Reagan, a true conservative
Actually it was called the Iran-Contra Affair.
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View original on discuss.onlineActually it was called the Iran-Contra Affair.
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I’m not old enough to remember that in 1953 the CIA overthrew the wildly popular prime minister Mosaddegh because he wanted oil proceeds to benefit the people of Iran, not the oligarchs. He was replaced by the Shah, who bloodily suppressed the people and gave the oilmoney back to the oligarchs. And to Britain and the US.
I am however old enough to read history books.
The American Boko Haram Party disproves
Remember, the US embassy in Tehran was absolutely massive and it had a heck of a lot more than 52 personnel. The Americans got advance warning by Iranian officials that the student protestors were coming, so they could flee to the Canadian embassy and were able to leave the country.
There's indication that the people who stayed were CIA operatives who had orders to shred evidence of their many misdeeds. Unfortunately for them, Iranian school children spent some time putting the shreds back together again, exposing the various crimes of the USA. America denied what they had done for decades until Obama officially apologized.
Idk about "indication". We've got extensive reports confirming it was exactly that. Hell, we've got dramatic movie retellings based on those historical accounts that reiterate it. This is the first act of Argo.
Using child labor to defame those sweet, innocent Iranian hostages?
One more crime Iran has to account for.
Then he let Oliver North take the fall
Hey, he got a banger of a song written about him like 20 years later.
https://youtu.be/lFV1uT-ihDo?is=U6k4TCv_l1HtfDmy
Educational song
I was so iconic they even made a video game about it called Contra
This is the kind of profound misinformation I can get behind. Totally off the wall.
You guys just unlocked my core memories of playing Contra on the Famicom in Iran in the 90s.
We used to call the Red Pants Guy "Arnold" for some reason. And I guess Blue Plants Guy was just "Contra"??
Beating contra on my much older cousins Nintendo litterally helped form a component of my identity. My other cousin and I made it a personal mission, but we had to accomplish on weekend barbeques nights. And we did eventually do it.
Red pants guys name was definitely Arnold .
This is why he was arnold:
It will provide perspective on the inherent hypocrisy and tragedy of Vietnam.
The USA also rigged the Italian vote to decide if our country would become a republic or a monarchy;
The problematic country was always the USA
"All conservative ideologies justify existing inequities as the natural order of things, inevitable outcomes of human nature. If the very rich are naturally so much more capable than the rest of us, why must they be provided with so many artificial privileges under the law, so many bailouts, subsidies and other special considerations - at our expense? Their "nat urally superior talents" include unprincipled and illegal subterfuge such as price-fixing, mass m%%der, stock manipulation, insider trading, fraud, tax evasion, the legal enforcement of unfair competition, ecological spoliation, harmful products and unsafe work conditions. One might expect naturally superior people not to act in such rapacious and venal ways. Differences in talent and capacity as might exist between individuals do not excuse the crimes and injustices that are endemic to the corporate business system."
-Parenti
Why censor murder, also do you have a source for the quote because I'm trying to find it and I don't even see one that includes mass murder. Is that added later or is the internet so censorship happy now as to completely remove the mass murder entry in the sources I can find?
Michael Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism
And Nixon blew up the Vietnam peace talks to make the war last until after the elections so he could win, I'm starting to see a pattern in these republicans...
He's a republican hero.
Reagan should have gotten the chair for that one, but here we are with a fascist dictatorship in the USA and somehow nobody knows how that happened
“I’m old enough to remember Iran seizing the US embassy” but not old enough to remember any of the shit that led up to that, huh?
That Reagan song from killer Mike.
and then he got caught and feigned ignorance like a motherfucker.
I wonder if Trump is going to pull something similar with Iran this time.
Does that mean Iran taking hostages wasn't a problem?
Does Reagan making a deal with Iran mean that both Iran and Reagan are good guys? Or does it mean they're both bad guys?
Not sure how "Reagan = bad" changes anything about the act of taking diplomats hostage.
Do you get your understanding of the world from Marvel movies?
'Murica has always treated action movies like documentaries
Remember how they didn't mostly sit out of WWII, how they didn't quite like the Nazis, and how they didn't cause massive casualties to their allies?
Oh, and they totally didn't give safe harbour to nazis when it suited them...
This is true, the USSR might have done 80% of the fighting, but the US still mobilized its entire economy for the war and had 12% of the total population in the actual military.
It's even more ahistorical to say they mostly say out than that the US single-handedly fought WW2.
Ever hear the phrase an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure? How about Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing...after all other options have been exhausted?
Like Britain, they would have almost certainly supported the nazis if Hitler invaded the USSR first. But that didn't happen and instead the US dedicated its entire existence to doing something good for one brief moment.
No, did you?
I got my understanding from reading actual news, not from bullshit foreign influence campaigns on social media sites.
Your analysis of geopolitics is about who are good guys and bad guys, but I'm sure you're correct and anyone who thinks that's weird is just being controlled by evil foreigners.
Nah just generally think of the systems countries have in place. When a country has an authoritarian system in place the country is capable of doing terrible things that are against the will of the people of the country. Iran has an authoritarian system in place, so they do all kinds of bullshit to maintain power and that includes executing people by the tens of thousands for protesting.
Iran is known to operate troll farms and are engaged in foreign influence operations in the west. You see how MAGAs fall for Russian influence campaigns, you're not much different. General rule, if the internet is telling you an authoritarian government that operates troll farms are the good guys, maybe take it with a healthy grain of salt.
Also look at how women are treated in a country. That's a fairly good barometer for how horrible a country's government is.
Nations with elective leadership are just as capable of doing terrible things that are against the will of the people....... It's not like the war in Iran has been popular with either conservatives or liberals in America.
Since ww2 US major military conflicts have resulted in 3.5-4 million direct civilian deaths, and that total is multiplied several times including indirect deaths. Can you think of a modern authoritarian regime with the same body count during the same period?
No one is trying to claim that the Iranian government is "good", just that the reasons America chose to invade the country are not morally or legally justified, and that it hasn't been done with the intent to better the lives of the average Iranian citizen.
Cuba and Venezuela are "authoritarian" because they won't sell out their people's resources and labor for pennies and also resist attemps to overthrow their governments are replace them with puppets. Iran is authoritarian because it is illegal to be gay. I have yet to see the UK get called authoritarian for what they do to trans people.
Its a useless word that just means "matches the values of rich, white, western liberals".
Imagine simping for Ronald Reagan. Just wow.
It was a problem that would have been solved much sooner if people who crave power and authority didn't meddle and prolong the problem for their own benefit.
It means that calling the Iran a "problem state" is pretty dishonest because most states, especially the USA are also problem states.
This is just making an argument based on distraction. Person A did something bad but hey look over here Person B also did something bad so stop thinking of the bad thing Person A did!
Why is it so hard just to admit Iran's government sucks? They execute people on a massive scale, support terrorism across the Middle East, and are currently trying to hold the world's economy hostage by breaking international law and targeting civilian shipping in an international waterway.
There's abuser's logic going on here where something bad happens to you and you think it makes it fine to hurt others. The US is responsible for their bad actions and Iran is responsible for their bad actions. Bad actions by the US doesn't justify Iran's bad actions towards others.
Sure, Reagan, Bush, Trump have done or are currently doing shitty things and stupid things. But that doesn't make Iran's government the good guys.
I am in no way saying either that Iran is by any measure better than the USA or that actions of the USA justify Irans actions.. I am also neither a USA nor an Iranian citizen or have any connection to either state besides my country having commercial relations with both.
You need to wrap your head around the fact that the original post about remembering stuff about Iran is a distraction piece to pull focus away from the atrocities that the USA is committing.
Or to put it in your words: why is it so hard for you to just admit that the USA are killing people on a massive scale in places nowhere near their territory, topple democratically legitimized governments for their own gains, and let governmentally supported thugs roam their streets terrorizing and killing their own population? Not to mention holding the global economy hostage regularly. Why do you need to point to other countries? Do other countries being bad make these actions okay?
The whole premise on the meme is to distract from the bad things Iran has done because "Reagan is bad."
Because you didn't admitted Iranian regime has murdered tens of thousands of Iranians, promoted terrorism, engaged in a a civil war that resulted in half a million people dead.
Yeah the US sucks. I'm a Canadian and I'm actively boycotting the US. But you're thinking that when someone points out the horrible things that Iran has done and you just need to say "but Reagan did some shenanigans!" and you "got 'em". It's really silly and shows lack of critical thinking. It's embarrassing that people think that this line of thinking is somehow a slam dunk argument for... what exactly? Why would you feel to make any kind of rebuttal against someone saying Iran's regime is horrible? Especially one that's so obviously fallacious?
So the people who took the hostages were the Islamic fundamentalists who only came to power because the US fucked over the communist movement. In the late 70’s, as the Shah’s regime was collapsing, the CIA chose to support the Islamists over the commies in Iran, and this was the predictable result.
Do you also agree the US bombing Iran is a predicable result of Iran having a nuclear weapons program and supporting terrorism?
Or do you think some events should be considered in purely dialectical Marxist thinking while others should not be?
There was an agreement with Iran about nuclear inspections, which they (mostly) followed. It was removed...by Trump. Less than 10 years later, we have a war to stop nuclear proliferation...started by Trump. I'm certainly not saying Iran is good, but we can certainly say America isn't, either. It feels like yet another example of, "Is this the consequences of my own actions?"
As for the terrorism point, and the time of year, we have very good evidence that Saudi Arabia was involved in the 9/11 attacks, yet they are trading partners with America to the point of being sold arms. I feel like the terrorism excuse is used by America when convenient, not because of the terrorism itself, particularly with the current regime.
OK so you've bought into the 9/11 truther stuff. So does that mean you think Saudis are good because they used terrorism on the US?
You're kind of all over the map on terrorism here. The only commonality I can see is that you think terrorism is good when it's done by Iran and it's proxies, but it's bad if done by anyone else. So you're just pro-Iran and trying to use socialist language to to make whatever Iran does sound appealing to leftists?
Iran is a theocratic authoritarian regime, you'd think Marxists wouldn't like it all that much given the whole opiate of the masses thing. But socialism in the 21st century isn't so much about ideology, is it?
The atrocities of the Saudis in a variety of situations are well documented. It's also no secret that the majority of the terrorists on 9/11 were Saudi. Occam's Razor indicates it was probably the Saudis, or a Saudi terrorist organization, that was behind the 9/11 attacks. There is also plenty of documentation to show that the people of many Middle East countries were happy it happened, whether or not they were involved.
As for the terrorism comment, I barely even spoke of it in this comment, and where I did, I mentioned America being very scattered on what they call terrorism. If you're referring to other comments I've made, I've generally been against them, whoever commits them. Some may see me saying an event was unsurprising, predictable, or even inevitable as supporting, but that's a failing on their part, and perhaps yours. I'm not happy Russians are getting killed in Ukraine, but I absolutely support Ukraine's right to defend their sovereignty. I'm not happy with the Palestinian attack on Israeli targets, particularly civilians, but I'm not surprised it happened give the repression they've been living under for decades. I'm also not very surprised by Israel's response, but I would have been much happier if they had chosen a solution other than genocide to achieve peace.
If you think ideology is why the Iran war started (this time around) you should read back a bit. The last two regimes were very authoritarian, one was backed by the Americans, and the one before that was leftist and democratic, which explains why the Americans interfered. Clearly, America has no trouble dealing with authoritarians, whether in Iran, in Saudi Arabia, or elsewhere, so long as the money and oil keeps flowing. And resistance to America is less than the money flowing in, which is literally why Saudis got a pass for assassinating an American journalist (and Trump doesn't like journalists who actually do their job).
So given that Iran has supported terrorism for more than a decade, have made it abundantly clear their enemies are the US and Israel, why aren't you similarly understanding about why the US and Israel would attack Iran?
The accusation of this post is that the US is being hypocritical by being against Iran while also occasionally negotiating with Iran. Aren't you being hypocritical when you say you're "not surprised" when "Palestinians" terrorism while also pretending to be outraged over the obvious response to such actions? I put Palestinians in quotes there because it's how you said it, I personally find how you imply that all Palestinians are terrorists to be disrespectful to Palestinians. Hamas did the terrorism and they did so because of the support of Iran.
You're talking about a regime that hasn't existed for over 70 years. That's some really extreme tankie behaviour to feel sympathy for an authoritarian country because 70 years ago there existed a dodgy politician that tried to nationalize things in that country. You're complaining about the realpolitik nature of international relations while engaging in that same kind of mindset yourself by jumping to the defense of any country that opposes countries you don't like.
To me, there are reasons for countries need to deal with authoritarians by necessity. There is no necessity for an individual to pretend an authoritarian country is good simply because they're in opposition to countries you don't like.
While you're being understanding of terrorist actions in response to oppression, maybe you should try to be understanding of a war in response to terrorism and who is ultimately responsible for those terrorist acts. It sure as hell isn't the Palestinian people that are benefiting from actions of Iran and Hamas.
America has been supporting terrorism for decades in various places around the world, including the Middle East. So has Israel. There are no clean hands in this conflict. I would be happier if they all stopped it, less happy if only some of them would. I'm not holding my breath.
If by "occasionally negotiating" you mean a politician asking for his own citizens to continue to be held hostage for his own personal gain, then yes, I guess that's correct. Likewise, if the obvious response to Hamas's attack is to start shooting children in the street, then I would say your integrity is as compromised as the leadership of Israel's is.
The regime I'm talking about was put in place in the 50s by Americans, and remained there until 1979. The people of Iran who are upset with America in large part had to live with the consequences of those actions which happened in their own lifetimes. Expecting them to just wave it off as a long time ago as you are is pretty disingenuous. As for the dodgy politician nationalizing things as an impetus to remove him, well, there have been far dodger politicians who haven't been removed, and over 50 nations have nationalized things in the last couple centuries, including both Canada and the US in that same time frame. Why is it not only bad when this guy did it, but bad enough to start toppling governments?
I also agree with dealing with authoritarian governments, but there are about 80 in the world right now, and the only two America has invaded happen to have a lot of oil. Why is that? Moreover, there are other ways to deal with authoritarian regimes, such as sanctions, non-proliferation agreements, and supporting enemy nations should those authoritarian regimes try to step out of their borders. Of course, those other things were being done before this war came along, but I guess since they weren't attacking their neighbors, things had to be stepped up. It's absolutely a problem that Iran is repressing their opposition and have drastically curtailed freedoms as compared to most western nations, but bombing people rarely fixes that. It certainly hasn't slowed the executions in this case.
Again, you're trying to imply tacit approval of terrorist acts, as opposed to an amount of expectation that some subset of the oppressed population will respond in inappropriate ways, whether they be Hamas, Sinn Fein, or whoever else. But when you start shooting kids in the street, targeting journalists and aid vehicles, and torturing prisoners and protesters, you aren't engaging in war, you're engaging in war crimes. That distinction might be too subtle for some. And as for who is ultimately responsible, I'm not sure any of them are still alive, but killing a few tens of thousands more just might fix it all, right?