Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Turns On Dmitry Medvedev

Does Gilligan have a death wish?

God, he sounds like George Bush or Glenn Beck. I’m sure the Russians just love being spoken to like that, too. No wonder Iranians voted against that guy.

It’s interesting that whenever the media is criticizing this administration they use simple declarative statements. However, when he does something right there is always a qualification. either the policy is working or its not. “Seems to” is the last refuge for a media that hates having to acknowledge this president’s successes because it’s contrary to the latest media narrative.

I take it you’re not referring to the president of Iran.

But But I thought Obama was in over his head and the Russians were laughing at us and smurfs were not really real. Where are the freepers?

Ooooh, man I bet the Russians are shaking in their boots now! /snark
I don’t quite understand what Ahmadinejad is trying to accomplish with this. He really does sound like Bush at his best (worst), except here it is truly empty bellicosity since there is no military force to back it up.
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Oh well, so much the better to have Iran diplomatically isolated, means that there might be a way to have effective international responses to future Iranian actions.

Give them a second. They have to be told what they’re supposed to say before they say it.

Showing up in 3…2…1…

Of course not! I’m referring to Michael’s statement that “The official Obama administration policy to work with China and Russia diplomatically to isolate Iran, according to a Reuter’s report seems to be working.”

Ok, the Russians just signed on to sanctions….somehow I don’t they were expecting hugs and kisses from Iran.

*I don’t think they…

Does this mean the Russians have finally capitulated to Obama’s “sanctions”, Michael?
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Or is this just another middle east Dictator who is frothing at the mouth again?
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What sanctions is Ahmadenijad so afraid that Russia will back that Obama has proposed? To stop the flow of bibles into Iran? To corral unicorns, and not allow them to cross over the border between Iraq and Iran?
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Oh I know what the sanction is, “stop the illegal use of Tooth Fairies from flying into Tehran”. I think that is one of the best “sanctions” the Obama Administration has come up with to date.

Interesting tantrum, Rusty. Just for clarification, are you more upset that Russia is cooperating with us, or that we’re using sanctions instead of bombs?

I used to suspect that Ahmadinejad’s rants were just theater, acting, for effect. This one directed at Russia causes me to think that the guy really is as foolish as his posturing appears. If he had any sense he would get to Moscow on his knees asking how to make things better. Idiot.

Ahmadenijad seems to think the Russians are of the belief that friendship means turning the other cheek, even when you are in violation of agreements or the law. They must be shaking in their boots at the thought of having Ahmadenija view them as historic enemies.

I know, especially given these rankings
http://www.globalfirepower.com/
(Disclaimer: I am not familiar with the site, this is what a quick Google search found)

So how does this play in the Iranian street… at least to the folks that are supposed to matter in the Iranian street? Is this chest beating to impress Iran’s multitude of rich, generous, and cooperative Middle East neighbors?
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If the US left all fossil fuels behind Iran would just be Nari spelled backwards.

I suppose my snark went right over your head, anon. Please tell me which sanctions Russia is agreeing with the US on? Have any clue.
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Oh, and instead of corraling all the unicorns, maybe we should go with carousel pink ponies. I think our Dear Leader is more partial to the carousel pink ponies. Don’t you think so too, anon?
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In other news which is more relevant and TIME reporters such as Michael Scherer neglect to report on…
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http://www.projo.com/news/content/tax_refund_delays_05-26-10_FKIKNT3_v8.381d9b9.html
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No more refunds. Rhode Island will not pay out the tax refunds this year.
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Whereas fiscal reponsibility when practiced DOES make a big difference. Gov Christie’s plan is working in New Jersey.
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http://wcbstv.com/politics/chris.christie.new.2.1714647.html
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But, how long will New Jersey residents be able to breath easy with the notion of freezing Unionized wages for Government workers and Teachers will be gobbled up by the now…………….. 13 TRILLION dollar national debt.
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http://www.usdebtclock.org/
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Ten percent more in debt and we shall have acheived spending at exactly our GDP of a little over 14 trillion dollars. I wonder how long it takes from there to declare bankruptcy?
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More good news on the Global Warming front. Skiing on Memorial Day in California!!!!!
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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/05/25/BABV1DK6CM.DTL

“Whereas fiscal reponsibility when practiced DOES make a big difference. Gov Christie’s plan is working in New Jersey.”
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Which is why 30,000 people showed up to protest it. According to the Tea Party math that Rusty is so fond of, that means the vast majority of Real Americans™ are against it. Right, Rusty?
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“More good news on the Global Warming front. Skiing on Memorial Day in California!!!!!”
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In other good news, there were no bombings in the U.S. today, so the Global War on Terror is over! Oh and if you’re smoking cigarettes, and you don’t have cancer today, you’ll never get it!
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If only conservatives ran everything, we could win the War Against Science once and for all! If you’re not with us, you’re with the scientists!

Rusty, there’s been a few posts over the last week and I think an article by Joe that have given a rough idea of what’s in the sanctions package. I can’t remember the full list of details but included is an agreement that the Russians will stop selling military equipment to Iran.

Ah who exactly where the “30,000 protesters” momento? I guess they wouldn’t have been the AFSME Government workers and Teachers who belong to the NEA would they? You know BIG UNION.
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Kinda like the “protesters” in Maryland outside of DC who were SEIU thugs who went onto a private citizens property because he happened to work for a Bank they are mad at and traumatized his 14 year old son. Right mo-mo-momento???
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You know 500 members of the union SEIU??? Yea that’s real grassroots there no doubt. The very same thing like the Tea Party Protesters are as well.

Ah who exactly where the “Tea Party protesters”? I guess they wouldn’t have been a bunch of rubes setup by Dick Armey and the FreedomWorks front group? You know REPUBLICANS.
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See? I can do it too, Rusty. Typos, bad grammar, and all.
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If 5000 Tea Partiers are legitimate then 30,000 union members are, too. Or not. The point is: You can’t have it both ways.

But wait, Rusty, there’s more!
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http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/04/gov_chris_christie_says_protes.html
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But I’m sure all those students are just the kids of SEIU thugs. Yeah, that’s it….

I say this as someone who studied Russian foreign policy in great detail in college, and has paid attention to Iran and North Korea’s bluster over the years.
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The Russians certainly are not intimidated by the Iranians in the classical sense of the word. However they do have a number of fairly lucrative contracts with Tehran. Most notable of late is a contract to sell the S-300 Surface to Air Missile system (and RADAR/Guidance system) to the Iranians as well as contracts for other military and civilian use hardware. The key to this is that Iran actually will pay them in hard currency (for now at least) something the Russian’s still need a lot of and unlike China who paid in cassette players for a new howitzer artillery system the Russians sold them. Just as the French wanted their money out of Iraq the Russians want theirs out of Iran.
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On top of that Iran and North Korea (I know you were waiting for me to tie them in after I mentioned them) have found that the world generally backs down if the bluster and saber rattle enough. The world screamed bloody murder about North Korea working on/testing/building nuclear weapons, but did almost NOTHING to stop them, and now the Iranian government expects the same treatment. Sanctions are only effective if the ruling class in a country actually cares about the people it rules over, if they don’t care that a lot of their citizens are on the brink of starvation, then all sanctions do is hurt the poor and middle classes while generally enriching the elites. In the case of North Korea, we have hurt the lower classes to the point that they are incapable of overthrowing their government (which we and most of the world would love). Now North Korea has nuclear weapons and apparently feels they can sink a South Korean vessel, killing a number of people, with impunity and then threaten to re-commence hostilities towards the South in terms of full scale war also with impunity. This particular situation could go sideways quite fast depending on how crazy Kim is and how loyal his military commanders are.
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Back to Iran; I view this “threat” against Russia as nothing but bluster for now, as I’m sure the Russian security services do. However, what’s “in between the lines” of that threat is basically a statement to Russia of this: “We’re working on nuclear weapons and we MIGHT just be crazy enough to use them. We’re more than willing to destabilize an entire region of the world (the Middle East) for the chance at becoming the country with hegemony there. Not only have we made this abundantly clear, you know damn right well the rest of the world will sit there with its thumb up its collective butt while we manufacture nuclear warheads and weaponize them. You might want to reconsider angering us now because if we destabilize the region (which we will probably be allowed to do) your interests in the region will suffer greatly and your military is in such a shocking state of disrepair there won’t be ANYTHING you can do about it other than be at our beck and call.”
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Just my read of it considering, that Ahmadinejad is nothing more than a mouthpiece for a bunch of completely insane religious whack-jobs that care nothing for anything more than increasing their own power and forcing their religion on others.