Iran

Is it just me or does this whole Iran debate seem a little too familiar?

You've got the Bush administration claiming that Iran has nuclear ambitions and that it needs to be stopped at any cost. You've got Iran saying that it's for purely civilian energy purposes, screaming their defense. You've got Seymour Hersh saying there are plans in the works to prepare for a possible attack on Iran (this seems most likely). And, you've got the international community lukewarm on the idea of invading, or even sanctioning, Iran. All of this sounds ridiculous. The kicker though, is that you've got intelligence analysts saying that their intelligence picture of Iran is actually worse than the pre-war intelligence of Iraq. And even by the best estimates of American intelligence (John Negroponte), even if Iran was allowed the civilian technology, nuclear weapons are still a decade out.

Wow. I hope this doesn't end up the same as Iraq.

It seems to me that there is something inherently arrogant behind the idea of stopping a country to use peaceful technology. Granted, it could turn bad, but if they would be willing to have the IAEA start an office in Tehran or something to keep an eye on it, the US should back off.

I'm not saying it would be good to have a nuclear armed Iran, but from everything I read this debate is just reinforcing the Iranian public's support in their government. As far as I knew, their support of their government was waning and analysts have been saying that Iran is ripe for an internal revolution of the people any minute now. So when we challenge something that can be viewed as "The World" against Iran, that would seem to me be a catalyst to reunite the people and keep this government in power longer. And then you've got the Hawks inside the administration calling for regime change already.

The way we're going about things just seems ass-backwards to me.

But what do I know? I'm just an asshole who reads the news a lot. I could be wrong, but somehow I doubt it on this one.