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"Today, we are a nuclear country and we are talking to others from that position." Those were the words of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, explaining his refusal to suspend his country's uranium enrichment program. While many believe that Iran has a right to develop nuclear power, others, including the Bush administration, fear a parallel nuclear weapons program. How should the international community react to Iran’s burgeoning atomic ambitions?
"Just because you label a nation a threat, it does not make it so."
In the context of Iran, that's a joke. Iran has been the world's leading sponsor of terrorism for decades. As such it has been directly and indirectly linked to countless terrorist attacks around the world, and has murdered hundreds if not thousands of Americans. Iran is killing American troops in Iraq by training and arming the insurgents. That alone is an act of war that should have been sufficient to end the Iranian regime. Iran isn't just a threat it's an aggressor who is already waging a covert war on the US.
With Iran's new long range missiles (successfully tested today), Europe is now within reach. Will we wait until we have proof of Iran's nuclear ambitions, say, when those missiles have nuclear warheads? And then what? The Iranian regime has to be shut down now.
- Nigel
November 12, 2008 6:35PM
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Iranians and others in that region feel just as you do, listen to the same justifications that you hear and feel the same national pride (often misguided and abused in the same way ours is) for their own country against detractors as you do? How do we decide who is right among such equal propaganda? Are "we Americans" less prone to inhumane actions than others? Are "they" the Iranians more inhumane than others? Who has precedence for using such destructive bombs on another country? Who would trust with the "red button" of destruction for a large part of humanity?
Personally I trust no one. The real discussion should be about total nuclear disarmament. Until then, I support every nation in having the same destructive power as everyone else. Every nation has a right to be as stupid as ours.
- mangueken November 22, 2008 5:54AM
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No. I can honestly say that I've never seriously considered that a barbaric theocracy is equivalent to system based on the inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Nor would I conceive of giving nations such as Nazi Germany, Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, et al, nukes. I'm not sure why you stop at nations or nukes though; how discriminatory. Why not give nukes and biological weapons to Hamas, Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda too?
The only stupidity I see is the idea that every murderous, totalitarian, fascist, communist, and theocratic dictatorship on the planet is equivalent to a country explicitly based on individual rights. I take that back. "Stupid" is too clean a word to denote that kind of depravity.
"How do we decide who is right among such equal propaganda?"
By observing the facts and thinking rationally, using logic, in short, by being objective.
http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/objectivity.html
- Nigel November 23, 2008 11:46AM
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If you like "facts and logic" so much why did you avoid my argument against all nations having such destructive weapons? If you take the time to read some (or all, if you have time) you will see that I consistently argue against all nations, including ours from having such weapons.
You also fail to see the "facts and logic" that even democratic nations like our own can make destructive decisions with weapons of mass destruction. So once again I put forward that the real debate is not whether one or another nation should have nuclear weapons but that no country should have them period.
- mangueken November 23, 2008 12:56PM
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Self-Defense From Declared Enemies is Also a Sovereign Right
- From Center for the Advancement of Capitalism
By The Center for the Advancement of Capitalism - Enterprise Demands Freedom
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POWER & sovernty
THE U.S. has adopted an OFFENSIVE plan of DEFENCE, that is not in keeping with peacful coexistance ...Foreign policy MUST re-enforce basic premiss of our own Country's reason for existance, as a free PREPULIC.. THESE premisses have been all but done away with in AMERICA ...WE are to be a beacon of hope for the world to see our example in action, not just word....
- nobody November 12, 2008 10:06AM
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