No nukes for Iran

By now you've heard about the Iran nuclear arms agreement with the US and five other countries. If not, the basic terms are Iran agrees to curtail its nuke enrichment programs in return for an easing of the crippling international sanctions they've been living under for what seems like forever. Seems like a pretty good deal to me. It offers some relief to the Iranian people who suffer the most under sanctions and the beautiful country of Iran doesn't get bombed into glass ashtrays.

Of course, all the people who thought bombing Iraq was the most brilliant idea ever, namely neo-cons and Republicans hate this deal. They're carrying on like it's the end of the world as we know it. One imagines they would have liked it better if a Republican administration had brokered it, but maybe not. Those warmongers never lose their taste for blood shed by other people.

I would have preferred Iran end its quest for nuclear energy generation as well. But then I would prefer that for everybody, especially the US. In any event, it's only a six month trial period. That will go by fast but I'll take a few months of  peace over imminent war any time.

Act Now! No Time to Lose!

By Capt. Fogg

Henry Kissinger -- the name could be a metonym for dishonest defense of imperialism and reckless disregard for the consequences of military action, and so it's no surprise to hear him tell us to ignore the consensus of all 16 US intelligence agencies that there is no evidence Iran is building or is about to build nuclear weapons.

Yes, of course they could all be wrong and there is always the argument from cliche that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but even in a nation of emotionally disturbed amnesiacs like the US, some might want to remember our useless attack and occupation of Iraq for which we continue to suffer and will continue to suffer for a very long time. In case you don't remember, that country had no nuclear, chemical or biological weapons or the materials or technology needed to produce huge, heavy nuclear prototypes much less the probably fictional "suitcase" bombs we were told could be smuggled into the US at any moment. Act now!

On CNN's GPS with Fareed Zakaria yesterday, Kissinger told us he was "uneasy" with the intelligence and that we should ignore it as we ignored the lies about Iraq and make the presumption that a bomb was forthcoming.

“I am very uneasy with the so-called intelligence report that say we don’t know whether they are actually working on nuclear weapons. I think we should start from the premise that they are undergoing all this in order to achieve a military capability. I don’t think that is a disputable point.”

I think it is disputable in the extreme, considering that we're listening to a war criminal involved in and culpable for massacres, invasions and genocides in Indochina, East Timor, Chile, Cyprus and Bangladesh talking about fomenting yet another dubious and probably disastrous war.

Kissinger and warmongering toadies like Israel's Prime Minister Netanyahu tell us we have no time to lose; that the time to attack is now as Former Secretary of State Rice once told us. Shoot first and pretend there is no question to ask, lest the "smoking gun" of evidence turn out to be a mushroom cloud. Frankly I think we have everything to lose, including our future and any basis upon which to base the proposition and pose of being a force for good in this world.