U.S. SUPPORTS TYRANTS IN MIDDLE EAST, YET CALLS FOR SANCTIONS AGAINST IRAN

The U.S. call for sanctions on Iran is hypocritical insofar as the U.S. and the Obama administration continue to support tyrants in the Middle East. Consider American support and "friendship" with Saudi Arabia where it is still a crime for an unmarried female to be with a male not a relative. Or where the punishment for certain crimes is to cut off a hand or a foot. Next consider the friendly relations of the U.S. with Musharraf in Egypt or with the royal family in Jordan. In both Egypt and Jordan, don't even think about freedom of speech or freedom from search and seizure. There are no human freedoms in either country.

So when Pres. Obama or his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton call for sanctions on Iran because it wants to develop its own nuclear power, unspoken is American support for leaders of countries in the same neighborhood as Iran that deny human freedom and impose draconian punishments on their citizens.

Mohamed El Baradei, former head of the IAEA, says the same in a report in The Guardian by Jack Shenker today.

""Western policy towards this part of the world has been a total failure, in my view. It has not been based on dialogue, understanding, supporting civil society and empowering people, but rather it's been based on supporting authoritarian systems as long as the oil keeps pumping."

"The 67-year-old added: "If you bet on individuals, instead of the people, you are going to fail. And western policy so far has been to bet on individuals, individuals who are not supported by their people and who are being discredited every day.""

Instead of supporting the people in each country, El Baradei says that the western countries wage war against individual heads of state, no matter that in the process, they kill hundreds of thousands of ordinary citizens of that state. Ahmadinejad of Iran might be a terrible leader but that is no reason to impose sanctions on the population at large, or even to consider a military strike, as in "all options are on the table."

"The popularity in the Middle East of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, he said, should be seen as message to the west that its "policy is not reaching out to the people. The policy should be: 'We care about you, we care about your welfare, we care about your human rights.'""

IRAN MAKES CONCESSIONS, OBAMA'S PEOPLE GIVE MIXED SIGNALS

Why is Pres. Obama making the same mistakes in his dealing with Iran as did hated George W. Bush?

Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, announces that negotiations with Iran are proceeding in good faith, and that Iran has agreed to open its Qom nuclear processing site to U.N. inspectors on October 25th. Furthermore, Iran has agreed to send all of its processed uranium to Russia for conversion into harmless nuclear fuel.

Yet much of the reaction from Obama's Washington is how Iran must do this, must do that. Where are the important and needed Obama celebratory words congratulating Iran for being willing to sit down and negotiate? Instead we get doom and gloom, and injunctions to Iran that it better move quickly.

Here is Politico reporting on the words of Susan Rice, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., on Meet the Press today.

"U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice on Sunday warned that Iran had to move quickly to prove its nuclear program was for peaceful purposes.

"“If it doesn't, time is short,” Rice said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"She told host David Gregory, “We're not interested in talking for talking's sake. We're not interested in interminable negotiations. They have to demonstrate conclusively that their program is for peaceful purposes.”"

Suppose you were Iranian. Suppose you were also an opponent of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. How would you feel about the threatening words of Susan Rice, Pres. Obama's friend and confidante?

However, all is not so bleak. The BBC reports on words of Obama's security adviser, retired general James Jones, praising Iran for its willingness to negotiate. Reports the BBC:

"US National Security Adviser Jim Jones said Tehran was now "willing to come to the table", following talks this week between Iran and major powers. . . .

"Speaking on CBS television on Sunday, Mr Jones said: "We now have an Iran that is willing to come to the table.""

Iran has agreed to several important steps after its sit-down negotiations with the U.S. and EU countries. Furthermore, ElBaradei believes that it is now negotiating rather than engaging in confrontation. The BBC reports:

Speaking after talks with the top Iranian nuclear official, Ali Akbar Salehi, Mr Elbaradei said the talks had been successful, and that inspectors would ensure that the Qom facility was for "peaceful purposes".

"He added: "I see that we are shifting gears from confrontation into transparency and co-operation. I continue, of course, to call on Iran to be as transparent as possible.""

Some of Pres. Barack Obama's signals will do little to foster the good faith needed on both sides to continue to engage in meaningful and productive diplomacy between Iran and the West. Stop the threats a' la Bush against Iran, and instead reward the Iranian government for taking meaningful steps, as Obama's security adviser, James Jones, has done.

ISRAELI OFFICIALS WARN AGAINST OBAMA CONDUCTING TALKS WITH IRAN

It is curious that in the last few days before president-elect Obama's news conference and his statements on Iran, two high-ranking officials from Israel thought it necessary to come out and warn Obama about establishing talks with Iran and its president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The Jerusalem Post reports that Foreign Minister Tzipy Livni offered that Obama's acceptance of talks with Iran would show "weakness."

"US President-elect Barack Obama should not talk to Iran just yet, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said on Thursday, warning that such dialogue could project "weakness."
"We need to fight extremism," Livni said as she stood next to visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at a joint press conference in the home of the American ambassador to Israel.. "We need to continue the pressure on Iran and I believe that the idea of continuing the pressure comes with more intense and effective sanctions on the Iranians."
Although she described Obama's election as "a source of inspiration to millions around the world," and congratulated him on his "historic victory," her comments marked a first sign of disagreement with the incoming American administration. Obama has stated a willingness to talk to Iran about its nuclear program without condition, telling The Jerusalem Post in July that he would engage "in tough, direct talks" with Teheran."

And Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said it would allow Iran to continue to develop nuclear weapons behind the pretense of engaging in diplomatic talks. Tovah Lazaroff reports for The Jerusalem Post:

"Israel is not ruling out any option when it comes to dealing with Iran's nuclear program, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Friday.

"Following a meeting with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Jerusalem, Barak said he told her that Israel is "not taking any option off the table, and we don't recommend that others take any option off the table," stressing, "We mean what we say."

"Barak insisted that Iran was continuing to "trick the world" in negotiations over the monitoring of its nuclear activities. "

The question is why we are getting all of these anti-Iranian statements from Israeli officials at this time.

I though that Barack Obama's statement on Iran at his news conference was bellicose enough with the push of the Israelis. Obama said he would never allow Iran to have nuclear weapons, and that furthermore, Iran should stop giving aid to "terrorists."

By "terrorists," I assume Obama meant Hezbollah in Lebanon. If so, Obama is no better than George W. Bush in a simplistic approach to Hezbollah and the Shiite Muslims spread throughout the Middle East. Israel calls Hezbollah a terrorist group, so does the United States. But it is not clear that Hezbollah is anything more than a political entity infused with Shiite Islam that fights against Israel for land and civil rights. In other words, Hezbollah is an insurgency against the Israelis.

And as far as Iran's approach to nuclear weapons, Iranian leaders claim they have no desire to make nuclear weapons, and certainly, the IAEA has found no evidence to the contrary. All statements by Israel and Bush about Iran's desire for nuclear weapons is based on supposition and conjecture.

The question then is, would Obama allow Israel to attack Iran on the basis of conjecture? Obama's statements don't seem to reassure me on this important question.

BARACK OBAMA MUTE AS MC CAIN SLIMES IRAN FOR NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND IEDS

I was especially unhappy with Barack Obama's comments last night about Iran. He seemed to go along with everything McCain said, such as that Iran is building a nuclear weapon, that it is an "existential" threat to the region, and that Iran is responsible for the super lethal IEDs inside of Iraq.

First of all there is no evidence from the IAEA that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons. If there was evidence, that would be another thing, but to date there is none. Yet the neo-cons and war mongers like McCain and Lieberman insist the opposite. So why would Barack Obama go along without raising a peep?

The same for the IEDs. This was the talking point of the Dept. of Defense under Rumsfeld. Yet when called upon to produce evidence, the DOD had nothing. Yeah, the Army laid out a whole bunch of IEDs that it said came from Iran, but the proof could have just as well come from some Iraqi's basement on a home made tool and dye.

During all of this bull****, Barack Obama offered no objections. His performance on Iran was truly depressing.

U.S. WANTS FURTHER SANCTIONS ON IRAN BECAUSE OF AMERICAN SUSPICIONS

Why is Bush/Cheney/Rice seeking new sanctions against Iran? The latest report of IAEA for the most part says Iran has been forthcoming on the issues asked by the IAEA. Apparently, the one unresolved issue has to do with coordinating nuclear weapons with missile development, an area that the U.S. says it learned about from some purloined notebook that was discovered last year.

For one thing, it is not clear that the contents of the notebook show that Iran has any plans to weaponize nuclear materials. The notebook has not been linked definitively to Iran, and so Iran feels it does not have to prove something that it knows nothing about. The U.S., however, through Bush/Cheney and Rice assume that the notebook shows conclusively that Iran has a secret weapons program.

And so the U.S. on possibly faulty assumptions wants to continue to press Iran to admit what the U.S. accuses of it based on the notebook. If torture could be applied to a nation, I have no doubt that Bush/Cheney would torture Iran to force Iran to admit and confirm mere suspicions.

This type of militaristic diplomacy must end. The U.S. thinks all foreign questions can be solved with missiles and guns. When will this nightmare of an administration finally come to an end?