Iran

Life in Iran with Rick Steves :: Photo Diary by Abdi Sami

Posted by Jeff from Yes! Magazine

In March of 2008 Rick Steves asked me to accompany him to Iran to help him produce a travel documentary on Iran and its people. Rick's intention was to put a human face on the people of Iran as opposed to the sensational news clips that tend to demonize people of other countries whose governments we don't agree with. I was delighted to accept!

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Bob Cesca: Killing Iranian Civilians Isn't Hilarious, Senator McCain on The Huffington Post

Posted by Damianmann from Huffington Post

Senator McCain has famously said, "Only a fool or a fraud talks tough or romantically about war." How, then, should we describe a clearly unbalanced presidential candidate who jokes about killing innocent civilians as part of a larger war-mongering foreign policy?

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Will the U.S. Support Terrorists to Destabilize Iran?

Posted by Shemuses

All attempts to justify a military attack on Iran have failed and the US is now looking at supporting fringe and terrorist groups to destabilize the country. It won't work, says NAM contributing writer, William O. Beeman, but it will destabilize the region for years to come. Beeman is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota. He is President of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. The second edition of his book, The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other, has just been published by the University of Chicago Press.

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Lessons from North Korea for Middle East

Posted by Damianmann from Arab News

Our world would be so dull without its delicious ironies and ever fascinating double standards. Who could have ever thought that having condemned North Korea as part of the "Axis of evil" - the other two being Iran and Iraq of course - in September 2001, Bush would rush his top diplomats to welcome "Dear Leader" Kim Jong-il to the fold of civilized world.

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Preparing the Battlefield

Posted by Jon from New Yorker

Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country's religious leadership.

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Seymour Hersh reports U.S. Special Forces Operating Deep in Iran

Posted by Jeff from New Yorker

Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. Further, Hersh alleges that leading Democrats in Congress have been passively supportive in funding this effort. Via HuffPo, watch video

here.

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US-Iran Relations: The Fourth Option

Posted by Shemuses

Empower the People.Over the past three decades, American policy towards Iran has drifted from ineffectual to misguided while the Islamic Republic has remained an enigma for most western strategists. The regime's rule is defined by oppression at home and aid to terrorists abroad. It routinely threatens Israel and challenges American interests where and when it can. Yet, successive American administrations have failed to develop a coherent, decisive strategy to face-down the fundamentalist regime.

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