A short note on Obama’s speech.

Nice to see Obama admit in public that the US overthrew Iran’s democratically elected government in 1953, which fact, along with the support of the Shah, has sort of culminated in our recent standoff with Iran over the last 30 years. 

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=97071&sectionid=351020502

Now, it would be nice if he would start confessing to every other coup we’ve ever been involved in.

Some of the elements of his speech today were pretty laughable such as his castigating Hamas for not renouncing violence.  Is there any reason to ask Hamas to renounce violence when Israel just pounded Gaza killing 1300 Gazans?  The fact of the matter is that we’ve always wanted for the US and our client states to have a monopoly on violence.  Anyone else is just a terrorist. 

Additionally, demanding Hamas recognize Israel is a silly thing to ask since Israel doesn’t recognize Palestine and East Timor doesn’t recognize Indonesia and Taiwan doesn’t recognize China etc.  If we are going to start asking countries to recognize other countries, especially the ones that are taking your land and call part of your land their country… we’d better get started soon, because the list is pretty long. 

Despite his recent insistence that Israel freeze settlement expansion (only a small part of Israel’s daily crimes against Palestinian Arabs) Obama is still a staunch ally of Israel and his refusal to talk to Hamas is good evidence of that.  He will talk to everyone else, even recently saying he will talk to Hezbollah.  Why not talk to Hamas?  Remember, 64% of Israelis polled last year think that Hamas should be engaged diplomatically.  Barack won’t do it because of AIPAC.