persiankiwi their is civil unrest in streets. receiving news of street battles accross tehran. #Iranelection

persiankiwi we are accessing twitter from open proxies. they are closing them as fast as we can find them. #Iranelection

persiankiwi the march has started. tens of thousands in streets. #Iranelection

persiankiwi ADVICE - carry photos of imam khomeini. they cannot shoot at us with these. #Iranelection

persiankiwi am being told that anyone using public phones in streets is being beaten. they are trying to stopus. #Iranelection

persiankiwi people pouring into alleyways. running everywhere. can hear people on rooftops. #Iranelection

Today, as global geopolitics is shaken to its core by events in Iran, I turned on cable news this morning, and saw endless ads for a Larry King Jonas Brothers “interview”, Morning Joe yukking it up discussing Kuwaiti massage therapists, a video of a tomato throwing contest on CNN, talk radio blowhard Bill Bennett…and occasionally a phone call from Christiane Amanpour in Tehran. I can’t even bring myself to turn on the network morning programs, I might vomit.

That's assuming that Iran is after nuclear weapons to begin with, which is not a certainty considering that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a fatwa saying that it was forbidden under Islam back in '05.

Either way though, Moussavi would not have ended their enrichment process. And to be honest, they shouldn't. Regardless of the fact that I enjoy the thought of Iran having nuclear capability about as much as I would enjoy having my fingers smashed with a hammer, they have every right to pursue nuclear technology.

It's rather off-putting that we're cool with Israel having nukes even though they've never signed the NPT, but we're scared to death of Iran having them.

Wrong, no. Irrational, yeah. There is a reason that no one has ever attacked another nation with a nuclear weapon after the U.S. did. Everyone knows the damage that is caused by the weapon itself, and everyone knows that any nation that launches a nuclear attack against another would be utterly destroyed.

Unless we find reason to believe that Iran is willing to sacrifice its own existence to ensure that Israel is eliminated, there's really not much cause for concern militarily.

My only hope is that if Iran *were* to acquire those weapons, we would provide them with the necessary safeguarding technologies just as we are with Russia, and as we should with N. Korea.

You overestimate my respect for MAD, and underestimate MAD itself. In order for MAD to work, a leader does not need to be rational or predictable, they just need to want to continue having a nation to lead. Thus far, it has worked flawlessly and I expect it will continue to work as a deterrence for nations.

What does Iran's reaction to the election have to do with this? Are you trying to say that engaging in potentially rigged elections and beating protesters is indicative of the fact that they'll nuke a neighbor?

Best photo gallery I've seen so far:

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/0 ... ction.html

So I'm curious to know what you guys think the US administration, and specifically Obama himself, should do or say.

I agree that it is the right thing to condemn the attacks on the protesters and to call for an investigation. (Yes, I am saying that Obama is doing something correct)

Iran is a very touchy subject. Anything that looks like the US wants the people will not want.

Q Mr. President, on Iran, does the disputed election results affect -- there's been violence in the street -- in any way change your willingness to meet with Mr. Ahmadinejad without preconditions? And also, do you have anything to say, any message to send to people who are on the streets protesting, who believe their votes were stolen and who are being attacked violently?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Obviously all of us have been watching the news from Iran. And I want to start off by being very clear that it is up to Iranians to make decisions about who Iran's leaders will be; that we respect Iranian sovereignty and want to avoid the United States being the issue inside of Iran, which sometimes the United States can be a handy political football -- or discussions with the United States.

Having said all that, I am deeply troubled by the violence that I've been seeing on television. I think that the democratic process -- free speech, the ability of people to peacefully dissent -- all those are universal values and need to be respected. And whenever I see violence perpetrated on people who are peacefully dissenting, and whenever the American people see that, I think they're, rightfully, troubled.

My understanding is, is that the Iranian government says that they are going to look into irregularities that have taken place. We weren’t on the ground, we did not have observers there, we did not have international observers on hand, so I can't state definitively one way or another what happened with respect to the election. But what I can say is that there appears to be a sense on the part of people who were so hopeful and so engaged and so committed to democracy who now feel betrayed. And I think it's important that, moving forward, whatever investigations take place are done in a way that is not resulting in bloodshed and is not resulting in people being stifled in expressing their views.

Now, with respect to the United States and our interactions with Iran, I've always believed that as odious as I consider some of President Ahmadinejad's statements, as deep as the differences that exist between the United States and Iran on a range of core issues, that the use of tough, hard-headed diplomacy -- diplomacy with no illusions about Iran and the nature of the differences between our two countries -- is critical when it comes to pursuing a core set of our national security interests, specifically, making sure that we are not seeing a nuclear arms race in the Middle East triggered by Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon; making sure that Iran is not exporting terrorist activity. Those are core interests not just to the United States but I think to a peaceful world in general.

We will continue to pursue a tough, direct dialogue between our two countries, and we'll see where it takes us. But even as we do so, I think it would be wrong for me to be silent about what we've seen on the television over the last few days. And what I would say to those people who put so much hope and energy and optimism into the political process, I would say to them that the world is watching and inspired by their participation, regardless of what the ultimate outcome of the election was. And they should know that the world is watching.

And particularly to the youth of Iran, I want them to know that we in the United States do not want to make any decisions for the Iranians, but we do believe that the Iranian people and their voices should be heard and respected.

Most of the younger generation in Iran actually have favorable opinions of America.

I find that very hard to believe.

Unless we find reason to believe that Iran is willing to sacrifice its own existence to ensure that Israel is eliminated, there's really not much cause for concern militarily.

Flaw, people in charge never don the bombs themselves. They always tell others what a glorious deed they're doing.

One cool thing: Anonymous, the group that protests against scientology set up a site and is provided proxies for the Iranian people and giving them information on how to hide their tracks:

http://iran.whyweprotest.net/

Damn child molesters helping the enemy!

Sounds an awful lot like any number of countries who have civilian military leadership sending kids off to war =p

The Iranian regime has developed, with the assistance of European telecommunications companies, one of the world's most sophisticated mechanisms for controlling and censoring the Internet, allowing it to examine the content of individual online communications on a massive scale.

Because sending a professional soldier to war is the same as strapping a bomb to some kid's chest and sending him to a crowded marketplace.

Really, doesn't it ever grate you just a little when some old rich politician who has never been within 1000 miles of a battle gets on TV and talks about how awesome it is that we just sent a bunch of 19 year olds off to possibly get blown up?

How was I exaggerating? It's reality, sir. Don't sit there and act like you've never seen politicians, pundits, people, whatever acting like it's so super that we send kids off to get blown up. (Of course, they don't say it that way, but it's the same idea.)

Sure, it's a neccessity of sorts...it'd be harder to get people to do it if we didn't exalt the "virtues" of going off to war. But it's still grating.