Republicans Press Obama on Iran

WASHINGTON -- Key Republicans on Sunday urged President Barack Obama to do more to support protesters in Iran who have been clashing with security forces there over election results, underscoring the challenge the president faces in trying to strike the right balance in addressing fast-moving events in the Mideast country.

"The president of the United States is supposed to lead the free world, not follow it," said Sen. Lindsay Graham (R., S.C.), on ABC's "This Week," adding that Mr. Obama was being "timid and passive."

Under criticism at home and abroad over his approach to the Iran protests, Mr. Obama kept administration officials off the Sunday morning talk shows, according to White House officials. Instead, he relied on Democratic surrogates from Congress, they said. Sens. Robert Casey (D., Pa.) and Evan Bayh (D., Ind.) defended the president's cautious approach on Iran, saying he was striking a difficult balance by expressing sympathy for the protesters while not giving weight to Teheran's claims that the protests were being orchestrated by Washington and Europe...

Continued at: online.wsj.com...


Does anyone else find it HIGHLY ironic that Republicans are pushing Obama to do something about a doctored/fixed election? Have they all but completely forgotten the 2000 and 2004 American Elections where their party manufactured a winner?

Originally posted by Capt. Charisma

Does anyone else find it HIGHLY ironic that Republicans are pushing Obama to do something about a doctored/fixed election? Have they all but completely forgotten the 2000 and 2004 American Elections where their party manufactured a winner?

OR.....Maybe Obama is laying low as to not be considered a hypocrite considering his 2008 ACORN election?

I remember the 2000 election being lost by algore because he couldn't carry his homestate of Tennessee. Pretty sad! The 2004 election wasn't even close in comparison.

Originally posted by RRconservative

Originally posted by Capt. Charisma

Does anyone else find it HIGHLY ironic that Republicans are pushing Obama to do something about a doctored/fixed election? Have they all but completely forgotten the 2000 and 2004 American Elections where their party manufactured a winner?

OR.....Maybe Obama is laying low as to not be considered a hypocrite considering his 2008 ACORN election?

I remember the 2000 election being lost by algore because he couldn't carry his homestate of Tennessee. Pretty sad! The 2004 election wasn't even close in comparison.

Yeah, the 2000 election was lost due to Gore not carrying Tennessee. It had absolutely nothing to do with the massive fraud and vote doctoring that happened in Florida.

Originally posted by Capt. Charisma
Yeah, the 2000 election was lost due to Gore not carrying Tennessee. It had absolutely nothing to do with the massive fraud and vote doctoring that happened in Florida.

Actually the fraud and vote doctoring Al Gore was attempting to commit was stopped early. If it were allowed to continue, then Gore could've easily 'chadded' quite a few Bush votes over to himself, or disqualified them. Paperclips are cheap.

Originally posted by Capt. Charisma
Yeah, the 2000 election was lost due to Gore not carrying Tennessee. It had absolutely nothing to do with the massive fraud and vote doctoring that happened in Florida.

If algore would have carried his homestate, Florida would not have mattered. Think about it....the people that algore once represented didn't want to see him as President.

The only fraud I remember in Florida was the refusal to count Military ballots...that fraud was perpetrated by Democrats.

Originally posted by RRconservative
If algore would have carried his homestate, Florida would not have mattered. Think about it....

The Kernel has. One could also say that if he took Florida he wouldn't have needed Tenn.

The only fraud I remember in Florida was the refusal to count Military ballots...that fraud was perpetrated by Democrats.

How many links would it take to remind you about DIEBOLD?

They both cheat. Democrats cheated this year, it isn't like ACORN has a very bad track record of voter registration fraud.

Not only that but there were a few counties that had over a 100% voter registration.

There is more evidence of fraud in the 2008 election than there is of the 2000 election. Doesn't matter which was you slice it.

And Obama is a spineless appeaser. He isn't saying anything about this because he thinks if the Ayatollah stays in power he is going to be able to have "talks" with Iran.

Not going to happen they are already blaming America, UK, and Israel for all this mess. Obama's vote of "present" on this situation says a lot about him. The protesters overthrowing the Ayatollah means new diplomatic ties and possibly a new ally.

This should not be a politicized issue at all, we have enough demons, divisions and corruption of our own here in the USA.

It may not be our fight, but regardless of your politics and the ultimate outcome in Iran, it is in the US interests to have been on the right side of the crisis in Iran, and that is the side of a free and fair democracy, the side of those who will rise up against tyranny and fight for freedom and liberty... It is not meddling to support the basic principles that our own country was founded on.

We don't have to send in our planes and tanks to show moral support for the people of Iran. It should come from all government officials and the President.

To make this a domestic political issue is disgusting.

Exactly.

We should support Iran's democratic uprising as HUMANS, and not fight within our own ranks.

WTH.

reply to post by Capt. Charisma


If Obama comes out in full support of the protestors he gives the Ayatollah an excuse to blame the West and commence an immediate and violent halt to Mousavi's supporters. Plus, he burns the bridges of any inroads made in trying to deal with the Iranian regime (if it survives).

Second, Mousavi had to be cleared by the clerics in Iran's theocracy to run for President in the first place. Just because he's considered moderate by some standards doesn't mean his stance towards the US is much different than Ahdmenijad's...we probably wouldn't see a suddenly amiable Iranian government if Mousavi did in fact take over.

Iran may have lost confidence in the Ayatollah, but that doesn't mean the people are ready to suddenly form a secular government away from Sharia law.

It's just a difficult situation all around. I think most of the world has a lot of sympathy for the protestors, but it's just a difficult situation for anyone outside of Iran to do anything about it without dramatically escalating the violence and instability.




Funny how so much attention is being put on Iran. I wonder if the fact that it is such a huge oil exporter has anything to do with it. If it was a barren country in central Africa. I wonder if we'd be seeing nearly as much media coverage as we are now.

This is to funny ...

G20 Protests: Obama = No response

Tea Party protests: Obama = Blatant Ignore and jabs.

Now we know the majority of Country atm is in line with the Republicans ... Only a percantage actually sees the farse ... So We will rally the republicans up to get obama to run to Iran.. and majority of populace will go along with it, and completly forget the other factors.

Obama will be praised.

You know, I don't know why we want to do anything about the elections in Iran. Do you know why? It's not America. It's not our problem.

I don't know why people in our government think that every problem in the world is our problem. It's not. Our problems are those that are in this country. Not those of other countries.

I think the best thing to do is to stay the hell out of the elections in other countries. The less involvement the better I say.

I think the United States needs to go through a period of isolationism again. I think the world would be much better off. Keep our hands to ourselves and stay out of everyone's business.

...Like we already dont have enough problems here....

This is absurd and ironic and pure hypocrisy.

Here's Obama saying they are just using their freedom of expression, and WE DONT HAVE THAT FREEDOM.

Somebody shoot me.

Please.

Obama did speak out at dawn on Sunday a.m. He called on Iran to deal peacefully with the protesters and not oppress their own people. Gordon Brown of the UK made a similar speech at the same time. What Obama did not do was make threats, veiled or otherwise, about what the U.S. might do if Iran didn't fall in line.

What do you all think he should do, threaten to invade or "Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb-bomb Iran" or something like that?

Obama has avoided the cowboy diplomacy championed by the neo-cons for cheap political gain. Now he's being accused of not caring.

America has already been charged by the Iranian regime with meddling in their elections and inciting the Iranian people to riot. They could crack down even harder on the protesters if they claimed they were puppets of the U.S. That would not further the "green revolution" in any way.

Obama has been a voice of moderation throughout. That is real diplomacy.




[edit on 22-6-2009 by Sestias]

I think that Obama really doesnt know WTF to do about this, hense why he is being so quiet. Hes sitting in his chair right now pulling out his hair because this whole situation in Iran can easily happen over here at anytime. He doesnt want to give Americans the Impression that they can do what Iranians are doing because it would ruin him if a major protest about the economy or war(or whatever) happened over here. I think that his response to Iran will show the American people what he is made of, and where he officially stands, but as of now, he has given nothing for us to look at, hes in the dark with his freinds and foes both of whom are carrying baseball bats just waiting to swing at anything he does.