Last week Stormy and I opened a chat room. We named it "Stop The Iran War." We held court five days and nights, and didn't send links to people we know, preferring to see who would visit and what they would say. I learned a few things. Certainly, it was educational.
After reading this article in The New York Sun, stating its sources claimed the war with Iran would begin October 15, I was curious to know if people would offer comments about why they favored or opposed it. I wasn't disappointed, in spite of receiving only about a dozen visitors. While it's easier reading for you that I describe what happened, I kept thinking I should copy the entire scroll and excerpt it, as so many of the comments were striking.
We changed no one's mind, and everyone but three of our visitors favored the war. But, their arguments were strictly toothless, being drawn directly from the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Freedom Watch and John Hagee. Their comments were redundant and offered the same recipe.
One visitor, whose nickname was written in Hebrew, entered and exited after making the statement Iran is no different than Hitler, having promised to destroy Israel. Other visitors compared President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Hitler, the Hitler analogy being popular. After seeing that, I'll never compare anyone to Hitler again. I kept a mental note of how many people hated Muslims versus how many hated Jews, and although one side of the Muslims v. Jews equation pulled ahead day to day, in the end the haters were roughly even.
Another visitor claimed we are under attack from our old, unseen enemy, "Islamofascism," and we must win. I pointed out Islamofacism is a term invented by extremists to scare you, but I wasn't scared because there is no such thing. Like all the pro-war sycophants, the visitor became angry and started calling me names. Sometimes it was simply idiot, fool, jerk or buffoon. I haven't been called that in many years. But other visitors wrote the most vulgar obscenities, so we adopted the rule of using the kick option at that point.
That proved unpopular with the furious visitor, and one guy came back with a "script" or "bot" that defied the kick function. At first this behavior made Stormy nervous, but I pointed out these people weren't thinking for themselves, having delegated it to stupid pundits, so by the time we got this show of bad manners it was nothing short of hilarious.
It followed a formula: spout slick, convoluted logic about what a good idea bombing Iran is, and when challenged, call the challenger rude names and exit (or get kicked out). Courageous it wasn't. Is that all ya got?
Pro-war visitors had no response to my idea I wasn't willing to spend another trillion or two dollars to kill innocent people by the millions. I talked to a woman from Holland who was anti-war. We talked about many things, and she had the most excellent written expression. She was surprised to learn high ranking officers in our military were discouraging the Bush administration from starting a war with Iran and asked for links. I gave her four or five. She said there was nothing about it in the Dutch press, and that she would see that this changed.
There were two other interesting visitors. One was an Iranian man who had either moved to Canada or was on business there. He expressed regret over the growing war, and worried Iran's mullahs would provide needless provocation toward war, considering it a "gift from God." He said they would be owed much blame for Iran's response, which would take many forms: direct attacks on American planes and ships, attacks on American soldiers in Iraq and attacks around the world by people engaged in terrorism, especially in the United States. I found that thought provoking, and was glad to hear from someone from Iran.
Another man who lives in China spent much time visiting with us. He said he knows there are many good people in the United States, but that we are governed by evil men. He said he'd like to come to the U.S. because he wants to enjoy his life, but that our government wouldn't let him. He told us that his chief apprehension about a U.S. attack on Iran is that China would attack Taiwan. I was unaware of that plan, and he didn't explain it. Certainly a picture of a widely expanding, disastrous war emerges.
In the last couple weeks, the Bush administration has changed its story from wanting to destroy many nuclear development and military targets to fewer Revolutionary Guard targets, a quick "in and out," as an easier sell to Americans and the world. Could the real reason be that our targeting capability is compromised? Don't forget, this was the official story going into Iraq. We were to be finished in two or three months. Now, we're told we couldn't consider leaving before grinding up Iraq 10 years, and 50 is more like it. Don't be surprised if that is the same thing that happens if Iran is attacked. Or worse.
Meanwhile, almost all our presidential candidates insist they'll wage more and longer wars and refuse to address civil rights violations in Darfur, Myanmar or the United States. I suppose they've made their kickback arrangements. Is that all we get? Is that all there is?
