Your hypotheticals are nothing more than hypotheticals. They are not based in any precedent or any educated understanding of how modern states operate. And your ad hominem fallacies are rather off putting. No one is going to take you seriously until you refute without these fallacies. Even posters who share roughly the same viewpoints as you such as ATW seem to be hesitant in having your back on this. Frankly, You just seem like a dick... an uneducated one.
Mostly agnostic??? Okay, you admit that you do not understand religion. That explains a lot on why you are so naive about this.
Don't be fooled by his ability to speak good English. Netanyahu is nothing more than a right-wing extremist, religious fundamentalist, and Zionist fanatic.
The reason nobody takes North Korea seriously is because they actually follow the political science narrative of self preservation you try to assign to Iran. North Korea, while run by a lunatic, has zero religious motivation. Iran, on the other hand, is all about Shiite Islamic extremism. Shiite extremist think if they create enough chaos that their Mahdi will return to establish a world caliphate. Their religion is their guiding principal in everything. They would not hesitate to use nukes if they get them.
Chris Matthews nails it “I’ll get to the heart of this speech now,” Matthews told MSNBC’s Thomas Robertson. “This man from a foreign government walked into the United States legislative chamber and tried to take over U.S. foreign policy. He said, ‘You should trust me, not your president on this. I am the man you should trust, I am your true leader on this question of U.S. geopolitics. To protect yourself, you must listen to me and not this president.’” “It was a startling situation,” he continued. “To allow someone to come in — knowing that was going to be their message — to the U.S. Congress. This was a decision made by Boehner and certainly complied with by Netanyahu and his ambassador [Ron Dermer]. They went into the U.S. Congress to take over U.S. foreign policy from the president.” “Think it through, what country in the world would let a foreign leader come in and attempt to wrest from the president control of the U.S. foreign policy?” Matthews asked. “This was a takeover attempt by Netanyahu with this complying America partners to take American foreign policy out of the hands of the president.”
If Israel wants to start another war in the Middle East let them do it. I still remember being floored when Bibi said on a national talk show that Iraq should be invaded years before the neo-cons actually did it. The host said well you (Israel) are too small to do it and Bibi said "but you aren't." I should try to find it for one of those revealing moments that are often hidden.
I don't understand the love for Israel. They are a very important ally, but an ally where their policy > US policy? Is it because of the "promised land"???
Not understanding which religions? Christianity or Islam? Or both? I think it's fair to said that is you aren't of a religion ever, you don't fully understand the FAITH and all the mystics and depth of a religion. But anyone can grasp at least an intellectual understanding of it. So I assume you mean the much deeper understanding and I have to assume Christianity is what you are referring to. On the same ground you just argued, you have no understanding of Islam and you are naive about it. Your basis that Iran will be irrational because they are "Muslim" (maybe you meant extreme Islamic but you did said just Muslim) fall flat since you have no understanding of Islam.
Jesus Christ dude... Maybe you need to take a breather from this place. Unless you think berating people with juvenile insults all while jumping to all sorts of emotionally-fueled conclusions somehow makes you worthy of actual responses.
From my experience and outside empirical sources, atheists and agnostics have a tendency to understand various religions than actual theists in general. It has plenty to do with atheists actively challenging the faith they were raised in.
I believe treeman has children... Imagine, a grown adult who goes on the internet and calls others "fukwads" is raising children.
He mentioned that he was raised catholic. This implies that he had some form of catechism during those times. Just an FYI, even faux news reported a study that atheist know more about the bible than Christians and it was not even close. Most believers who later on become an atheist or agnostic reached their conclusion because of reading the holy book (cover to cover)
What is really lost in this discussion is can the US actually sustain a conflict with Iran while continuing to try to prop up the Iraq, fight ISIS and deal with a host of other issues. I don't blame Netanyahu for making this speech. It is logical to try to get your ally and a larger power to take on an enemy you consider an existential threat but this is where it get's dangerous to allow a foreign leader to dictate US foreign policy. While Israel is our ally we are not the same country and our interests are not always the same even though many try to portray it as such. From the US standpoint we have far larger obligations than Israel has to deal with. Israel has proven that it can defend itself and has shown in the past it can strike it's regional enemies when dealing with a what it considers a potential existential threat. I'm not recommending that they do it but if needed Israel could strike Iran itself. The fear that Israel is going to be wiped out is overblown when given that they already defeated existential threats and since the 1970's the gap in military technology between Israel and it's neighbors has only increased.
The other aspect of this is if the US and Israel refuses to try other option (as the US and other nations are doing now), when it comes down to it and Iran is on the blink of nuclear weapon, who is it that will get involved. It's the US and likely only the US. Israel maybe, but there was a good reason why Israel was specifically left out of both Iraq wars. Now if the deal goes through and Iran still get to a nuclear weapon, well, we have the whole world on our side and there is a much greater chance that we have a coalition of nations going after Iran.
