4 ms·

Just like any other country, there are factions in the Iranian government that are unhappy about the rapprochement between US and Iran. They probably profited h

Just like any other country, there are factions in the Iranian government that are unhappy about the rapprochement between US and Iran. They probably profited handsomely from the sanctions (just like Saddam and his sons did in Iraq, years ago). They're unhappy. And they're making these ridiculous provocative gestures to provoke the US. The last thing that US needs to do is get provoked. Ignoring the idiots is the right course of action. But will the US do that? I doubt it. Because we have our own set of idiots too, who love to play cowboys.

bogomipz 11y ago
Yep and the tired old guard complicit media trying to gin up some drama. Its laughable.
dogma1138 11y ago
Not exactly, Iran has a 2 tier system. The upper tier which consists of the Council of Experts (also known as the Guardian Council) and the Supreme Leader who also control the IRGC (which controls most of Iranian industry at this point) is not another faction this is the main ruling body of Iran an the body which de-facto controls everything within it. While the people can say elect a president the Religious leadership has veto rights into who is going to actually run basically how Iranian elections start is that you have a bunch (were talking 50 or more candidates) of candidate starting the race about half of them get rejected immediately by the religious authorities the rest "decline" to run and you end up with 1 or 2 candidates in the final race in which always one of them wins in a land slide mostly because the entire election process is fixed by the Supreme Leader. The so call "belligerent" faction in Iran is under the direct control of the Supreme Leader and this isn't exactly a country where one does what ever they think. This is a country with well over a 1000 executions each year you won't have politicians sending out embarrassing letters or generals speaking out of term unless they want to either face a firing squad or have their necks stretched out.
- kaonashi 11y ago
  > This is a country with well over a 1000 executions each year You don't say... http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/16/the-counted-killed-by-police-1000 http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/16/the-counted-k...
  - dogma1138 11y ago
    Ironically this probably illustrates the difference the best making the same comment in Iran (and many other countries in region) would've gotten you into a heap of trouble including putting your life directly at risk.
jjoonathan 11y ago
We certainly do have our cowboys and idiots, but in this case we should applaud our troops for being neither. They went to great lengths to assess the provocation and determine that they could ignore it, taking on personal risk in order to preserve the peace: > Marks said a U.S. Navy helicopter was launched from the Truman to get a closer look at the drone, and personnel on board determined it was not armed before it traveled directly over the ship. That's some serious professionalism!
- discardorama 11y ago
  I didn't mean to imply that the sailors are cowboys; but that people like Trump and others are cowboys. It is easy to be a cowboy when you have nothing to lose: your kids won't be fighting the war(s), coming home scarred for life (mentally, if not physically).

bogomipz 11y ago

Yep and the tired old guard complicit media trying to gin up some drama. Its laughable.

dogma1138 11y ago

Not exactly, Iran has a 2 tier system. The upper tier which consists of the Council of Experts (also known as the Guardian Council) and the Supreme Leader who also control the IRGC (which controls most of Iranian industry at this point) is not another faction this is the main ruling body of Iran an the body which de-facto controls everything within it. While the people can say elect a president the Religious leadership has veto rights into who is going to actually run basically how Iranian elections start is that you have a bunch (were talking 50 or more candidates) of candidate starting the race about half of them get rejected immediately by the religious authorities the rest "decline" to run and you end up with 1 or 2 candidates in the final race in which always one of them wins in a land slide mostly because the entire election process is fixed by the Supreme Leader. The so call "belligerent" faction in Iran is under the direct control of the Supreme Leader and this isn't exactly a country where one does what ever they think. This is a country with well over a 1000 executions each year you won't have politicians sending out embarrassing letters or generals speaking out of term unless they want to either face a firing squad or have their necks stretched out.

kaonashi 11y ago
> This is a country with well over a 1000 executions each year You don't say... http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/16/the-counted-killed-by-police-1000 http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/16/the-counted-k...
- dogma1138 11y ago
  Ironically this probably illustrates the difference the best making the same comment in Iran (and many other countries in region) would've gotten you into a heap of trouble including putting your life directly at risk.

jjoonathan 11y ago

We certainly do have our cowboys and idiots, but in this case we should applaud our troops for being neither. They went to great lengths to assess the provocation and determine that they could ignore it, taking on personal risk in order to preserve the peace: > Marks said a U.S. Navy helicopter was launched from the Truman to get a closer look at the drone, and personnel on board determined it was not armed before it traveled directly over the ship. That's some serious professionalism!

discardorama 11y ago
I didn't mean to imply that the sailors are cowboys; but that people like Trump and others are cowboys. It is easy to be a cowboy when you have nothing to lose: your kids won't be fighting the war(s), coming home scarred for life (mentally, if not physically).