Yeah . . . um, OK. The whole point was that we don’t have a firm grasp on this guy’s real position, so it doesn’t make much sense to use him as an example of a defined personality, even for himself. It’s a context thing, you see. Thus the humorous range of possibilities between a historical monster and a run-of-the-mill jew hater.
H.
p.s. Amazon.com
That definitively proves that he never said either of those two things. How does it do that?
Haha.
Number of conflicts started by Iran since the Islamic revolution: zero.
Number of conflicts started by the US in the same period of time: 8.
So Iran gets credit for pacifism because Hezbollah launches the rockets for them?
Define “started” and “conflicts.” Also, please explain how you are comfortable with your knowledge that Iran is not, for example, directing Hezbollah.
EDIT: Nevermind, Nick was faster on the draw on this one.
I guess Iran has only been supplying Hamas and Hezbollah with thoughts and dialogue.
EDIT: go hivemind! :(
Hitler owned nine pairs of golf shoes, but never played the game once in his entire life.
Hitler owned a piece of the true cross which he used as a toothpick. In 1943, he accidentally swallowed it while laughing at a knock-knock joke.
At the height of World War II, Hitler challenged FDR to a foot race, not realizing that the US President was a paraplegic. He apologized two weeks later.
Although it is widely known that Hitler was a vegetarian, few people are aware that his book Die Neue Rohe Energie (The New Raw Energy) is the basis for the raw food diet now popular in the US.
Hitler is still alive, currently posing as a retired dermatologist in Argentina. At 117 years of age, he is the world’s oldest living man.
Does his not having said something prove that he didn’t say it? Did you really just ask that question? Boy, is you a mo-ron?
I’d also like to point out that you asked for “any reason to doubt”. Which is another way of saying “reasonable doubt.” So yeah, having never actually uttered those things on record is pretty goddamned strong support for reasonable doubt.
Of course, you’ll just flip out because you’ve got a neuron in your brain flipped to the “on” setting for Ahmadinejad + Jewkill + HolocaustDeny. God forbid you actually read any transcripts of his speeches.
H.
Yeah, apparently the heavily pro-western news source of Al Jazeera also has a hardon for hating him.
Thank god he didn’t deny the Holocaust on the record.
Of course, I suppose “the Holocaust is a myth,” will mean something different than denial, just like, “Israel will be annhiliated,” has nothing to do with killing Jews. Perhaps in Farsi, “myth” means, “Thing that happened, when said on the record?”
Boy, I’m glad I didn’t predict you wouldn’t read his speeches. Seriously, read the speeches in HIS context, not the newspaper’s context, then get back to me. Or just read the other thread, whichever is easiest.
H.
Even comparing the number of terrorist organisations funded by the US and Iran since 1979, I think the US would win that one too. Iran’s involvement in funding terrorists and murderous rebel militia is murky and largely unproven, although it’s almost certain they are supplying Hezbollah, and possibly others in Iraq. The US involvement with the same is very well documented. The Contras in Nicaragua as well as Al Qaeda in Afghanistan are two very strong examples.
And then there is propping up all those evil dictators…
I define “starting a conflict” as being “engaging in prolonged military combat against an adversary who has not attacked you or an ally first”.
I can list them for you. Since 1979:
Grenada (invasion - or “vertical insertion” as the Reagan administration so poetically described it)
Panama (invasion)
Iraq I
Haiti (invasion)
Serbia I
Serbia II
Afghanistan (invasion)
Iraq II (invasion)
Then there was the bombing of Libya (twice), the interventions in the Lebanon, and of course Somalia, but I didn’t count those as conflicts.
I actually supported the US in most of those conflicts I listed, but it is difficult to argue that America doesn’t solve its problems with bombs more often than other nations, even when compared to “rogue states” like Iran.
So does any of that make his statement I quoted any less silly?
I don’t give a fuck about reading his speeches. If Al Jazeera and about 100 other news organizations tell me that he has said the Holocaust is a myth, I’m willing to credit that. He can certainly come out and say that it happened if he likes, then I’ll be listening. Or are you suggesting that this is a lie, and he didn’t really say it?
""They have fabricated a legend under the name Massacre of the Jews, and they hold it higher than God himself, religion itself and the prophets themselves.
“If somebody in their country questions God, nobody says anything, but if somebody denies the myth of the massacre of Jews, the Zionist loudspeakers and the governments in the pay of Zionism will start to scream.”
I don’t care about his dissembling and cute attempts to distance himself from his monstrous sayings after the fact, with cute statements about why we can insult Mohammed but he can not deny the Holocaust. If he does not want to be “misunderstood,” then don’t call the fucking Holocaust a “myth of the massacre of Jews.”
I’ll add that the thousands of suicide bombers who showed up after his call for “the gentle change of the current government of the Zionist state formerly known as Palestine” appeared to interpret his call somewhat differently than you do. But maybe that’s because they speak his language, and know what he was saying.
Except for those annoying quotes in that thread where he did in fact insist the Holocaust was “subject to interpretation”, “open to debate”, and “not really his fault anyway, so could you please move those annoying Jews? Thanks.”
I’m sorry, you can continue to, to use your words, have a hard-on for defending any possible neo-conservative enemy as much as you want, but if I posted to my blog that “slavery was a myth, deserves impartial historical study, and in any event I believe African Americans should be moved to Europe because we are blameless in any injustice to them”, I would be - quite rightly - pilloried as a racist. Ahmadinejad doesn’t get a free pass simply because his writing and speaking style resembles Kahlil Gibran on a bad acid day. He is quite brazenly manipulating the anti-Semitism that exists in Arab opinon to push his faction’s agenda (which is done by many other leaders in the Arab world, such as the Palestinian factions, Hezbollah, and the radical Iraqi factions); and much like any other racist in a position of power often tries to leaven his shout-outs to the racist jackals with plausible deniability. The problem is that, unlike most other Arab leaders, Ahmadinejad really, really sucks at hiding it.
Also - to make it clear, that doesn’t mean we should send in the bombers. He’s a religious nut and an anti-Semite, but that’s not a casus belli. I’d classify it more as yet another land with an unfortunate choice in who they elected. (Insert Bush joke here.)
I suspect you are counting things like Bosnia, Kosovo and the liberation of Kuwait? Because honestly, my count of “unjustified US aggression in the last 20 years” still pegs at a big 1, but I’m open to corrections.
(That 1 is a doozy, I’ll grant you, but it’s still just 1. Also, I’m tempted to give Iran extra credit on the latest Middle East hoofrah.)
He’s a numbers-revisionist at worst. And the “myth”, in context, is that the Holocaust somehow justified creating the state of Israel in the middle of Arab lands. But since you can’t be bothered to read for yourself, and instead trust the media without question, the discussion is closed.
In other words, he thinks the Holocaust is a myth, and you can’t find anything to refute that, so you no longer have anything to discuss.
Part 1: Yes, the Holocaust is open to interpretation. I tend to believe the conventional view, but having researched the argument from both sides, there is a lot of compelling evidence that the numbers could have been inflated. I can certainly see how the President of Iran would fall on the other side of the issue.
Part 2: “Not really his fault” meaning “not the fault of the Arab world” is correct. “could you please move the Jews” also correct. Monster!
H.
I’ll try to find a TV program that will explain it to you.
H.
Don’t try to saddle me with some perceived cultural or intellectual inferiority because I don’t believe the bullshit you are trying to peddle here. I’m not the one with the inability to present evidence to the contrary. I’ve actually read the speeches, they simply don’t say what you seem to think they do. Of course, you are more than welcome to show me, with quotes from his speeches, his clarifications that the Holocaust is not actually a myth, and he was solely presenting it as a counterfactual to question why such things can’t be questioned. Go ahead, I’ll wait.
Another wonder of this forum. Perhaps I should suggest that I will try to find a clip of Auschwitz for you to understand what happened, but I fear you might start masturbating to it.