Da Techguy's (no longer backup) Blog

Apparently the rules about trading with nations that support terror are a bit more flexible than they should be:

While you were busy getting ready for Christmas,U.S. Approved Business With Blacklisted Nations

Despite sanctions and trade embargoes, over the past decade the United States government has granted special licenses allowing American companies to do billions of dollars in business with Iran and other countries blacklisted as state sponsors of terrorism, an examination by The New York Times has found.

Including Iran?

Yes, including Iran.

Not a good idea:

I share Fausta’s opinion on the wisdom of this, over on the left Firedoglake also objects:

Well, I see our foreign policy has really learned it’s lessons…and that lesson is how much of this profit goes to the Caymans?

Alas Attaturk being a person of the left draws the wrong conclusion:

It’s almost as though all that posturing about how evil some state is, is just posturing.

Yeah after all there is no reason to believe that we have anything to worry about with Iran is there?

Among the two most alarming revelations is the already completed sale and delivery, to Venezuela by Russia, of nearly 2,000 advanced, shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles capable of hitting aircraft as high as 19,000 feet. Equally and perhaps more alarming is an October agreement between Iran and Venezuela. The agreement establishes a joint ground-to-ground missile base on Venezuelan soil and calls for the sharing of missile technology and the training of technicians and officers. In addition, Venezuela may use the missiles as it chooses for “national needs” and in case of “emergency.” Several types of missiles will be deployed, giving Venezuela the ability to strike targets throughout South and Central America and throughout the U.S.

Well how bad can medium range missiles be in the hands of a guy like Chavez?

Medium-range ground-to-ground missiles based in Venezuela are another matter entirely. Armed only with conventional explosive warheads, there would be little motivation for Venezuela or Iran to use them, as even under Barack Obama, massive retaliation would be at least possible. The equation is swung more in favor of use with biological or chemical warheads. But with nuclear warheads, use becomes even more likely. What is almost certain is that nuclear warheads would allow substantial blackmail capability, giving Iran and Venezuela a free hand not only in South and Central America, but in the Middle East as well. And all that is apparently keeping Iran from producing such warheads is a computer virus.

Well it’s not like Iranians are actually fighting us on the ground or something….oops:

Coalition and Afghan special operations teams have captured a Taliban commander who doubles as an Iranian Qods Force operative and helped ship weapons from Iran into Afghanistan.

The Taliban/Qods Force operative, who was not named, was detained during a Dec. 18 raid in the Zhari district in Kandahar province, the International Security Assistance Force reported in a press release. ISAF and Afghan forces are currently working to secure Zhari and the neighboring districts of Panjwai and Arghandab from the Taliban.

Nah all that axis of evil stuff is just hooey, why look at how peaceful North Korea is?

North Korea threatened Thursday to launch a “sacred” nuclear war against South Korea if it attacks, as Seoul staged military exercises that have raised already high tensions on the peninsula.

The remarks seemed aimed at revving patriotic spirit on the eve of the 19th anniversary of leader Kim Jong Il’s appointment as the supreme military commander.

Defense chief Kim Yong Chun said North Korea is “fully prepared to launch a sacred war” — and would use its nuclear capabilities — if attacked and warned the South against intruding even the smallest amount on its territory, according to the official Korean Central News Agency.

Yup nothing but peaceful folk there, as that noted war mongering extremist (per Morning Joe) Victor Davis Hanson said:

The present strategy in Korea? Who knows? But I think a prosperous South Korea is between the rock of hoping for the relatively nonviolent implosion of the failed state of North Korea in some sort of East German fashion, and the hard place of a communist thugocracy in the bunker lashing out in “we will take you down with us” fashion.

Yup no sign of evil there. After all they oppose the most oppressive homophobic force known to man, the US Military.

May our friends on the left always have the privilege of never finding out just how wrong they are the hard way.