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The Pursuit of Knowledge
Dealing With Iran
There’s a reason why paranoids have enemies: they create them.
IT IS NEARLY 30 YEARS SINCE Islamist students and Revolutionary Guards, with the support of the Iranian government, invaded the U.S. embassy in Tehran and took 52 American citizens into captivity—a captivity that would last 444 days, and which included the usual humiliations of blindfolded parades before the media and scripted confessions. President Carter chose not to regard this outrage as a declaration of war, though de facto, and probably de jure, that is what it was. His subsequent attempt to rescue the “hostages” was a disastrous failure and, instead of learning from the experience, the president left office with the determination to brand himself as the exponent of soft power in a world of violence. His failure to retaliate at the moment when retaliation was called for is the root cause, in my view, of Khomeini’s triumph, and of the growth in the belligerence and military capacity of Iran, which will shortly be a nuclear power able to threaten all of us. It also enabled the Iranians to believe that “hostage-taking” is a cheap and effective way of humiliating adversaries and achieving short-term political objectives. Two years ago Iranian Revolutionary Guards seized 15 British navy personnel from a patrol boat in the Gulf and enjoyed the opportunity to show the powerlessness of the Royal Navy in the new world of “war by media.” The 15 were released, after the usual humiliations, and Iranian power, belligerence, and self-confidence was ratcheted up another notch.
In the dispute over the recent elections it has been possible to glimpse the real source of policy in Iran-the paranoid old geezers in beards who emerge from behind the president to declare that Britain and America are the “evil enemies” of their country. At their behest innocent people are taken prisoner from the British embassy—Iranians, this time, but accused of collaboration with a hostile foreign power. And again we rush around in a flurry of doubt, consulting our feeble partners in the EU, wondering whether to break off diplomatic relations, while the BBC goes out of its way to remind us that Britain and America have a long and disgraceful record of interference in Iranian affairs, and that after all the paranoia might be justified.
Actually, paranoia is always justified. The paranoid is the person who creates the enmity that he begins by suspecting. When reasonable people witness the Iranian Revolutionary Guard parading their blindfolded hostages, or the bearded loons delivering their humorless indictments of the Great Satan, they respond with indignation. Who are these people, they ask, who assume the right to threaten and intimidate whomsoever they choose? Nothing makes me regret the decline of the Royal Navy more vividly than witnessing Iranian belligerence, in all its primitive self-deception, put on public display. So yes, these guys are right to believe they have enemies, and they can count me among them.
But what about our governments? Do they respond as you and I respond to the sight of flag-burning, air-punching, slogan-shouting men who seem to have nothing behind their beards save teeth? The answer, I fear, is no. Their response may not be as feeble as President Carter’s was. But it still falls far short of anything that the Iranians need to take seriously. The Iranians have been permitted a run of cost-free bellicosity, during which we maintain embassies and trade relations that serve no purpose but to maintain the supply of innocent victims, should victims be needed. We constantly endeavor to enter into dialogue with senile buffoons who have mastered no style of speech save that of the monologue; we tolerate the presence of President Ahmadinejad in New York, where he is able to address Columbia University without fear of being blindfolded and paraded on television as he deserves; we negotiate with the Islamic Republic through the UN and the EU, but without making any threat that Iran needs to take on board. We even go so far as to neutralize the only country, Iraq, that has made war on Iran, so leaving the Islamic Republic over-armed and under-threatened. And in all this, it seems to me, we repeat a mistake that caused all the great catastrophes of the 20th century: the mistake of not taking paranoia seriously.
The paranoid personality is the one who cannot accept the Other. Although he recognizes that other people exist after their fashion, he responds to them as threats and mysteries that he must do his best to bring under his own control. Only when dominated by the self is the Other acceptable, since only then is he not truly other. The paranoid has no conception of equal dialogue or partnership, and it is impossible for him to look on himself from outside, and to judge what he finds. He receives all criticism as an assault, self-criticism included. He proceeds through life with uniform motion in a straight line until encountering some external force or immovable obstacle.
STATES CAN BE PARANOID in the same way. This was what the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany had in common, and what made them so dangerous. Paranoid states regard others as threats or mysteries, which must be brought under control. They have no conception of dialogue and regard diplomacy as war by other means. They crush opposition at home, since self-criticism is as much a threat as the existence of other plans, other schemes, than the plans and schemes that propel them. They proceed in a straight line until encountering some external force, like Nazi Germany, or hitting a brick wall, like the Soviet Union.
Our politicians never understood this. They did not see, in 1938, that diplomatic relations with Nazi Germany, and treaties like the one signed at Munich, were steps on the way to capitulation. They never saw that diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union were of no use to us, and of enormous use to the Soviets in tying our hands. A paranoid state will sign treaties; it will present a smiling face like the faces of Hitler at Munich and Stalin at Yalta; it will indignantly protest whenever some minute obligation undertaken by others seems to have been neglected. But it cannot be bound by treaties and will always regard them as instruments for achieving its ultimate goal of domination. Its dialogues are carefully disguised monologues, and it looks for the sources of criticism not in order to listen to them, but in order to silence them.
Hence all diplomacy with the Soviet Union had the effect of increasing Soviet power, as we bound ourselves by treaties that the Soviets disregarded, and as we opened our resources, our media, and our gullible intellectuals to a power that would never reciprocate so precious a gift. It is only when Ronald Reagan arrived on the scene, and decided to place a brick wall in the unalterable path of the great machine, that it came abruptly to a halt.
Now I don’t say that Iran is quite as paranoid a state as the Soviet Union. But it has a striking “personality disorder” that emulates those of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. It extends only a circumscribed permission to its domestic critics; it lives under a delusion of enemy encirclement, identifying the tiny state of Israel as the mastermind behind a worldwide anti-Iranian conspiracy—and would that there were one. It has the paranoid conception of treaties, namely as low-level warfare, with which to tie the other’s hands. And it is programmed by plans and schemes which, conceived in the heads of wizened old theocrats and translated into the mouth of the demagogue Ahmadinejad, are entirely un-alterable by any fact or argument that might tend in a contrary direction.
If in ordinary life you encounter a real paranoid, there is only one safe way to proceed. Do not enter into dialogue; do not give hostages in the form of things that you want from him; do not make any part of your life depend on his decisions or goodwill. Steer a course around him and make for the hills. It seems to me that this is also how we should deal with paranoid states. Break off diplomatic relations, cutback all ties of trade and mutual interest, and ensure that nothing that we want or need depends upon the other’s say-so. Whether or not we respond to Iran in this way, Iran will treat us—the English-speaking world—as its enemy. But if we respond as I advise, then we will be in the best position to defend ourselves from any future aggression while getting on with building that solid brick wall in the unalterable path of the mullahs.
About the Author
Roger Scruton is a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. His latest book, How to Think Seriously About the Planet: The Case for an Environmental Conservatism, has just been published by Oxford University Press.
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Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 8:33AM
top notch piece.
Frankly, the best outcome for us in WWII would have been for the Commies and Nazis to have killed each other off. Madison (this is a slight digression) had the right idea-- keep everybody fighting so as to keep the self-seekers at bay. 'Check' them. And checkmate them.
The irony, the great irony, in Mideast terms, is if the Arabs who hate Israel did succeed in driving Israel into the sea, they'd have each other to check for a long, long time.
Check as in say, ...kill. Say.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 8:34AM
"Whether or not we respond to Iran in this way, Iran will treat us—the English-speaking world—as its enemy"
My, my, my. Someone sure sounds paranoid.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 8:40AM
of course critics can say we supported Shah Reza Pahlavi.
But, just for instance, Mossadegh was footsie towards the Russians.
And, not merely btw, Stalin killed almost as many of his own people as Hitler did. Quite an achievement of population control, even if Koba didn't say so himself.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 8:42AM
"They did not see, in 1938, that diplomatic relations with Nazi Germany, and treaties like the one signed at Munich, were steps on the way to capitulation."
To reference 1938 Munich appeasement in any argument involving contemporary American foreign policy always and invariably discredits whoever is making the argument. The scenario we face today with Iran and the one faced in 1938 with Germany are profoundly dissimilar and not even remotely analogous.
It is a tawdry, puerile argument that relies entirely on the visceral, emotional reaction to Nazism and not at all on the reality of the situation we face now.
The irony is that to see evil Hitlers and Nazi-esque threats around every corner is the very definition of "paranoia".
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 8:49AM
oh Toddard you are so trite. You don't know how tedious it is to read comments from someone so pollyannish, smarmy overeducated-yet-underinformed. How old are you? 34? You're a fine lad. Just go elsewhere. Good boy. Wrong blog.
Can't you go to the Progressive Touchie-Feelie site? You waste space here. At least Bob has something to say. one actually learns something from Bob's comments.
Funny, you're the shill, Teddy, er, Toddy, boy. Not AS.
Too bad you'll be the last to know. But you dig your own grave; and if you don't like it, then you make your own bed. You're like a kid in a classroom, so we wouldn't want to subtract anything from your wittle self esteem.
Tim| 9.3.09 @ 8:50AM
Rooster Cogburn: Mr. Rat, I have a writ here says you're to stop eating Chin Lee's cornmeal forthwith. Now it's a rat writ, writ for a rat, and this is lawful service of the same. See, doesn't pay any attention to me.
[shoots the rat]
Chen Lee: [Runs into the room] Outside is place for shooting!
Rooster Cogburn: I'm servin' some papers!
[to Mattie] You can't serve papers on a rat, baby sister. You either kill him or let him be.
True Grit.
Tim| 9.3.09 @ 8:50AM
Rooster Cogburn: Mr. Rat, I have a writ here says you're to stop eating Chin Lee's cornmeal forthwith. Now it's a rat writ, writ for a rat, and this is lawful service of the same. See, doesn't pay any attention to me.
[shoots the rat]
Chen Lee: [Runs into the room] Outside is place for shooting!
Rooster Cogburn: I'm servin' some papers!
[to Mattie] You can't serve papers on a rat, baby sister. You either kill him or let him be.
True Grit.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 9:00AM
"The scenario we face today with Iran and the one faced in 1938 with Germany are profoundly dissimilar and not even remotely analogous."
that's the whole subtle (un-Toddard) point, you dummkopf. Every situation is different; if such weren't so we could have a draw-by-numbers foreign policy, we wouldn't need Hillary at all. We could hire Robert Crumb. What a brilliant blockhead you are, Teddard.
And you went to private schools??
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 9:06AM
I just wish we could move Israel to a better location, and let those feudalists clean each others' clocks.
but that's the last thing they really want. I just hope all of Israel's enemies turn out to be too devious even for their own good.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 9:37AM
"that's the whole subtle (un-Toddard) point, you dummkopf"
Ah. The point of this article is to emphasize the *dissimilarities* between Iran and Nazi Germany/Soviet Russia? That the lessons we supposedly learned after Munich are *not* applicable here? That Iran does *not* possess "a striking "personality disorder" that emulates those of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia"?
Subtle indeed.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 11:12AM
''Ah. The point of this article is to emphasize the *dissimilarities* between Iran and Nazi Germany/Soviet Russia? That the lessons we supposedly learned after Munich are *not* applicable here? That Iran does *not* possess "a striking "personality disorder" that emulates those of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia"? ''
NO, not the point of the article; you can draw conclusions based on nuances-- subtle, unToddard nuances.
"International affairs", Teddard.
A little Byzantine, one might say. There are no real laws or rules.
But give it 100 years.
(psssssst, fella; maybe nobody has told you this, but, this is a conservative/rightwing blog).
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 11:16AM
"Now I don't say that Iran is quite as paranoid a state as the Soviet Union..."
The above is what the author, whose pieces are about 300x more interesting to read as your comments are, wrote.
Lieberman in Africa| 9.3.09 @ 11:31AM
Buzz Up! Print Story Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Wednesday said Africa should help moderate Arab positions to solve the Middle East crisis, as he began a five-nation tour of the continent. Skip related content
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Lieberman, who arrived in Ethiopia at the start of the tour, said: "Africa's ties with Arab and Muslim countries, whether within the framework of the Arab League, the Islamic Conference or the African Union, place the countries of Africa in a position to contribute positive influence.
"We look to Africa to help promote moderation and reconciliation in the Middle East."
Many African countries, often cajoled by Libya whose leader Moamer Kadhafi currently holds the African Union chairmanship, have traditionally backed Palestinians in their conflict with Israel.
Kadhafi accused Israel Monday of being "behind all of Africa's conflicts" during a special AU summit in Tripoli.
"Indeed, within the African Union itself it is very important that the decisions and activities of African states reflect a positive and constructive approach, one that rejects one-sided decisions against Israel," Lieberman said.
His eight-day trip aimed at bolstering Israel's standing on the continent, will also take him to Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria and Uganda. It is one of the most extensive trips by an Israeli foreign minister to Africa in recent years
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 11:36AM
here is an excerpt from a (nonToddard) deep thinker
Many blame Germany’s aggressions on the supposedly harsh terms of the Versailles Treaty following the First World War, which stripped a defeated Germany of territory, required reparations, and dismantled its military.
But Versailles was far more lenient than what the Germans had planned for Britain and France should they have won in 1918. And it was not nearly as harsh as the terms the Germans imposed on a defeated Russia under the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in early 1918, before they lost the larger conflict.
A better reason there was a Second World War, but not a Third, is that Germany was occupied and monitored after 1945 — unlike following its previous defeat in 1918.
Most give the Red Army the most credit for wrecking the German army. That is absolutely true: Two of three German soldiers who died in the war were killed on the murderous Eastern Front, a larger theater of conflict than all others combined.
Yet despite the superhuman heroism of millions of brave Russian soldiers, Stalin’s Soviet government was largely an amoral actor throughout the war. It, along with Hitler’s Germany, invaded neutral Poland in September 1939. Three months later, it attacked tiny Finland.
Until the day it was invaded by Hitler, Stalin’s Soviet Union had provided Nazi industry with much of its strategic materials used to defeat and occupy democratic Western Europe. Communist Russia renounced most of its wartime promises, guaranteeing that a war that started to free Eastern Europe from totalitarian government ended by ensuring it under Soviet control.
Armegado 2010| 9.3.09 @ 11:38AM
America, Israel, Europe, Africa in War in the Middle East.
I think I just heard of a death wish. Why would Africans go into such a war for Israel, who held Black people in Slavery all across Europe & America, for money. What would Israel use to bribe the African corrupt leaders. Like the corrupt American leaders in their PONZI schemes. It seems that Israel wants a World War, and has started it's campaign to bring in the nations of the world to distruction in Armegado, I will not be attending.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 11:39AM
the above was a bit offtopic, but posted to show how some people can think in a nuanced, unToddard, fahion.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 11:41AM
Daph,
right, you wont be attending; you'll be sleeping off your haldol.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 12:03PM
Indeed, I would also describe that regurgitation of universally-accepted conventional wisdom "un-Toddard-like". Of course, because the Nazis had worse in store for the nations they'd conquered had they won does not negate the obvious truth that their rise was a result of Versailles. I'm not sure who this writer is, but he's not very adept at making an argument. And only a profoundly undereducated rube would find the observation that Soviet Russia was "an amoral actor" some sort of deep revelation.
About the only statement in that rather tedious, uncontroversial excerpt that anyone could take issue with is this:
"A better reason there was a Second World War, but not a Third, is that Germany was occupied and monitored after 1945"
The idea that Germany was gearing up for WWIII after having their entire military, industry and infrastructure obliterated is... eccentric, to say the least. Perhaps this "writer" possesses a crystal ball with which to gaze into an alternate past and predict what *would* have happened decades after the fall of Nazi Germany if only Germany had not then been occupied.
Is the author Harry Turtledove?
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 12:34PM
I should say, Mr. Brooks, that I do understand why that piece appeals to you: it reaffirms things you already believe. Neoconservative are always very happy to be told things they already agree with, and hate nothing more than having those ideas challenged. And this pits fits perfectly into that echo-chamber dynamic. Because the author says things you already want to believe, you consider it deeply revelatory. I mean the author is clearly a "deep thinker", offering such "nuanced" concepts as "USA good!" and "Nazis bad!" On top of that it tells you that not only is conquest and occupation good (which you are truly desperate to believe, now that the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have exposed neoconservative foreign policy to be an utter, unmitigated failure), but it saved us all from "WWIII", which surely would have been bad (see: "Nazis bad!" earlier in post).
Very, very deep stuff. Extremely "nuanced".
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 12:35PM
pits fits!
Joe| 9.3.09 @ 1:16PM
Well, my my my S.L. Toddard, someone seems nieve and ignorant of history. And obviously too stupid to learn. So like Davey boy we should just ignore.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 1:38PM
"Well, my my my S.L. Toddard, someone seems nieve and ignorant"
If you mean ignorant of how to spell *naive* then yes, I agree.
Tim| 9.3.09 @ 3:08PM
[Hitler] has grasped the falsity of the hedonistic attitude to life. Nearly all western thought since the last war, certainly all ‘progressive’ thought, has assumed tacitly that human beings desire nothing beyond ease, security, and avoidance of pain. In such a view of life there is no room, for instance, for patriotism and the military virtues. The Socialist who finds his children playing with soldiers is usually upset, but he is never able to think of a substitute for the tin soldiers; tin pacifists somehow won’t do. Hitler, because in his own joyless mind he feels it with exceptional strength, knows that human beings don’t only want comfort, safety, short working-hours, hygiene, birth-control and, in general, common sense; they also, at least intermittently, want struggle and self-sacrifice, not to mention drums, flag and loyalty-parades…. Whereas Socialism, and even capitalism in a grudging way, have said to people ‘I offer you a good time,’ Hitler has said to them ‘I offer you struggle, danger and death,’ and as a result a whole nation flings itself at his feet.
George Orwell, from a review of Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf, New English Weekly (1940-03-21)
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 3:36PM
Orwell! Fantastic. Here is another Orwell quote describing perfectly the jingoistic "journalists" who ceaselessly beat the drums for war - against Iraq, Iran, or whomever is next:
The people who write that kind of stuff never fight; possibly they believe that to write it is a substitute for fighting. It is the same in all wars; the soldiers do the fighting, the journalists do the shouting, and no true patriot ever gets near a front-line trench, except on the briefest of propaganda-tours.
Sometimes it is a comfort to me to think that the aeroplane is altering the conditions of war. Perhaps when the next great war comes we may see that sight unprecedented in all history, a jingo with a bullet-hole in him.
- George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia
John| 9.3.09 @ 3:49PM
This article is less than solid, since it doesn't deal with a fundamental factor in our dealings with Iran: Oil and the Arab world. Just why is it that the U.S. has not long ago either broken off all dealings with Iran or dealt with it militarily? Oil and the Arab world. Like it or not, for the foreseeable future we need Middle Eastern oil. This requires us to have decent relations with influential Arab nations. If we treat Iran as we wish we could, our relationships with Arab nations would no longer be decent, and we would jeapordize not only the price and supply of oil from Iran, which is significant, but also that of other important Arab nations. Therefore we must draw lines we wish we did not have to draw, and we must continue to hold our nose and deal with Iraq, and therefore Iran, and therefore Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
Include this fundamental fact in your essay and the main premiss seems to fall apart, that we should just break off all attempts to deal with Iran.
Tim| 9.3.09 @ 4:00PM
John, Iran is not an Arab nation. They are Persians and Shia muslims and the historical animosities run back centuries between Arab and Persians, as well as Sunni and Shia.
Tim| 9.3.09 @ 4:05PM
Toddard my dear fellow, perhaps I was unclear; I was trying to underscore that "paranoid Iranians" may be better understood if we allow that they may not in fact be interested (solely or even chiefly) in peace and prosperity.
Obama's overture's to Iran strike me as coming from a distinctly Western bias that can be summed up as ; "Looks like somebody needs a hug" diplomacy.
New York Protest| 9.3.09 @ 4:18PM
New York: Haredim equate Jerusalem police with Nazis
Anti-Zionist Jews gather outside Israeli Consulate in Manhattan to protest treatment of religious Jews opposed to opening of parking lot in capital on Shabbat. 'Government, Jerusalem municipal government committing acts of brutality against religious Jews on scale not seen in last 65 years,' Satmar rabbi says
Reuters and Daniel Edelson Published: 09.03.09, 19:20 / Israel News
Hundreds of anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox Jews demonstrated Wednesday in front of the Israeli Consulate in Manhattan in reaction to the recent clashes between police and religious Jews in Jerusalem over a new parking lot opened by the government near the religious neighborhood of Meah Shearim.
Tension Mounts
Haredim, seculars clash in Jerusalem / Efrat Weiss
Hundreds of ultra-Orthodox rioters block roads in protest of parking lot's opening on Shabbat
Full Story
Religious Jews object to the government's decision to keep the parking lot open on the Jewish Sabbath.
"The Israeli government and the Jerusalem municipal government are committing acts of brutality against religious Jews on a scale not seen in the last 65 years," said Rabbi Menashe Fulop, a prominent Rabbi of the Satmar Hasidic community.
"For the past three months, religious Jews have been regularly beaten mercilessly at demonstrations, called by the chief rabbis of Jerusalem, against the parking lot set up by the city government right next to the walls of the Old City. The government is inviting Sabbath-desecrators from the entire country to come to the Holy City, the palace of G-d, the place where the Divine Presence resides, to insult G-d, who warned in His Torah against the desecration of the Sabbath."
Rally outside consulate in New York (Photo: Ilan Klein)
This wave of violence reached its peak this past Friday night, August 28, when a police officer directed a driver stopped at a traffic light to proceed, although, the religious community claims, the officer was aware of the religious Jew lying under his car. The driver obeyed, injuring the man and dragging his body some distance along the road. The man is still hospitalized.
A similar incident occurred on Sunday, August 30, at a demonstration staged by religious Jews to protest an autopsy of the body of a Jewish man stabbed to death the previous night: a police car struck and seriously wounded one of the protestors.
"In which country in the world do religious Jews suffer as much persecution as in the state that calls itself Israel?" said Rabbi Fulop.
Yirmiyahu Cohen of the "Jews against Zionism" organization told Ynet that the demonstration was held as a show of support for the haredi community's struggle against the opening of the parking lot on Shabbat, adding that police used "excessive force and did some cruel things."
'Jews beaten mercilessly.' New York rally (Photo: Ilan Klein)
Cohen admitted that the affair served as an excuse for his group to protest against the State of Israel. "We are not against the Israeli people; we oppose the Israeli government and the fact that it is running the country instead of living in the Diaspora. According to the Torah, Jews must remain in the Diaspora until the coming of the messiah," he said.
Police Commissioner Dudi Cohen said this week that he had no plans to turn a blind eye to the situation. "Every public in the State of Israel has the right to protest," Cohen said, "But at the end of the day, there will be zero tolerance to 'Nazi' chants and spitting at policemen."
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As for the dispute over the parking lot, the police chief said the matter must be solved between the Jerusalem Municipality and the protesting haredi community.
"In any case, we will always be there to handle the event. I believe the way the Israel Police are dealing with this is the most professional and correct way, with a lot of tolerance and patience. But the solution must be between the two sides," Cohen said.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 4:27PM
"I mean the author is clearly a "deep thinker", offering such "nuanced" concepts as "USA good!" and "Nazis bad!" On top of that it tells you that not only is conquest and occupation good (which you are truly desperate to believe, now that the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have exposed neoconservative foreign policy to be an utter, unmitigated failure), but it saved us all from "WWIII", which surely would have been bad (see: "Nazis bad!" earlier in post)."
well, the author (Victor Davis Hanson) is writing for the public, which is poorly educated. Maybe we will withdraw feom Afghanistan soon it might be too ate there. I'm no neocon, btw.
I never trusted Bush, he is a RINO down to his cells; so are Jeb and Jenna.
But I trust them more than YOU, Toddard.
Hope I can write that without hurting your feelings.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 4:35PM
sorry for the typos, maybe we will withdraw from Afghanistan.. it might be too late. And perhaps Iraq will go down. But who started the whole mess in Iraq? the Soviets invaded in '78. you could go back farther in time for the blamegame, but '78 is the proximate cause.
Iraq? are Iraqis worse off in 2009 than 2002? some are natch. Look, IMO for one to win another must lose. Being an ex-lib I don't like it all--but I do not make the rules anymore than you do. IMO there will always be winners and losers.
Was the 2003 Iraq invasion a mistake?
I don't know. I don't know everything; only you do, Toddard. You're the oracle of AS.
Hey, nice ring to it. the Oracle of AS.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 4:38PM
sorry again, Todd; meant to write the Russkies invaded Afghanistan in '78, not Iraq. You must be rubbing off on me.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 6:24PM
"Iraq? are Iraqis worse off in 2009 than 2002?"
Of course they are. Hundreds of thousands of them are dead, millions of them displaced, and they all live in a country that has had its infrastructure obliterated and has ceased to work.
"Was the 2003 Iraq invasion a mistake?
I don't know."
Yes you do - it was. We went in to deprive Saddam Hussein of WMD he did not have. We were mistaken, and made a mistake. There's no question of that any more.
Bob| 9.3.09 @ 6:38PM
Alan, do not overlook the fact that S.L. Toddard actually did time in Ft Leavenworth for various hate crimes including the firebombing of a synagog...
Bob| 9.3.09 @ 6:41PM
The jerk is a total nobody and he doesn't even exist!
Just check Intelius.com and you'll see there is no S.L. Toddard in the USA.
Bob| 9.3.09 @ 6:44PM
He just has a slight varnish of what casually passes for culture but it was painstakingly acquired in Leavenworth's library between unpleasant episodes in the shower room.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 6:46PM
This is an outrageous lie, it was not a synagog, it was a baptist school.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 7:44PM
"Just check Intelius.com and you'll see there is no S.L. Toddard in the USA"
Thank you. I quite forgot I had an actual stalker.
Bob| 9.3.09 @ 8:03PM
What did you expect, moron? You crashed here, on this conservative website and decided to parasite it, despite our warnings. Shouldn't we check your credentials?
Bob| 9.3.09 @ 8:04PM
We don't want you here. You blow ragheads for a living.
S.L. Toddard| 9.3.09 @ 8:20PM
"What did you expect, moron?"
I certainly didn't expect a sad, lonely shut-in to become so obsessed with my writing that, like some sort of demented and love-struck super-fan, he/she would wage a full-court press trying to uncover any tidbit about me they could find to fetishize.
Trust me - I understand that in its own warped fashion it's a compliment. And I appreciate it - really I do - but it's just creepy having a stalker. I don't begrudge you your homoerotic crush - what you do in the privacy of your own home is your business, not mine. It's just sad, I guess, to be reminded that there are people out there that are so forlorn, lonely and desperate.
Anyway I wish you the best, sincerely, and I hope things get better for you. Do you have any family you can talk to about your problem?
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Cool website, like what I have read. Will definitely be back to read again.
Alan Brooks| 9.3.09 @ 9:58PM
well, Saddam is gone, and that is a plus.
netlog | 9.3.09 @ 11:20PM
thanks so much bebeimmmm xDd
Richard Baker| 9.3.09 @ 11:27PM
Remember, the Sage from Plains gave us this disaster with his hounding of the Shah from the country. Aren't we glad that happened?
Hydraulic Valves | 9.4.09 @ 2:06AM
That's the last thing they really want.
alafa | 9.4.09 @ 3:21AM
In which country in the world do religious Jews suffer as much persecution as in the state that calls itself Israel?" said Rabbi Fulop.
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Barckly | 9.4.09 @ 3:35AM
Anyway I wish you the best, sincerely, and I hope things get better for you.
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S.L. Toddard| 9.4.09 @ 10:18AM
I apologize for the indecent proposal toward Bob, it is the very first time anybody cares about me. Nobody in Leavenworth ever did.
Richard Baker| 9.4.09 @ 11:46AM
Hey S.L. you should try those lines each time Smokie asks you to show your driver's licence!
You're really a pompous pervert! lol
Richard Baker| 9.4.09 @ 9:36PM
Richard Baker did not write the insult to S.L. above. Bad show,whoever wrote it, but not my style. Find your own name.
S.L. Toddard| 9.4.09 @ 9:47PM
Right on! Find your own name, just as I did before Bob found out I had no official existence!
S.L. Toddard| 9.4.09 @ 9:51PM
And guess what I did when he outed me? Instead of apologizing for the rudeness I've displayed all these months, I gave him a stern and pitiful lecture where I couldn't help projecting my homosexuality and my suicidal tendencies.
Pray for me, please!!
Bob| 9.4.09 @ 10:00PM
Sorry, but I'll never pray for you. Burn in Hell.
S.L. Toddard| 9.5.09 @ 8:13AM
Mr Baker, I understand. Whomever did that is the stalker I referred to above - he's posting this other gibberish in my name
Bob| 9.6.09 @ 8:42PM
Yeah right. Like we should believe you. Either you're using the Van Jones defense or you just don't know what dirty stuff you put in your bang.
Slimy Libturd Toddard you are a disgrace or a pure invention of the Cato gang.
micky&vicky; | 9.7.09 @ 2:18AM
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Alan Brooks| 9.10.09 @ 10:33PM
Toddard wont admit that the Carter administration policies from 1977- 80 killed far more people-- from Africa and the Mideast to Latin America and all the way to Asia-- than Bush administration did 2001-'08.
But there is nothing wrong with Toddard.
wrong blog.
Alan Brooks| 9.10.09 @ 10:41PM
And, above all, it was the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in '78 that triggered Al Qaeda, and eventually led to this war. The Red Army withdrew from Afghanistan in '89, and 9-11 was 12 years later.
Not even Toddard could deny it, though he will try-- he never gives up. I think he's partly here to pick our brains, why else would it be worth his valuable (he's no fool) time to blog at AS?
Pingback| 9.12.09 @ 5:36AM
Grace under pressure « Martin TURNER’s Weblog links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
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