[Mb-civic] SUGGESTED READ-FW: Will WashingtonSupportDemocracyinIran?

[richard haase]

if they pay enough money
ill call it
RICHARD LOVES NAZIS
does that answer your question?
lol
im a producer i want that money
lol
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Robin McNamara" <olhippie at tampabay.rr.com>
To: <mb-civic at islandlists.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2005 10:41 PM
Subject: Re: [Mb-civic] SUGGESTED READ-FW: Will
WashingtonSupportDemocracyinIran?


> Hey Richard
>
> What are you going tocall the show " the Iranian way "
>
> Peace
> Robin
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "richard haase" <hotprojects at nyc.rr.com>
> To: <mb-civic at islandlists.com>
> Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2005 8:01 PM
> Subject: Re: [Mb-civic] SUGGESTED READ-FW: Will Washington
> SupportDemocracyinIran?
>
>
> > which is why we need to get everybodys money for shows michael lol
> > ----- Original Message ----- 
> > From: "Robin McNamara" <olhippie at tampabay.rr.com>
> > To: <mb-civic at islandlists.com>
> > Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2005 8:52 PM
> > Subject: Re: [Mb-civic] SUGGESTED READ-FW: Will Washington Support
> > DemocracyinIran?
> >
> >
> >> Right On Michael !
> >>
> >> Peace
> >> Robin
> >> ----- Original Message ----- 
> >> From: "Michael Butler" <michael at michaelbutler.com>
> >> To: "Civic" <mb-civic at islandlists.com>
> >> Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2005 3:12 PM
> >> Subject: [Mb-civic] SUGGESTED READ-FW: Will Washington Support
Democracy
> >> inIran?
> >>
> >>
> >> This is a worthwhile article about the current situation.
> >> For certain the current regime in Iran was/is far more dangerous to
world
> >> security than Iraq ever was.
> >> Planning a pushover our neocons sure blew it. They picked on the local
> > bully
> >> ignoring the monster.
> >> Michael
> >>
> >> ------ Forwarded Message
> >> From: Golsorkhi <grgolsorkhi at earthlink.net>
> >> Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2005 14:06:52 -0500
> >> To: <michael at michaelbutler.com>
> >> Subject: FW: Will Washington Support Democracy in Iran?
> >>
> >>
> >> ------ Forwarded Message
> >> From: Samii Shahla <shahla at thesamiis.com>
> >> Date: Sat, 12 Feb 2005 17:07:39 -0500
> >> Subject: Will Washington Support Democracy in Iran?
> >>
> >> Will Washington Support Democracy in Iran?
> >>
> >> by Michael Rubin
> >> Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs: Issue Brief
> >> February 13, 2005
> >> http://www.meforum.org/article/680
> >>     ?
> >> After a first term marked by schizophrenic Iran policy initiatives, the
> >> Bush White House will soon develop a coordinated policy to promote
> >> peaceful regime change in Iran. The Bush administration is heartened by
> >> the apparent success of the Iraqi election and believes that Iranians
> >> are ready to exert their democratic rights.
> >>     ?
> >> Bush policy is motivated by the grave and growing threat from the
> >> Islamic Republic's nuclear weapons program, and the realization that
> >> neither Iran nor the European Union are sincere in preventing Iran's
> >> acquisition of nuclear weaponry. The Islamic Republic's potential
> >> threat to American security emanates from Tehran's determination to
> >> develop satellite launching capability which could well substitute as
> >> an intercontinental ballistic missile delivery system as well as from
> >> the regime's continued sponsorship of terrorists.
> >>     ?
> >> A new U.S. policy will also recognize that the dichotomy within Iran is
> >> not one of reformers versus hardliners within the Islamic Republic, but
> >> rather proponents of democracy versus proponents of theocracy. Even if
> >> Iranian acquisition of nuclear capability is inevitable, the threat
> >> comes from the nature of the regime rather than from the Iranian
> >> people.
> >>     ?
> >> As hardline ideologues consolidate power in Tehran, Iran will mark a
> >> number of important anniversaries which might spur ordinary people to
> >> agitate against their government and for democracy as they call for a
> >> new national referendum on the future of Iran.
> >>
> >> A Stalemated Iran Policy
> >>
> >> In his January 20, 2005, inaugural speech, President George W. Bush
> >> declared, "America will not pretend that jailed dissidents prefer their
> >> chains, or that women welcome humiliation and servitude." Less than two
> >> weeks later, Bush argued in his State of the Union address that "the
> >> victory of freedom in Iraq will...inspire democratic reformers from
> >> Damascus to Tehran." Such statements are not mere rhetoric, but mark a
> >> new willingness to advance democracy in Iran.
> >>
> >> During Bush's first term in office, the U.S. government lacked an Iran
> >> policy. The State Department, Pentagon, Central Intelligence Agency,
> >> and Treasury Department twice failed to reach consensus on a National
> >> Security Policy Directive. Neither then-National Security Advisor
> >> Condoleezza Rice nor the President forced the issue. As a result,
> >> American policy was schizophrenic. While Bush labeled Iran as part of
> >> the "Axis of Evil" in his January 2002 State of the Union Address,
> >> Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage described Iran as a
> >> "democracy."1
> >>
> >> With no clear White House policy direction, Senate Republicans likewise
> >> took contradictory positions. While Arlen Specter (Pennsylvania) dined
> >> with the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations,2 Sam Brownback
> >> (Kansas) introduced an Iran Freedom and Democracy Support Act which
> >> would have created a $50 million fund to support opposition satellite
> >> stations and civil society.
> >>
> >> State Department lawyers, meanwhile, argued that non-interference
> >> clauses in the 1980 Algiers Accords, the agreement which had led to the
> >> release of the U.S. embassy hostages, prohibited funding of opposition
> >> media. Retired National Security Advisors, though, disputed the State
> >> Department's line.3 In recent weeks, the White House legal office has
> >> opined that nothing in the Accords prevents assistance to Iranian
> >> democrats.
> >>
> >> New National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley's decision to remove
> >> Richard Haass protégé Meghan O'Sullivan from the Iran portfolio (she
> >> retains her position as senior director for Iraq at the National
> >> Security Council) also bodes well for a more activist policy,
> >> especially as the new National Security team again reviews Washington's
> >> policy - or lack thereof - toward Tehran. O'Sullivan had long been both
> >> dismissive of Iranian dissidents and a proponent of engaging the
> >> Islamic Republic.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Why Now?
> >>
> >> The Bush administration's new focus on Iran is a reflection not only of
> >> the President's sincere conviction that the Iranian people deserve
> >> freedom and liberty, but also of the belief that the United States
> >> cannot live with a nuclear Islamic Republic of Iran. While many
> >> European officials and American academics describe Iranian politicians
> >> like former president and current Expediency Council chairman 'Ali
> >> Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani as a pragmatist,4 U.S. policymakers do not
> >> dismiss his December 14, 2001, threats to initiate a nuclear first
> >> strike against Israel,5 nor do they dismiss as rhetoric banners reading
> >> "Israel must be uprooted and erased from history," draped over
> >> medium-range Shihab-3 missiles in a September 22, 2003, military
> >> parade.6
> >>
> >> The Islamic Republic's potential threat to American security is just as
> >> serious, though, both because of Tehran's determination to develop
> >> satellite launching capability which could well substitute as an
> >> intercontinental ballistic missile delivery system,7 and because of the
> >> regime's continued sponsorship of terrorists. American officials
> >> continue to blame Iranian intelligence for planning the 1996 bombing of
> >> an American military barracks in Khobar, Saudi Arabia.8 The 9/11
> >> Commission's bipartisan intelligence review found that the Iranian
> >> regime lent passive support to many of the 9/11 hijackers, between
> >> eight and ten of whom transited Iran in the year before the attack.9
> >> Washington also takes seriously reports that Iranian authorities have
> >> sheltered senior al-Qaeda figures in Revolutionary Guard bases near the
> >> Caspian town of Chalus.10
> >>
> >> While some editorialists and politicians argue that Washington should
> >> support the diplomacy of the European Union troika of London, Paris and
> >> Berlin, many European diplomats and analysts privately acknowledge that
> >> they believe Tehran's acquisition of a nuclear bomb to be inevitable, a
> >> tacit admission that European diplomacy is a charade. American
> >> officials may not be so blunt, but many believe their European
> >> counterparts care more about the preservation of the Nuclear
> >> Non-Proliferation Treaty than they do about Iran going nuclear. If the
> >> European Union allows the Islamic Republic to negotiate acquisition of
> >> nuclear capability, then they need not admit the emptiness of the
> >> current non-proliferation regime.
> >>
> >> Even if Iran's acquisition of the bomb is inevitable, to American
> >> strategists, the question is not whether the United States can live
> >> with a nuclear Iran, but rather whether the United States can live with
> >> a nuclear Islamic Republic of Iran. To many Bush administration
> >> officials, the danger is not necessarily that the Islamic Republic
> >> would use its nuclear weapon against the United States, but rather that
> >> the feeling of immunity from retaliation that a nuclear capability
> >> might lend regime ideologues would lead to an increase in terrorism in
> >> the Middle East and Europe, and violent attempts to subvert Iraq and
> >> Afghanistan. Iranian authorities, for example, ignored numerous Turkish
> >> diplomatic demarches, and only scaled back support for Kurdistan
> >> Workers Party [PKK] terrorists operating in Turkey after the Turkish
> >> Air Force bombed the Iranian border town of Piranshahr.11 Had the
> >> Islamic Republic enjoyed a potential nuclear retaliation capability,
> >> Turkish authorities could likely have not forced an abandonment of
> >> Tehran's PKK support. Meanwhile, American authorities are increasingly
> >> concerned by the resurgence of the Revolutionary Guards within the
> >> Islamic Republic's political class. Revolutionary Guard influence has
> >> been most recently evidenced by their effective veto of Turkish
> >> commercial involvement in the communications sector and Tehran's new
> >> airport.12
> >>
> >> Such concerns - and the unwillingness to assume that regime ideologues
> >> will not try to act upon their deeply-held beliefs about the United
> >> States and Israel - are responsible for the current debate about the
> >> efficacy of military action. While targeted strikes on nuclear and
> >> ballistic missile sites might not eliminate the Islamic Republic's
> >> capability, the question is whether they could delay Tehran's nuclear
> >> ambitions beyond the lifespan of the Islamic Republic.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Are Iranians Ready for Democracy?
> >>
> >> The best option from an American point of view would be a peaceful
> >> transition of power leading to an Iranian abandonment of the Islamic
> >> Republic's more threatening convictions. The relevant question
> >> therefore becomes whether the Iranian people are ready for democracy
> >> and, if so, when they might rise up and demand real rather than
> >> cosmetic rights. No one in Washington seeks to use military force to
> >> oust the Iranian regime, and rumors that the U.S. government even
> >> considered lending support to the Mujahidin al-Khalq are without basis.
> >> Democracy advocates within the Bush administration are likely to ask
> >> whether they can take any actions which would catalyze the Iranian
> >> people's ability to replicate last year's peaceful revolutions in
> >> Georgia and the Ukraine.
> >>
> >> Both anecdotal and statistical evidence indicate the Iranian people are
> >> ready for change. While some outside analysts continue to speak of a
> >> dichotomy between hardliners and reformers, most Iranians now accept
> >> that the political tension within Iran is between regime and dissident.
> >> On December 6, 2004, students heckled Mohammad Khatami, chanting "Shame
> >> on you" and "Where are your promised freedoms?"13
> >>
> >> In August 2002, the Tarrance Group, a professional polling outfit,
> >> conducted a survey of Iranian public opinion. They randomized the last
> >> four digits of every Tehran telephone exchange, and surveyed residents
> >> rich and poor. Just 21 percent of the statistically-representative
> >> sample of more than 500 people said that the Guardian Council
> >> represented the will of the Iranian people, while only 19 percent
> >> supported a politically-active clergy. The poll also found significant
> >> economic malaise, perhaps motivating the disillusionment with their
> >> leadership. Only 16 percent felt that their economic situation had
> >> improved during the Khatami years, while 68 percent said their family's
> >> financial situation had declined since the Islamic Revolution.14
> >>
> >> A quarter century of theocracy has moderated the Iranian people. While
> >> studying in Iran in 1996 and 1999, many Iranians told me they supported
> >> Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini less out of an endorsement of his views
> >> than out of a reaction to the dictatorship of the Shah. While American
> >> and European intellectuals may criticize Bush's "Axis of Evil" rhetoric
> >> as simplistic, the fact remains that there is a correlation between
> >> Bush's moral clarity and the willingness of Iranians to take to the
> >> street, as they did en masse in July 1999,15 October 2001,16 November
> >> 2002,17 and July 2003,18 and at a number of more localized
> >> demonstrations.19
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Historic Opportunity: The Call for a Referendum
> >>
> >> Iranians, inheritors of a 2,500-year-old culture, are far more
> >> historically aware than many in the West. Recent democratic
> >> developments in Iran coincide with a number of symbolic anniversaries.
> >> December 2005 marks the hundredth anniversary of the start of Iran's
> >> Constitutional Revolution when merchants, liberals, clergy, and
> >> nationalists rose up to demand basic rights in the face of an
> >> autocratic ruler. After a year of struggle, the Shah granted the
> >> Iranian people a constitution. In December 2006, Iranians may ask why
> >> their forefathers had rights today's Iranians no longer enjoy.
> >>
> >> On April 1, 2004, Iranians marked a more recent anniversary - the
> >> 25-year anniversary of Khomeini's declaration of an Islamic Republic.
> >> On that day, Khomeini announced the results of a referendum asking a
> >> simple question: "Do you want an Islamic Republic." Ninety-eight
> >> percent of Iranian voters said "Yes." "By casting a decisive vote in
> >> favor of the Islamic Republic," Khomeini told an enthusiastic crowd,
> >> "you have established a government of divine justice." Increasingly,
> >> though, a growing and disparate number of Iranian groups are suggesting
> >> that Iran is ready for a new referendum.20 Many Iranians suggest a
> >> simple question, "Theocracy or democracy." The Tarrance Group poll
> >> found that 71 percent of Iranians would favor such a poll.21 While it
> >> is not likely that the Islamic Republic's leadership would ever consent
> >> to an internationally-supervised referendum - they understand the
> >> contempt with which most of their charges view them - such a referendum
> >> would better focus international attention on the fundamental issue of
> >> the Islamic Republic's lack of legitimacy and moral bankruptcy.
> >>
> >> Into this tinderbox was inserted the success of Iraq's January 30,
> >> 2005, elections, that country's first free poll in a half century. It
> >> is a juxtaposition Iranians - many of whom believe themselves to be
> >> culturally superior to their Arab neighbors - cannot miss. In June
> >> 2005, Iranians will march to the polls to elect a president. Under the
> >> terms of the Islamic Republic's constitution, the new president will
> >> have only limited power and will remain subordinate to the unelected
> >> Supreme Leader, Ayatollah 'Ali Khameini. While the unelected Guardian
> >> Council in Iran severely limits the choice of candidates in Iran,
> >> Iranians have already noted the full range of candidates allowed to
> >> compete in Iraq's elections. Many European, American, and Arab
> >> commentators sought to correlate voter turnout with election legitimacy
> >> in Iraq. The same standards might be applied to Iran, where many
> >> Iranians may choose to stay home as Iranian pilgrims in Iraq estimated
> >> that 80 percent of their compatriots did during the February 2004
> >> Majlis elections.
> >>
> >> After four years of policy ambiguity, the Bush administration will
> >> finally make a concerted approach to change the status quo in Iran.
> >> European officials may calculate they can live with a nuclear Islamic
> >> Republic of Iran, but they are wrong. If the current regime goes
> >> nuclear, Iran will unleash a new and potentially devastating wave of
> >> terrorism which will end any hope for stabilization in Iraq and
> >> Afghanistan, and peace in the Middle East. The White House is right to
> >> pursue democratization as a solution. Europe would be wise to hope for
> >> its success because the alternative for Washington might not be
> >> acceptance of a nuclear Iran, but rather military action.
> >> ---
> >> Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute,
> >> is editor of the Middle East Quarterly. He served as an Iran and Iraq
> >> staff advisor to the Office of the Secretary of Defense between 2002
> >> and 2004.
> >>
> >> Notes
> >>
> >> 1. Robin Wright, "U.S. Now Views Iran in More Favorable Light; a Top
> >> Official Makes a Distinction between the regime in Tehran and those of
> >> fellow 'axis of evil' members North Korea and Iraq," Los Angeles Times,
> >> February 14, 2003.
> >> 2. Robin Wright, "Activity Heats Up as U.S. and Iran Flirt with Closer
> >> Ties," Washington Post, February 1, 2004.
> >> 3. Michael Ledeen, "Act on Iran," Wall Street Journal, October 23,
2002.
> >> 4. Reuel Marc Gerecht, "Going Soft on Iran," Weekly Standard, March 8,
> >> 2004.
> >> 5. Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran, December 14, 2001.
> >> 6. Ron Kampeas, "As Palestinian Picture Improves, Ominous Signs About
> >> Iranian Nukes," Jewish Telegraphic Agency, November 22, 2004.
> >> 7. "Iranian 'Sputnik' Could be Trojan Horse for Tehran's Ballistic
> >> Missile Program," Aviation Week Group, November 28, 2004.
> >> 8. The 9-11 Commission Report, p. 60.
> >> 9. The 9-11 Commission Report, p. 240. Also see: "Iran's Link to
> >> al-Qaeda: What the 9-11 Commission Found," Middle East Quarterly (Fall
> >> 2004).
> >> 10. "Nearly 400 al-Qaeda members and other terror suspects in Iran,"
> >> Agence France Presse, July 15, 2004.
> >> 11. "Iran Accuses Turkish Jets of Bombing its Territory," Associated
> >> Press, July 18, 1999.
> >> 12. Karl Vick, "Politics on Collision Course at Shuttered Iranian
> >> Airport," Washington Post, August 10, 2004.
> >> 13. "Students Heckle Iranian President," BBC News, December 6, 2004;
> >> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4072887.stm
> >> 14. Public Opinion Survey in Iran, August 23-28, 2002, Tarrance Group.
> >> 15. "Fateful Moment in Iran," New York Times, July 14, 1999.
> >> 16. "Tehran Gripped by Pro-Western Street Violence," Independent,
> >> October 27, 2001.
> >> 17. "Iranian Student Protestors Call Referendum on Hard-Line Rulers,"
> >> New York Times, November 29, 2002.
> >> 18. "Student Leaders Seized by Vigilantes in Iran," New York Times,
> >> July 10, 2003.
> >> 19. See reporting, for example, of the Student Movement Coordination
> >> Committee for Democracy in Iran, www.daneshjoo.org
> >> 20. Eli Lake, "Iranian Democrats Establish a United Front," New York
> >> Sun, December 7, 2004.
> >> 21. Public Opinion Survey in Iran, August 23-28, 2002, Tarrance Group.
> >>
> >> ---
> >> You may freely forward this information, but on condition that you send
> >> the text as an integral whole along with complete information about its
> >> author, date, and source.
> >>
> >> ------ End of Forwarded Message
> >>
> >>
> >> ------ End of Forwarded Message
> >>
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