IAEA: No Evidence of Iranian Nukes
The AP reports,
A report by the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency shows there is no proof Iran’s nuclear program is aimed at producing nuclear weapons, Iran’s foreign minister said Tuesday in Japan.
“They could not find evidence which shows that Iran has diverted from its peaceful purposes of nuclear activities in Iran,” said Manouchehr Mottaki, who was in Tokyo to meet with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
A confidential International Atomic Energy Agency report made available to The Associated Press Monday said that a more than three-year probe has not revealed “any diversion of nuclear material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.”
Full story.
[Related] NY Times: Why Iranian nukes pose no serious threat.
If by “proof” they mean “mushroom cloud”, then they need to be a little patient. It takes time.
When I guy in a suicide vest with an unlit match in his hand steps into line at the mall, they don’t wait for proof that he’s not just lighting a cigarette with the match and turning the explosives in at the lost and found.
Of course, I’m totally ignorant as to what is really going on inside Iran, which is as it should be, so I probably should hold my comments and just go back to raising my Israeli family and leave the worrying to the professionals.
OK, I’m done, thanks for letting me get that off my chest.
It really is time to start reading linked items and to stop selective quotations. From the article-
“A confidential International Atomic Energy Agency report made available to The Associated Press on Monday said more than three years of investigation has not revealed a secret nuclear weapons program in the Islamic republic.
However, it also cautioned that a lack of sufficient cooperation by Iran meant the agency could not rule out the existence of a weapons program.”
See how the second paragraph completely transforms the first? The fact that something is “not revealed” doesn’t even come close to showing that it doesn’t exist.
The Iranian nuclear program is the most significant crisis in the world today. To try to mislead people by minimizing it (and thus diminishing support for its successful resolution, which will probably involve force) is a terrible thing to do.
shit J you opened my eyes. id never actaully thought of clicking on the link to read the whole article. and all this time….mobius how could you.
Not everyone clicks on the link, Danny. Just imagine if the post read “Danny Accused of Molesting Children”, and only the link explained that the accuser is a mental patient, there is no evidence whatsoever, and the child in question has never been within 1,000 miles of Danny. Are you telling me this would be OK with you?
To date, there have been two mushroom clouds; one over Nagasaki, and one over Hiroshima.
Yes, just another part of the American aggression during the 1940’s. After the USA allied itself with the Nazis, invaded Manchuria, pulled off a sneak attack on the Japanese Navy while the two countries were at peace, raped Nanking, performed deadly experiments on Chinese citizens, and led Japanese prisoners of war on death marches, America had the nerve to drop nukes. Incredible.
J:
Good point; my chief criticism of Jewschool has been the selective editing that both Mobius and John Brown seem to excel at. Seems to me that Jewschool could become much more credible by simply showing progressive thought from both the left AND the right…not to mention the centre. Seems that certain conservatives think that progressive thought is a domain which is the sole preserve of the Left. *sigh* And I enjoyed the sarcasm as well…I wasn’t aware of suh biting ironic humour outside of the UK. 🙂
Miriam:
As a statement of fact, you are correct. But what, exactly, is your point?
Matityahu-
Thanks for the kind words. As for “progressive” thought from the right or center (note spelling! 🙂 ), I’m not sure what you mean. In America today, “progressive” as a label is just a self-description by liberals and leftists since “liberal” became a dirty word (at least in electoral politics). As for its actual meaning, clearly everyone wants “progress”, but we disagree as to what that constitutes (conservatives, centrists, moderate liberals vs. Leftists vs. paleoconservatives) and how to achieve it (liberals vs. conservatives). So in that sense, I believe that my ideas, which are a blend of traditional religious thought and Enlightenment liberalism (so different from today’s “liberalism”), and are today labelled “Conservatism” , are the best path toward progress. But I wouldn’t know of any distinction between conservative progressive thought and conservative non-progressive thought.
As to the humor, could be I’ve spent too much time watching the Pythons. 🙂
J:
As a rule, one can never watch too much Pythons! I would also recommend ‘Yes, Minister’, ‘The Thick of It’, and ‘The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin’ should you be interested in humourous but strangely accuracte depictions of political life here in the UK.
As regards the use of the term ‘progressive’, thanks for the definition as you see it from the US perspective as this isn’t something I was aware of. Liberal is still a term very much in vogue here in the UK and indeed the EU at large, but not a label I would subscribe to. Equally, I find it difficult to place myself firmly in a conservative camp as I don’t share some of the more traditional viewpoints of conservatism as it relates to society. And in my age group (30-55) I am not alone. Here in the UK David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative or ‘Tory’ party of which I am a member, has attempted to describe a new conservative ideology as ‘compassionate conservatism’ but I’m not sure this is accurate either. Still others in the US have attemtped to describe us as ‘neo-conservatives’ but I think this is a crap moniker as well.
I suppose I would describe myself as a progressive conservative in as much as I subscribe to conservative principles as they relate to economics, freedom of the individual, a smaller government, and wishing individuals to be encouraged to take more individual responsibility as opposed to legislating what we perceive to be morality. But I wouldn’t say that I subscribe to conservative principles as they relate to foreign policy (I’ve not much time for realpolitik and believe it to be a lazy and cheap way of avoiding tough political situations and decisions) or the health service and related public services.
Anyway, this is what I meant when I remarked that progressive thought is hardly the preserve of the Left.
Matityahu-
Interesting. Just a couple remarks:
Re foreign policy, I wasn’t aware that in the UK conservative foreign policy thinking was identified with realpolitik (which I assume is akin to what we call the “Realist School” in the US). In the US, we have a four-way split regarding realist vs. idealist and liberal vs. conservative. There are conservative internationalists (which include neo-cons, Reagan, largely the current President, and last but not least, me); liberal internationalists (think Bill Clinton, if he had guts and actually cared); conservative realists (elder Bush, and the king of this crowd, Henry Kissinger); and liberal realists (usually more moderate liberals). So in America, you can be a conservative without the realpolitik (but let me say that although I don’t subscribe to this as a worldview, the realists do have very valuable lessons to teach and should not be ignored).
I wonder sometimes if there’s more reluctance among European Jews to embrace conservatism than among American Jews because conservatism in Europe is tied somewhat to the “old order” of the Christian polity, while in America the “old order” is the Enlightenment pluralism of the Founding Fathers.