Congress Pushes for War with Iran

[xchrom]

http://www.nationofchange.org/congress-pushes-war-iran-1339854484

In another resolution apparently designed to prepare for war against Iran, the U.S. House of Representatives, in an overwhelmingly bipartisan 401-11 vote, has passed a resolution (HR 568) urging the president to oppose any policy toward Iran "that would rely on containment as an option in response to the Iranian nuclear threat."

With its earlier decision to pass a bill that effectively sought to ban any negotiations between the United States and Iran, a huge bipartisan majority of Congress has essentially told the president that nothing short of war or the threat of war is an acceptable policy. Indeed, the rush to pass this bill appears to have been designed to undermine the ongoing international negotiations on Iran's nuclear program. According to Iranian-American analyst Jamal Abdi, a prominent critic of both the Iranian regime and U.S. policy, the motivation for the resolution may be to "poison those talks by signaling to Iran that the President is weak, domestically isolated, and unable to deliver at the negotiating table because a hawkish Congress will overrule him."

President Obama's "red line" on Iran -- the point at which his administration would consider taking military action against the country -- has been the reactionary regime's actual procurement of nuclear weapons. The language of this resolution, however, significantly lowers the bar by declaring it unacceptable for Iran simply to have "nuclear weapons capability" -- not necessarily any actual weapons or an active nuclear weapons program. Some members of Congress have argued that since Iranians have the expertise and technological capacity to develop nuclear weapons, they already have "nuclear weapons capability." The hawkish Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) has argued that "everybody will determine for themselves what [capability] means."

In case there was any doubt about the intent of Congress in using this language, when Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) offered a clarifying amendment to a similar clause in a recent Senate resolution -- declaring that "nothing in the Act shall be construed as a declaration of war or an authorization of the use of force against Iran" -- both its Republican and Democratic sponsors summarily rejected the amendment.Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff for Secretary of State Colin Powell, noted how "this resolution reads like the same sheet of music that got us into the Iraq war, and could be the precursor for a war with Iran. It's effectively a thinly-disguised effort to bless war."

[geckosfeet]

1. Can't these shitheads do anything without saber ratteling?

Congress Pushes for War With Iran

The real "threat" from Iran is if that country achieves nuclear capability, it would then have a deterrent to a U.S. attack that was unavailable to its immediate neighbors to the east (Afghanistan) and west (Iraq), both of which were invaded by U.S.-led forces. Both Democrats and Republicans appear to be united in their belief that no country should stand in the way of the unilateral projection of military force by the United States or its allies.

Indeed, this resolution is not about the national security of the United States, nor is it about the security of Israel. It is about continuing U.S. hegemony over the world's most oil-rich region.

The defense industry has these guys so brainwashed that war is the only way - it's filthy and disgusting. They can't think or interact with other countries without threatening to bomb them. Talk about bullies.

on edit - added link and excerpt

[Iggy]

3. Nuclear Power

Iran's population is 80 million people.

They have to have electricity. I'm not aware of many (any?) large rivers in Iran which
can be used for hydro power- thus the need for 20 nuclear power plants by 2025
generating 20,000 MW of power.

I guess since we don't make electronic appliances in the U.S. anymore, we don't
really care whether the Iranian people have electricity like we do.

U.S. construction companies could assist with construction of Iran's nuclear power
plants, but since we can't get past the Israel/U.S. government induced "Iran is
eveel" baloney, and since U.S. transnationals can't bid competitively on these
projects with European companies (can't make a 1,000% profit that way) that's
not an option.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Israel#Israel

[malthaussen]

6. It's not in the interest of an imperialist nation

... for the colonized nations to pull themselves up to equity. This is as true with modern "economic imperialism" as with the old-fashioned kind.

Since the most-effective currently-available means for the colonized nations to generate sufficient electricity to pull themselves out of subjugation is nuclear power, and since nuclear power capability implies nuclear weapons capability, the imperialists have a ready-made meme to smack down any colonized nation that rears its ugly head.

Yeah, oversimplification. But the bottom line is, we don't want any more rivals in our playground.

-- Mal

[TheWraith]

11. We've made that offer, actually.

The problem isn't construction of nuclear plants. The problem is the supply of nuclear fuel, and enrichment of it. Uranium can be enriched to various levels of purity. "Reactor grade" purity is about 5% pure. "Weapons grade" is 85%. The proposal has been brought up of the US supplying the Iranians with reactor-grade fuel in exchange for them shutting down their own enrichment. That way everyone could be sure that they were using it strictly for power. However, that's been rejected. So it's impossible to know whether they're just being stubborn, or if their talk about nuclear power is just a front for enriching weapons-grade material.

[Iggy]

13. Regardless, Nuclear Apartheid

doesn't work. Iran will get refined uranium one way or the other.

Teh Fear tactic, propagated by Israel and the U.S., that presumes Iran intends
to use a nuke weapon (if they somehow were able to create one) offensively
on Israel is nonsense.

Iran is not suicidal. The counter attack against them would be massive.

[HopeHoops]

4. Five will get you ten that they try to construe that as "creating jobs".

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

5. Gee, do you think that it's an election year and looking "tough" is thought essential?

What a pathetic bunch of cowards they are.

[spanone]

7. a shitload of neo-democrats voted for this bullshit

[trueblue2007]

8. !!!!!!! NO MORE WAR !!!!!!!

STOP IT!!! STOP IT NOW

[whatchamacallit]

9. This must be wrong

I've been assured by woodchucks war with Iran will only happen under Romney.

[TheWraith]

12. You've noticed there isn't actually a war, right?

And there's not going to be, since a non-binding resolution of the House has all the legal impact of a fart in a paper bag.

[woo me with science]

10. They do whatever the hell they want.

We don't have representatives anymore.

[Volaris]

14. The President's formal response to this kind of nonsense should be

"If Congress wants to go to war with Iran at some point in the future, then The Congress can actually buck up and DECLARE WAR. Because unless and until Congress forces me by Rule of LAW to attack that country, I'll deal with Iran AS I SEE FIT, and that's just too damn bad for the chickenhawks."