Let's Stop for a Moment and Take in the Joy in Iran Right Now
Let's just stop and appreciate the happiness from #IranTalks.
I've followed this story minute by minute. Not because it's my job to stay abreast of these events, but because I love Iran. I love it for all its faults, hopes, beauty, and disappointments. But mostly I love it for its people. The lives of Iranian people with the prospect of fewer economic constraints and greater integration into the global system, is the reason I want to celebrate this nuclear deal.
So, before we get into interpretations of the text of the nuclear framework agreement (which is necessary and needed); and before we consider that there is much to be done in Iran, in terms of the nuclear deal, the economy, human rights, etc. (as many politicians, analysts, and activists have already pointed out)—before all those things, just for a moment, I want to absorb the tide of joy from the people of Iran.
Here are some of my favourite snippets of the happiness that overtook the streets of Iran last night. And I promise more sober commentary once we come down from the collective high of #IranTalks!
People on Tehran's streets celebrating #IranTalks, hoping for increase in rial value http://t.co/SPhvZRMx8y
— Sobhan Hassanvand (@Hassanvand) April 2, 2015
Group of #Iran‘ians gather outside Foreign Minstry in Tehran to celbrate outcome of #IranTalks http://t.co/F2iJrZ9I3o pic.twitter.com/tic9SO48GB
— Hadi Nili (@HadiNili) April 2, 2015
Still in the party. People are drinking to (in the honor of) all the turned off Centrifuges :)) به سلامتی سانتریفیوژهای خاموش #IranTalks
— jadi (@jadi) April 2, 2015
Friend of mine in #Iran pinching #Obama‘s cheek out of sheer joy #IranTalks pic.twitter.com/M68J6yKgQt
— Holly Dagres (@hdagres) April 2, 2015
Contact in Tehran: “I'm going out to celebrate.” #IranTalks #Iran
— Golnaz Esfandiari (@GEsfandiari) April 2, 2015
Tehran celebrates #IranTalks. @rebaz_hassani pic.twitter.com/7lfRnPPlHO
— Negar نگار (@NegarMortazavi) April 3, 2015
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21 comments
Good riddance to the Bush Doctrine of pre-emptive wars.
Yes – and welcome to the Obama doctrine of prematurely ending wars so that we can go back and fight them all over again.
Now we will have to watch the middle east enter an arms race for nukes. The bamster was given the choice of war or giving the persians nukes and he chose to give the persians nukes and now in the longer run we will get war. Sad to see this manner of self deception but it is what it is.
Good grief!
A Manichean world it is: Black or White, War or Peace, Bomb Now or Bomb Later.
No thanks, no how, no way.
You forgot friend or foe and in the case of Iran’s leaders there isn’t much grey area. The chants of death to America don’t sound like music to anyones ears but yours I suppose.
Netanyahu: I don’t think I’ll see a Palestinian state in my lifetime.
Obama Admin: This terrible hate-mongering is an irrevocable sign of a concrete change in Israeli policy that mean the US will have to react swiftly and dramatically to teach them a lesson!1!!1! (eleventy)
Khamenei: DEATH TO AMERICA!!!!!!
Obama Admin: Oh he really didn’t mean that, he was just saying that to satisfy the Iranian counterpart to the Teahadist, Reich-wing, extremist wackos; which, we know how he feels having to suffer such obstructions to his royal, er, executive will…We’ll ignore it and keep groveling, er, negotiating for our triumphant sell-out, er, treaty that will surely bring peace in our time.
Which one of these things is not like the other? In which case are they dealing with out allies? In which, sworn enemies that view as a great Satan; an enemy of which there would be no moral penalty for killing, indeed one would instead be feted in perpetuity.
Don’t you just love the “SMART POWER!” crew?
The US gives Israel $4 billion annually and gives Iran sanctions. What more does Israel want? The American taxpayers could really use that money.
So criticism of Mr Obama is an irrational Manichean binary, but dismissing his predecessor’s policy as contrived, bad faith, pre-emptive war is…let me guess, speaking truth to power, or some such bromide.
By the way, do you see the irony in both your need to still criticize Mr Bush for policy decisions that, in many cases, Mr Obama is imitating?
Which, ironic again, he may be doing with what you may have formerly characterized as wanton, cruel disregard. Because at least when there are live soldiers involved on the ground, consolidating area liberated from adversary forces the fighting finally ends; as opposed to trying to do it all from the air.
As an aside, how do drone strikes settle with you? Is imprisonment at Gitmo, 3 hots and a cot in a tropical environment, more reprehensible that simply rubbing them out by drone strike? I’m just curious,,,
So hello to “Surrender At the First Sign of Hostilities”.
How’s that Bring back our Girls hashtag coming along?
How about Libya, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Yemen , thank you Obama and add in Crimea, and Ukraine. Endless wars
and future wars brought to you by the clueless one, Obama.
You do realize that if Iranian mullahs break the promises that Obama said they gave, the next president would have no choice by to bomb them, right? The sanctions are over, war is now the only other option.
I’m glad the Iranian people are so happy today. I wish such joy could be longstanding…Whether they realize it or not the shape of the prospective deal is simply because Mr. Obama is near-desperate to realize some legacy for his otherwise failed foreign and domestic policies.
And that regardless of how much he sells out the US to suit his own personal ambitions, that selfish betrayal will only stand as long as he is in office.
And Obama just gave the green light to Saudi Arabia to get their own nuclear weapons. Expect a mushroom cloud over Tehran in the near future.
Jan. 20, 2017 cannot get here soon enough.
Twenty-one months, 3 days, 7 hours, and 10 minutes…but who’s counting?
So what if large numbers of Iranians are cheering. They’re happy because their government has told them what IT claims it agreed to. (And no party to the talks SIGNED anything–there is no “deal”, just a set of “parameters” for further discussion.) They are happy because what their government says it agreed to is drastically different from what Obama and Kerry claim Iran agreed to. The Iranian citizens believe sanctions will be lifted so their economy will improve and they’ll be personally better off. The Iranian government is happy because it gets to continue pursuing a bomb.
Didn’t anyone of you read Jadi’s post? They the centrifuges would be turned off. Sounds like the mullah’s are giving them a line of crap for a show of solidarity among the Iranian people who have been sh!t on by 0dumbo”s administration.
Sad that the comments here are so pathetic. You morons think it’s all about America and Obama. There are 5 other countries trying to get a deal to save lives. Why are you not basing China, UK, Russia, France and Germany. At least Obama is trying to come to an agreement to avoid another useless war. Bush, Cheney and Netanyahu lied to go to war. killed over 400,000 people. Germany is trying to charge Bush and Cheney with war crimes because the Iraq war was the worst decision an American president has ever made in history. Obama will be and has been called every name in the book but he stands proud, laughs off stupidity and goes on making American lives better. Stock market all time high, Uninsured rate lowest in 25 years, housing market back, unemployment rate lowest in a decade, RECORD 60 month straight of job growth,16 million more with health insurance. Shall I go on. Please any republican name 3 things Bush did better than Obama. Where was everyone when the US crashed in 2008 because of Bush and his policies. Did we conveniently forget how bad Bush was and how Obama has been cleaning up his mess.
These commenters live in their own little world of Fox News and KKK.