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• Mark April 9, 2009 12:04 pm

  

  Now, to Iran…
  I can’t deny the truth, which is that under President Eisenhower, the USA deposed an elected Iranian leader and installed in his place the Shah of Iran, a dictator who imprisoned and tortured political opponents. True, this happened more than 50 years ago, but I cannot deny it occurred.
  The USA patrols international waters. (I don’t believe there’s any credible evidence we’ve been in Iranian waters but I’m happy to see what you provide.) And you’re right about the passenger plane, the Vincennes, shot down in the late 1980’s by an American ship that claimed, probably unreasonably, that they believed they were being attacked.
  You’re also right that I really feel there’s a threat from Iran. I don’t agree that Iran hasn’t done anything we haven’t done. Their invading an American embassy and taking hostages and their threats to wipe Israel from the pages of history (or “off the map” as it has also been translated) have no comparison to US actions. Nor does their intentional support of terrorist organizations who, through suicide bombings and missiles regularly target innocent civilians for murder. I realize the USA has murdered its share of innocent civilians. Usually, civilians are not targets (although the civilians of Hiroshima were certainly targets in World War II). But I don’t believe that the USA today intentionally targets innocent civilians for murder (as Iran does), and if anyone in the US does this, they should be prosecuted.
  Why does Iranian nuclear weapons concern me while American nuclear weapons do not?
  Principally, I’m extremely nervous whenever a dictatorship obtains nuclear weapons. For this reason, Russia and China do scare me, although there is nothing we can do about it. North Korea scares me too, greatly. As does Pakistan because its democracy is shaky. In contrast, the possession of nuclear weapons by UK, France, the US, India, Israel, and South Africa (now that apartheid is gone) scare me much less. Do I wish that nuclear weapons did not exist? I do. But I recognize that such weapons in the hands of a democracy are far less dangerous than in the hands of an aggressive dictatorship.
  And Jeff, is there any doubt in your mind that Iran is an aggressive fundamentalist dictatorship? That the people of Iran suffer by their government’s rule? That Iran mistreats women? And tortures and imprisons political opponents with at least the same, if not greater, severity than the Shah ever did?
  Ask yourself why the Iranian People love America more than any other Islamic country in the world. It must be because they themselves consider our Government more legitimate than their own. And if we can help the Iranian People in any way take back their Government, it would be an extraordinary step forward for peace in the world.
  No I do not currently support war with Iran. But if Iran were on the verge of obtaining nuclear weapons, I would support taking those weapons out by military force if necessary, just as has successfully been done with Iraq in 1982 and Syria in 2007. Indeed, on today’s show, I criticized the Bush Administration strongly for not taking out North Korea’s nuclear arsenal while we had the chance.
  In sum, we agree to disagree on this one. I don’t think we disagree on the facts, but I do think we disagree on the conclusions derived therefrom. I’m just not willing to take the “risk” of worldwide nuclear conflagration based on the “promises” of a dictator that has also promised that there are no homosexuals in Iran and challenged the truthfulness of the Holocaust. I don’t believe such man is to be trusted and that we should pin the future of the planet on his word.
  That is not, of course, to absolve America in any way of any of the awful deeds the USA has done in the past or the present which I continue to criticize every day on my show. But the fact that the USA has done many awful things throughout history in no way convinces me to allow a dangerous, evil or deluded man the power to destroy the world.