeveloped countries when going to the exact 19 spots? Didn’t sound like much of a deal when it was made.

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Actually they can be from ANY country except those 5 countries, so New Zealand, Belgium, Netherlands, Sweden, Japan, etc. Also they are closely monitoring all stockpiles of Uranium in all shapes and forms so Iran can’t have any other operating facilities without some Uranium missing.

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Hi @Apirant - do you know the background of the inspectors? I admit that I don’t.
How well are they trained? I read they have a 6 month training program, and they can only inspect at the 19 agreed sites, and it is not easy to gain access. I certainly wouldn’t know what to look for. I inspect factories and it took me years to know what to look for. My clients have typically visited the factory themselves and they still miss very basic things even though they design the products. This is why I question the inspections. I’d be curious to know how they know what to do. And why not from US, UK, Canada, France and Germany? It seems to me that if we are removing sanctions that we’d have a direct way to verify. It would be like going to the bank and someone else counts the money, but you can’t see it yourself.

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