Romney Comments on Israel

[Viking]

Destroy Tehran.

I jest.

In other news, apparently Jesus made an appearance on a tortilla:

http://us.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_mid#...-guacamole.cnn

[FMCoug]

Can we stipulate that none of the options are perfect?

Please tell me which of the three courses you think has the lowest risk.

Of your 3 I'd say #1. #3 sounds good on paper but history has shown that you can't reason with these people.

That's crazy talk. Not even remotely possible. Unless you carpet the country with nukes. And if that is what you are suggesting, then you have no business calling terrorists crazy.

Sure it is. Conventional bombs, cruise missiles, etc. can do a hell of a lot of damage.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Sure it is. Conventional bombs, cruise missiles, etc. can do a hell of a lot of damage.

Doing "a hell of a lot of damage" might sound cool, but it won't necessarily make us safer. Again, I seriously doubt that you kill the entire program. At best you set it back a few years. You also motivate the entire country (including the youth) to hate the US and support terrorism.

Americans tend to have a fantasy about the effectiveness of bombing that just isn't grounded in reality.

[Viking]

I do agree with one conclusion here: Obama will royally f-this up.

This could be one of those armageddon scenarios that should never have been.

[FMCoug]

Doing "a hell of a lot of damage" might sound cool, but it won't necessarily make us safer. Again, I seriously doubt that you kill the entire program. At best you set it back a few years. You also motivate the entire country (including the youth) to hate the US and support terrorism.

Hasn't this pretty much already been done? They already hate us. I don't see that changing with diplomacy while we show ourselves unwilling to use our military might.

[Jeff Lebowski]

I do agree with one conclusion here: Obama will royally f-this up.

Based on what? Let's have fewer Glenn Beck sound bites, and more substance please.

[Omaha 680]

Hasn't this pretty much already been done? They already hate us. I don't see that changing with diplomacy while we show ourselves unwilling to use our military might.

Actually, the US is quite popular with the younger generations in Iran. The main reason I think is becasue it's the one country in the Middle East we haven't meddled in a lot (at least since the Islamic revolution). They have an oppressive regime, but they know it's not our fault.

So Jeff has a point that it is a tightrope. One thing you don't want to do is give the nutters in Iran a rallying point to galvanize public opinion on thir side. On the other hand, I disagree with him on the relative sanity of the leadership. Some, maybe even most, wouldn't push the button. But there are elements in the Iranian government and the revolutionary guard that would, if given the opportunity.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Hasn't this pretty much already been done? They already hate us. I don't see that changing with diplomacy while we show ourselves unwilling to use our military might.

Did you not witness the protests in Iran a couple of years ago? Did you miss the Arab Spring? There are plenty of reasons to be hopeful for the future if we proceed carefully.

[Viking]

Based on what? Let's have fewer Glenn Beck sound bites, and more substance please.

I'm not sure we'll see eye-to-eye on Israel, based on what I've read here, but Glenn Beck is not my master...I've never even seen one minute of him, in fact, on TV.

Israel is our best friend in the world. More so than the UK. By far. I'd enlist personally to protect Israel.

[il Padrino Ute]

Did you not witness the protests in Iran a couple of years ago? Did you miss the Arab Spring? There are plenty of reasons to be hopeful for the future if we proceed carefully.

The protests that were practically squashed by Iranian police while Obama watched silently?

[myboynoah]

Yes, and we have presidential candidates that deny evolution.

I am not equating the two, mind you, but holding a crazy belief like that is a far cry from being willing to self-destruct to make a point.

But the crazy belief could give us insight concerning how the religious zealots might approach certain situations. That someone might not believe in evolution seems pretty benign when it comes to MAD. That someone would deny the holocaust and call for the destruction of Israel isn't so benign.

[Viking]

The protests that were practically squashed by Iranian police while Obama watched silently?

I don't think like you often, but when I do, I can't stand Obama.

[creekster]

It includes self-preservation. Iran as a country, a culture, and a people would cease to exist. Including all of the leaders. They aren't that crazy.

I don't think anyone thinks that Iran will try to nuke us. I think they fear a laissez faire attitude about control of the nukes, allowing them to get into a terror group's hands and then claiming they were stolen or some such. Maybe more importantly, they are afraid of the complete impediment to the unfettered assertion of western will the nukes represent. You cannot unilaterally attack Iran if they have the capacity to return fire with a nuke.

EDIT: oops, I am hacking PAC.

[creekster]

Indeed, the Jews have achieved their remarkable success through the ages not by putting the Torah (the old Testament) into practice, but by a potent symbiotic relationship with ideas and disciplines introduced to a large extent by Gentiles.

I think this is sort of an odd comment. First, the torah is not the old testament, it is the Pentateuch, or the first five books of what we call the old teatamnet.

Second, a symbiotic relationship, even if you are right, has to be between at least two things. If you have gentile ideas and disciplines, then the Jewish side must be the Torah, or the tradition of teaching and learning the Torah in the synagogue.

[creekster]

Yes, and we have presidential candidates that deny evolution.

I am not equating the two, mind you, but holding a crazy belief like that is a far cry from being willing to self-destruct to make a point.

THoise are not equivalently dangerous crazy talks. Denying the holocaust goes directly to the issue, while evolution does not go directly to any issue except his grip on science. Iran's fearless leader (I can spell the guys' name) denies that israel has a right to exist at all. So the no holocaust is much more menacing here, in this context. It is germane and relevant crazy talk.