Iran Practices For Pissing Match In Baghdad, Ron Paul RIP...

"Membership and recruiting of Al Qaeda is drying up. Far be it for me to tell terrorists about strategy but I think membership started to subside when they went to the suicide bomber exploding underpants." – David Letterman

"Let's just say you put on the exploding underpants and you detonate. When they bring in the 72 virgins, then what?" – David Letterman

"The White House admitted that Vice President Biden's endorsement of gay marriage forced him to come out in favor of it. So in a related story millions of Americans are trying to get Biden hooked on pot." – Conan O'Brien

Preliminary talks over Iran's nuclear program seemed to go well in Istanbul, enough to set the agenda for the upcoming pissing match to be held in Baghdad... there are two different Iranian strategies, represented by those close to the President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and those close to the religious Supreme Ayatollah Khamenei. The president's strategy is seen to disrupt proceedings and be in-your-face about things like national pride. The other side, which is currently in charge, takes a more patient posture, designed to keep buying as much time by saying yes to inspections then not letting them happen, along with the public insistence that their program is only for creating energy, not weapons. Crucial to their argument has been the fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khamenei that owning nuclear weapons is anti-Islamic and against the teachings of the Koran. The NY Times reported that: "Iran’s public posture fuels a sense that both sides are searching for a way to declare victory and defuse the crisis. For the West, officials have said that success, at least in the short term, would mean a deal that has Iran ship all its medium-enriched uranium out of the country, which would increase the amount of time needed to make bomb-grade material.

“Without violating any international laws or the nonproliferation treaty, we have managed to bypass the red lines the West created for us,” said Hamidreza Taraghi, an adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is close to the negotiating team."

In Tehran, Mr. Taraghi was promoting a narrative that might pave the way for public, and political, acceptance of a compromise over a program that has broad public support, even among competing political factions. Enrichment is seen as a matter of national sovereignty and pride.


Mr. Taraghi ticked off Iran’s successes. First, he said, Western countries did not want Iran to have a nuclear power plant, but its Bushehr reactor was now connected to the national grid. Second, the West had opposed Iran having heavy-water facilities, he said, but it now has one in Arak.


Third, the West had said no to any enrichment.“But here we are, enriching as much as we need for our nuclear energy program,” Mr. Taraghi said with a smile, referring to the thousands of cascades of centrifuges spinning for years in the half-underground facility in Natanz. Since January, dozens more centrifuges have been online in the Fordo mountain bunker complex, near Qum, built to withstand a heavy attack."

We'll see if these arguments will be enough to get sanctioned lifted. The sanctions are hurting those government officials who have frozen accounts in foreign banks, and are forced to live on their salaries, seriously putting a crimp in the normal flow of graft and corruption. They also prevent the government and larger companies from doing international business that depend on foreign banks to help pay for goods and transportation. Oh, and the sanction on Iran's oil industry is indeed, killing them... European members who support sanctions have said that if the upcoming Baghdad talks are not productive, then more stringent sanctions may be instituted, though its hard to see what's left to punish with. If the US has overestimated its position, then it may have backed itself into a corner that leaves war as a result. Which is ironic, since Israel has just had an injection of moderate politicians added to its government, and may be changing their attitudes towards Iran. More important, really, than all of this nuclear theater, is the jockeying between Shia and Sunni for dominance in the Middle East. The difference between these groups is so silly, that to have an entire region erupt in a religious civil war just boggles the imagination.

To add to the mix, today Iran executed a man they said was a Mossad agent, who confessed to killing one of their nuclear scientists a couple of years ago. Was he really a spy and was he guilty? We'll never really know, because his trial was held privately, and because he was said to have confessed, not subject to appeal. Reminds me a bit of the military trials the US wants to have with prisoners in Guantanamo...

Well, its official, Ron Paul has conceded that Mit Romney has enough delegates to become the presidential nominee, and he is stopping campaigning nationally. Instead, his followers are sneaking into state conventions and trying to take as many delegates as they can, in case their is a brokered convention, ya never know... And, failing that, they are trying to get as many positions of leadership in the state parties as they can.

As the head of Mr Paul's campaign said in an interview: “We laid out a strategy that would have put us in a very good position at a brokered convention. Unfortunately other candidates were not able to maintain their strength and only Ron and Gov. Romney remain. We recognize that Gov. Romney has what is very likely to be an insurmountable delegate lead.”

Ron never had the resources to stage a major campaign, and is serious about his chances only in his dreams. Personally, I like Libertarians a lot. As a group, they are a lot crankier than I am. If you ever get a chance to attend a Libertarian convention, it has better entertainment value than any movie plot you could ever conceive... It has elements of old acid-heads, spouting out-there gibberish, mixed with every form of conservative conspiracy theory ever invented, and a few well thought out ideas that you wish would be made into policy immediately. It's inclusive to Occupy Wallstreet and End the Fed...

And quite a vocal crowd, as demonstrated by the catcalls and booing at Romney supporters in the last couple of Republican conventions. So unruly that it worries the Ron Paul campaign, who issued a call for civility and respect come this summer and the national convention in Tampa. Ha ha ha, like that'll work. Whether you believe in climate change or not, its going to be another long, hot Summer, with the heat and humidity making us old folks bitchy and mean. It'll get real feisty in Tampa, now that the Woodstock generation has spent the last few years whacked out on prescription neuroleptics, and show these tea partiers how its really done right...