A Quote by Shahin Najafi
Iran is hard to understand. Although it is ruled in an authoritarian manner, it's not a state in which everything is controlled from one center. There are many forces that work in parallel: the military, the intelligence service, the Revolutionary Guard, the clergy and the government. They all share a fear of the nation's youth.
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The military and the clergy cause us much annoyance; the clergy and the military, they empty our wallets and rob our intelligence.
The Revolutionary Guard Corps is the official protector of Iran's revolution, with 100,000 troops divided into air, naval and ground divisions. It plays a large role in Iran's economy. Its international paramilitary arm, the Quds Force, is Tehran's main vehicle for supporting Shiite proxy forces.
The Revolutionary Guard controls almost everything in Iran, and this is hurting the people.
I signed up for military service in the months following 9/11, and later, as a military intelligence officer, I felt called, like so many others, to volunteer for deployment and service in Afghanistan.
My first direct encounter with the military was when I joined ROTC as a graduate student, although my father, who served in the U.S. Marine Corps, can trace the military service in our family all the way back to the Revolutionary War.
Some things the legislator must find ready to his hand in a state, others he must provide. And therefore we can only say: May our state be constituted in such a manner as to be blessed with the goods of which fortune disposes (for we acknowledge her power): whereas virtue and goodness in the state are not a matter of chance but the result of knowledge and purpose. A city can be virtuous only when the citizens who have a share in the government are virtuous, and in our state all the citizens share in the government.
Iran is not a nation-state; it's a revolutionary cause devoted to mayhem.
I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the civilized world - no longer a Government by free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.
There are many good reasons to fear a nuclear Iran, but also many good reasons to fear the consequences of launching a preventive military strike against Iran. If the president, whoever it is, wants to do the latter, he or she should - indeed, under the Constitution, must - go to Congress.
As we look at the many problems we face in treating our veterans in a manner befitting their service and sacrifice, it's time we commit ourselves as a nation to applying the kind of resources and military precision necessary to finally make things right.
In recent years... forces have developed in our government over which we have no control, and these forces have an authoritarian approach to justice - meaning, they tell you what justice is.
My advice for Obama concerning Iran is just to do what you already promised you would do, open up communications with Iran. Which is what I did after the Shah was deposed, as you know when the revolutionary government came in, I still had diplomatic relations with Iran, otherwise the hostages wouldn't have been there. We had about, as you know, 60 some diplomats in Iran, they had about the same number in Washington.
Mr. Speaker, we are a blessed Nation. We have not suffered another attack on our soil since September 11, and we are grateful. We have killed or captured dozens of members of al Qaeda and the Taliban. Our military and intelligence forces are working both hard and smart.
One opinion I share with the Dadaists is that art-making presupposes a revolutionary state of mind. Assimilating the practice into commodity or symbol of status nullifies its fundamental aims; therefore at the center of my own adherence to to this ranginess in taste is that it doesn't add up to membership in a private club. The differences choose me. There are so many approaches, so many innovative moves, so many oddly shaped ears in the field; may they never sing in unison.
The thing about Iran is there are many political factions and it's not quite the dictatorial, authoritarian state with one person always making every single decision.
The Middle East that Obama inherited in 2009 was largely at peace, for the surge in Iraq had beaten down the al Qaeda-linked groups. U.S. relations with traditional allies in the Gulf, Jordan, Israel and Egypt were very good. Iran was contained, its Revolutionary Guard forces at home.
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