But AIPAC wants the derail, so what do US interests matter?
It's an error, however, to suggest this is a Republican move. It's a fully bipartisan move, as the Senators From AIPAC come from both parties. Menendez, one of the prime Israel-firsters in the Senate, is a Democrat. He and Kirk move in lockstep on this issue.
One of the most annoying things about this scandal is that Wise illicitly took it on herself to pull the contract, when it should have gone to the trustees. She made the unilateral assumption that the trustees would reject him, and never gave them the chance to consider the issue.
Hamas appears to have lost much support among the Arab states, which seem to be willing to throw them under the bus. And the backing of some of their allies isn't really helpful.
There's really only one factor here. Large pro-Israel donors exerting pressure. The control mechanism now is money. That wasn't really the case in the McCarthy era, when the pressure was primarily political, driven by official forces. Now, the pressure is private and monetary.
The US is now having to reap what the Neocon imperialists sowed in their drive for glabal hegemony, and the Neocons are still trying to sow. The problem with imperialism is that when the empire falls, it doesn't fall alone but brings down all around it.
This is why Palestine needs the International Criminal Court, because the IDF operates with complete impunity and its soldiers aren't punished for these killings.
If the settler violence is terrorism and the Israeli state supports the settlers, enables their terror and refrains from opposing it, that makes Israel a state supporter of terrorism.
The US ought to impose sanctions on itself for its support of Israeli terrorism.
It's disgusting to see Susan Rice's condemnation of Palestine for asserting the fundamental rights that all states possess, just to suck up to Israel. And knowing that she will certain veto any such measure that reaches the Security Council.
WRT the Palestinian prisoner release issue, Israel also rearrests the released prisoners at will. So it would really be poor judgment to give up any substantial concession just in return for a temporary release.
It's important to note that this is a yeshiva for English-speaking youth. That is, American Zionist extremists whose main motivation is likely to be formenting trouble in the neighborhood., like they already have in Sheikh Jarrah.
Jerusalem is already full of yeshivas for people with real religious motivation to study there.
Cheney isn't an anomaly. There was the ironfisted control over domestic policies exercised by Hoover. There were the Dulles brothers, who brought down democracy in Iran. Presidents couldn't or wouldn't stand up to these guys.
According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, AIPAC is now declaring "there should not be a vote at this time" on the sanctions. They report that Menendez, too, has backed off on the vote.
When even Abe Foxman, whose life is devoted to digging up anti-Semitism where it doesn't exist, condemns the Israeli comments on Kerry, you know you've got extreme extremism.
These terrorist-linked settlements send representatives to the US to conduct huge fundraisers with total impunity, despite draconian US laws prohibiting any kind of material support for terrorist-linked activities and organizations.
Here we see just one more case of blowback stemming from US exceptionalism, the belief that the rules just don't apply to us, and consequences be damned.
Obama's record of pardons is abysmal, one of the lowest in recent times. Everything he does has been with both eyes on reelection, so I suppose he didn't want to be called "soft on crime." What's his excuse now?
Maybe marijuana pardons would make Holder resign in protest, in which case, good riddance.
I'm glad you used the term wealth inequality. Too often, this problem is described in terms of income - income inequality. But the power of the 1% lies not in their income but their massive wealth, that accretes like a black hole, sucking more and more wealth into it from the powerless.
This is a systemic problem, and it won't be understood by namecalling and finger-pointing - at Obama, or Congress, or lobbyists. It can only be understood systemically.
Was the law broken? It doesn't matter. We now know that the NSA has broken the law repeatedly, that it's repeatedly violated the orders of the courts, even its own secret oversight court.
And what happens? Who is jailed for it? Who is fined? Who loses their job? If government agencies can break the law with complete impunity, we have no law, only a police state. Which brings its full repressive force down on individuals who attempt to uphold the law.
It can't be too much emphasized that the agency involved in this activity was a contractor of the NSA. It was outsourced to a private corporation that employed Snowdon.
You don't get this story because you incorrectly think Obama is a decent guy. He doesn't pardon. He keeps Kiriaku in prison to intimidate potential whistleblowers in the CIA. He keeps Bradly Manning in prison to intimidate potential whisteblowers in the military.
This isn't the behavior of a decent guy, it's the behavior of a mob boss.
I notice that Obama didn't demand or get an apology for the cold-blooded execution of US citizen Furkan Dogan on the Mavi Mamara. Tell you where his priorities lie.
At the same time they are running these ads, the right-wing Israeli government is passing a raft of antidemocratic measures and haredi-inspired measures against women that will probably drive more secular Israelis out of the country.
"Pro-democracy forces in Libya say at least 10 of their fighters have been killed in a NATO air strike on the outskirts of the eastern town of Brega, as the battle rages on for control of the oil port."
Which is why I'm very dubious about supporting any Western intervention in civil wars.
The fear of Western imperialism is well-founded, particularly when the intervention is in an oil state. How can any Arab hear the words "no fly zone" and not shudder, thinking of Iraq?
Near my home, the local authorities have recently refused permits to several different Muslim groups seeking to build mosques. To their great credit, leaders of other religions, including Jews, have stepped forward to defend the rights of these congregations to build a place of worship. It was disturbing to see a rabbi listed as one of the leaders of the hate mob in Yorba Linda, and to see what appeared to be an Israeli flag among the US flags behind the podium.
If these people want to see their country hated, this flag abuse is certainly the way to go about it.
The origin of this corruption is in the policies of US oil imperialism, as the article makes quite clear.
Saudis like to insist that nothing can be changed because of their traditions, but very old Saudis can tell you that most of these "traditions" never existed before oil money corrupted the society.
It would be insane for the US, EU or any foreign power to use military force against the Libyan military. It would immediately be seen as "foreign powers attacking and killing Libyans," not liberating them. "They" are trying to depose "our" leader. Saddam redux.
This is the lesson of Somalia, that military intervention, even from humanitarian motives, will turn the local population against the interveners.
Al-Jazeera is putting out a cautionary signal with this post: link to english.aljazeera.net "My Revolution Betrayed" about the longterm outcome of the Orange Revolution in the Ukraine. A good antidote for excessive optimism.
If the Brotherhood is de-demonized, can Hamas be far behind? One of the primary charges in the demonization of Hamas is the claim that it's a "branch of the (evil terrorist) Muslim Brotherhood.
Or is it more likely that the connection will be used to continue the demonization of the Brotherhood as linked to the (evil terrorist) Hamas.
Or is it more likely that the Brotherhood will throw Hamas and the Palestinians under the bus to promote their own interests in Egyptian liberty?
The point of the White House policy would seem more to be backing Suleiman and making sure he stays in office, rather than Mubarak. Mubarak is already pretty irrelevant, but his regime is not, and this is what Washington wants to remain in power.
I see that Rep Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R - AIPAC) is now saying that democratic elections in Eygpt would be OK, but only parties that "support Israel" should be allowed to run.
The comparison of the situation in Egypt to 1979 Iran is pretty weak. The Iranian generals who were arrested and executed were the Shah's generals. But as Cole points out in the interview, Mubarak is the army's president; presidents may come and go, but the army remains. Any takeover of the Egyptian government is more likely to leave the army in charge, not the Muslim Brotherhood, which indeed is calling for the army to step up.
And now we see the results of the US plot to install its own police force in Palestine to repress any popular uprising against the quisling government. The phrase "fighting terror" covers up for a lot of sins.
This snowballing tendecy to label any kind of dissent as "terrorist" is very troubling, given the growing body of laws that target anything so labeled.
Why aren't Giuliani and his co-conspirators being arrested for providing material support to a terrorist group?
Using the lastest police-state ruling by the Supreme Court, the FBI has been targeting peace activists who have traveled to Gaza to protest Israel's illegal blockade, but nothing is ever done about Americans who support the terrorist groups supposedly on "our side."
Of course the US is the biggest terror organization of them all.
Blumenthal is one of the first to say openly how much of the current Islamophobia is being generated by right-wing Zionist interests. The taboo in the mainstream media against any criticism targeting Jews is so firmly in place that this aspect of the Islamophobic phenomenon is more usually ignored.
But the stance taken by liberal Jewish organizations in defense of Muslims demonstrates how Israel is becoming a wedge driven into the US Jewish community.
Phud - your point, calling the term "racism" "excessively inflammatory" seems to be exculpating Israel, suggesting it's not really so bad as all that.
Race may or may not be a genetic distinction, but racism is definitely a social distinction. The real question is not how closely peoples are related but how they are perceived by others as Other, as different from Us. And there can be no doubt that the Palestinians in Israel, the "Arabs," are perceived by the Israeli public as very Them, as an Other that is racially inferior, even subhuman.
Racism is really the most accurate term.
I only wish black Americans had a more clear understanding that their representatives in Congress are backing a racist state.
A gang of posters at Daily Kos also routinely abuse people who link to articles from respectable sites like antiwar.com, which they have labeled "antisemitic." It's part of a pattern of suppression of evidence that shows Israel in a bad light.
Iran has good cause to suspect the US and Israel, at least, of complicity in terrorist activity against them. It could get awkward if Iraqi counterterrorism activity picked up evidence of US involvment.
The recent defections of the congressional Democrats are widening the rift between Obama and the party he nominally leads, so that it's becoming increasingly clear this is going to be a one-term presidency. The sooner he realizes that he really doesn't have any more to lose, the sooner he will be liberated to stop Haim Saban from running his State Department and take positive steps to keep his peace prize from being the travesty of all time.
Netanyahu didn't have to freeze settlements to obtain what Obama was offering. Despite his slap in the face, the US will continue to veto any UN Security Council resolutions that Israel doesn't like, in particular the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state. This is what Israelis call a "freier," a sucker - if a guy is going to give away something for free, you take it.
For a person who claims to support the founding of a Palestinian state, Obama is certainly doing everything he can to prevent it. By clinging to the rotting corpse of "negotiations" as settlement building accelerates, he is less a referee than the guy pinning Palestine's arms behind his back while Israel beats him up.
If the real existential threat to Israel is fear, then the real enemy is the Israeli leadership that persists in fanning the flames of fear. The "Iran threat" is the product of Israel rhetoric. When Netanyahu repeatedly declares that Ahmadinejad is Hitler and it's 1938, he shouldn't be surprised when the consequence is to drive the Jewish population away from the neighborhood.
In doing this, he reveals clearly that the Zionist premise of finding safety in the "land of Israel" was always a false one. Nothing is more dangerous to the world's Jewish population than the project of concentrating it in one, small, vulnerable area. But given that Israel does exist, its only hope for safety now lies in making peace with its neighbors and extending the hand of friendship to them, instead of the hand of war.
Unfortunately, it never seems to occur to the Israeli leadership to extend the hand of friendship to Iran.
The remark about the Shah really sums it up. The constant Iranophobia that has never really let up in the US since the Shah was deposed is all about bringing back some form of the Shah, another a US puppet regime and imperial garrison. The neocons have a longterm plan of "perpetual hegemony" over central Asia, and anything like a free and independent state stands in their way.
© 2025 All Rights Reserved
But AIPAC wants the derail, so what do US interests matter?
It's an error, however, to suggest this is a Republican move. It's a fully bipartisan move, as the Senators From AIPAC come from both parties. Menendez, one of the prime Israel-firsters in the Senate, is a Democrat. He and Kirk move in lockstep on this issue.
Exceptionalism is nothing more than sociopathy exalted as ideologiy.
I recall saying at the time that getting involved in Syria was the dumbest thing Hezbollah could do, and now it's coming back to bit them.
One of the most annoying things about this scandal is that Wise illicitly took it on herself to pull the contract, when it should have gone to the trustees. She made the unilateral assumption that the trustees would reject him, and never gave them the chance to consider the issue.
Hamas appears to have lost much support among the Arab states, which seem to be willing to throw them under the bus. And the backing of some of their allies isn't really helpful.
Interesting that U of I is also hosting Sayed Kashua this year. With apparently no controversy. Yet.
There's really only one factor here. Large pro-Israel donors exerting pressure. The control mechanism now is money. That wasn't really the case in the McCarthy era, when the pressure was primarily political, driven by official forces. Now, the pressure is private and monetary.
The US is now having to reap what the Neocon imperialists sowed in their drive for glabal hegemony, and the Neocons are still trying to sow. The problem with imperialism is that when the empire falls, it doesn't fall alone but brings down all around it.
I think you refer to the death of Iman al Hams, the school child murdered at point-blank range as she lay wounded. The soldier was acquitted.
This is why Palestine needs the International Criminal Court, because the IDF operates with complete impunity and its soldiers aren't punished for these killings.
Israel can hardly strip search the Pope.
If the settler violence is terrorism and the Israeli state supports the settlers, enables their terror and refrains from opposing it, that makes Israel a state supporter of terrorism.
The US ought to impose sanctions on itself for its support of Israeli terrorism.
And now we hear voices in Congress condemning and threatening Kerry. He's already apologized for the A-word.
It's disgusting to see Susan Rice's condemnation of Palestine for asserting the fundamental rights that all states possess, just to suck up to Israel. And knowing that she will certain veto any such measure that reaches the Security Council.
I'm ashamed for my country.
And now US officials are piling on Falk with "good riddance" insults and defamation.
WRT the Palestinian prisoner release issue, Israel also rearrests the released prisoners at will. So it would really be poor judgment to give up any substantial concession just in return for a temporary release.
Kirk claims the majority of the American people support his warmongering against Iran, when polling shows decisively that the majority wants peace.
Why? Pressure from the US is the main reason why.
It's important to note that this is a yeshiva for English-speaking youth. That is, American Zionist extremists whose main motivation is likely to be formenting trouble in the neighborhood., like they already have in Sheikh Jarrah.
Jerusalem is already full of yeshivas for people with real religious motivation to study there.
Cheney isn't an anomaly. There was the ironfisted control over domestic policies exercised by Hoover. There were the Dulles brothers, who brought down democracy in Iran. Presidents couldn't or wouldn't stand up to these guys.
According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, AIPAC is now declaring "there should not be a vote at this time" on the sanctions. They report that Menendez, too, has backed off on the vote.
In the Israeli paper Haaretz, this story is illustrated by a grossly misleading photo of an actual fleet of warships. Shameful distortion.
Maybe they'll make a nice friendly port call.
When even Abe Foxman, whose life is devoted to digging up anti-Semitism where it doesn't exist, condemns the Israeli comments on Kerry, you know you've got extreme extremism.
When it gets personal, somehow it gets different. Consider Cheney and his daughter Mary.
At Davos, Netanyahu declared "I will not uproot a single Israeli." Not a single settler will be moved.
These terrorist-linked settlements send representatives to the US to conduct huge fundraisers with total impunity, despite draconian US laws prohibiting any kind of material support for terrorist-linked activities and organizations.
Here we see just one more case of blowback stemming from US exceptionalism, the belief that the rules just don't apply to us, and consequences be damned.
Obama's record of pardons is abysmal, one of the lowest in recent times. Everything he does has been with both eyes on reelection, so I suppose he didn't want to be called "soft on crime." What's his excuse now?
Maybe marijuana pardons would make Holder resign in protest, in which case, good riddance.
White isn't the right word, Juan, as you surely know. I doubt if Obama would attend Radovan Karadzic's funeral, either, and he's white as rice.
But none of those African countries, or the Serbs, have a sufficiently powerful lobby in Washington, applying whitewash to their war crimes.
The lobby is largely directed by a foreign interest. It's Netanyahu who's behind the current push for this sanctions bill.
There are plenty of Americans who would like to brand this country as a Christian state, and the strongest opponents of this have always been US Jews.
I'm glad you used the term wealth inequality. Too often, this problem is described in terms of income - income inequality. But the power of the 1% lies not in their income but their massive wealth, that accretes like a black hole, sucking more and more wealth into it from the powerless.
This is a systemic problem, and it won't be understood by namecalling and finger-pointing - at Obama, or Congress, or lobbyists. It can only be understood systemically.
Was the law broken? It doesn't matter. We now know that the NSA has broken the law repeatedly, that it's repeatedly violated the orders of the courts, even its own secret oversight court.
And what happens? Who is jailed for it? Who is fined? Who loses their job? If government agencies can break the law with complete impunity, we have no law, only a police state. Which brings its full repressive force down on individuals who attempt to uphold the law.
Not just Republican members of Congress in bed with AIPAC, plenty of Democrats, too. eg Charles Schumer.
The US needs Russia more than Russia needs the US. All because of the inteventionist US policies. This is what puts the nation at risk.
It can't be too much emphasized that the agency involved in this activity was a contractor of the NSA. It was outsourced to a private corporation that employed Snowdon.
You don't get this story because you incorrectly think Obama is a decent guy. He doesn't pardon. He keeps Kiriaku in prison to intimidate potential whistleblowers in the CIA. He keeps Bradly Manning in prison to intimidate potential whisteblowers in the military.
This isn't the behavior of a decent guy, it's the behavior of a mob boss.
As long as we're looking, how about looking at former congressman Jerry Weller, Montt's son-in-law and biggest supporter on the Hill.
I notice that Obama didn't demand or get an apology for the cold-blooded execution of US citizen Furkan Dogan on the Mavi Mamara. Tell you where his priorities lie.
Why not hold Holder's boss accountable?
If only there were a single member of the US Congress with the integrity to board such a ship.
There won't be Congressional hearings because Congress was complicit in the crime, which is essentially American exceptionalism.
At the same time they are running these ads, the right-wing Israeli government is passing a raft of antidemocratic measures and haredi-inspired measures against women that will probably drive more secular Israelis out of the country.
The comparisons to 1948 only grow.
I wish they were not doing this. Other dictators will take the arrests as reason to cling to power and fight instead of relinquishing it peacefully.
Here we go again.
link to english.aljazeera.net
"Pro-democracy forces in Libya say at least 10 of their fighters have been killed in a NATO air strike on the outskirts of the eastern town of Brega, as the battle rages on for control of the oil port."
Which is why I'm very dubious about supporting any Western intervention in civil wars.
So we're going to see UAE pilots supporting revolution in Libya while UAE troops are suppressing revolution in Bahrain? We're living in Bizzaroworld.
The fear of Western imperialism is well-founded, particularly when the intervention is in an oil state. How can any Arab hear the words "no fly zone" and not shudder, thinking of Iraq?
Saudis favor "stability," which in their minds is Israel, not Hamas.
My question is how far the US opposed this Saudi move into Bahrain, or did they subvetly encourage it?
I get the feeling that it's Saif who's really in charge now.
Near my home, the local authorities have recently refused permits to several different Muslim groups seeking to build mosques. To their great credit, leaders of other religions, including Jews, have stepped forward to defend the rights of these congregations to build a place of worship. It was disturbing to see a rabbi listed as one of the leaders of the hate mob in Yorba Linda, and to see what appeared to be an Israeli flag among the US flags behind the podium.
If these people want to see their country hated, this flag abuse is certainly the way to go about it.
The origin of this corruption is in the policies of US oil imperialism, as the article makes quite clear.
Saudis like to insist that nothing can be changed because of their traditions, but very old Saudis can tell you that most of these "traditions" never existed before oil money corrupted the society.
It would be insane for the US, EU or any foreign power to use military force against the Libyan military. It would immediately be seen as "foreign powers attacking and killing Libyans," not liberating them. "They" are trying to depose "our" leader. Saddam redux.
This is the lesson of Somalia, that military intervention, even from humanitarian motives, will turn the local population against the interveners.
Al-Jazeera is putting out a cautionary signal with this post: link to english.aljazeera.net "My Revolution Betrayed" about the longterm outcome of the Orange Revolution in the Ukraine. A good antidote for excessive optimism.
If the Brotherhood is de-demonized, can Hamas be far behind? One of the primary charges in the demonization of Hamas is the claim that it's a "branch of the (evil terrorist) Muslim Brotherhood.
Or is it more likely that the connection will be used to continue the demonization of the Brotherhood as linked to the (evil terrorist) Hamas.
Or is it more likely that the Brotherhood will throw Hamas and the Palestinians under the bus to promote their own interests in Egyptian liberty?
The point of the White House policy would seem more to be backing Suleiman and making sure he stays in office, rather than Mubarak. Mubarak is already pretty irrelevant, but his regime is not, and this is what Washington wants to remain in power.
I see that Rep Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R - AIPAC) is now saying that democratic elections in Eygpt would be OK, but only parties that "support Israel" should be allowed to run.
The comparison of the situation in Egypt to 1979 Iran is pretty weak. The Iranian generals who were arrested and executed were the Shah's generals. But as Cole points out in the interview, Mubarak is the army's president; presidents may come and go, but the army remains. Any takeover of the Egyptian government is more likely to leave the army in charge, not the Muslim Brotherhood, which indeed is calling for the army to step up.
"I know that every inch hurts you." But they keep cutting off more inches. This is called sadism.
And now we see the results of the US plot to install its own police force in Palestine to repress any popular uprising against the quisling government. The phrase "fighting terror" covers up for a lot of sins.
This snowballing tendecy to label any kind of dissent as "terrorist" is very troubling, given the growing body of laws that target anything so labeled.
Homeland Security now says he may be tied to a right-wing anti-immigrant hate group. So the lone loonie thing may not hold up anyway.
The Taseer assassination was a lot more scary, owing to the mobs massing in support of the assassin. At least the US hasn't quite come to that yet.
I hope this poster does not own a gun.
The most disturbing thing about the report is the fact that the members of Congress did not say: No. You can't do that. We won't support that.
Why aren't Giuliani and his co-conspirators being arrested for providing material support to a terrorist group?
Using the lastest police-state ruling by the Supreme Court, the FBI has been targeting peace activists who have traveled to Gaza to protest Israel's illegal blockade, but nothing is ever done about Americans who support the terrorist groups supposedly on "our side."
Of course the US is the biggest terror organization of them all.
Blumenthal is one of the first to say openly how much of the current Islamophobia is being generated by right-wing Zionist interests. The taboo in the mainstream media against any criticism targeting Jews is so firmly in place that this aspect of the Islamophobic phenomenon is more usually ignored.
But the stance taken by liberal Jewish organizations in defense of Muslims demonstrates how Israel is becoming a wedge driven into the US Jewish community.
Phud - your point, calling the term "racism" "excessively inflammatory" seems to be exculpating Israel, suggesting it's not really so bad as all that.
Race may or may not be a genetic distinction, but racism is definitely a social distinction. The real question is not how closely peoples are related but how they are perceived by others as Other, as different from Us. And there can be no doubt that the Palestinians in Israel, the "Arabs," are perceived by the Israeli public as very Them, as an Other that is racially inferior, even subhuman.
Racism is really the most accurate term.
I only wish black Americans had a more clear understanding that their representatives in Congress are backing a racist state.
A gang of posters at Daily Kos also routinely abuse people who link to articles from respectable sites like antiwar.com, which they have labeled "antisemitic." It's part of a pattern of suppression of evidence that shows Israel in a bad light.
Iran has good cause to suspect the US and Israel, at least, of complicity in terrorist activity against them. It could get awkward if Iraqi counterterrorism activity picked up evidence of US involvment.
What the General Assembly giveth, the General Assembly can take away? I'd like to see a vote on rescinding Res 181.
The recent defections of the congressional Democrats are widening the rift between Obama and the party he nominally leads, so that it's becoming increasingly clear this is going to be a one-term presidency. The sooner he realizes that he really doesn't have any more to lose, the sooner he will be liberated to stop Haim Saban from running his State Department and take positive steps to keep his peace prize from being the travesty of all time.
Netanyahu didn't have to freeze settlements to obtain what Obama was offering. Despite his slap in the face, the US will continue to veto any UN Security Council resolutions that Israel doesn't like, in particular the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state. This is what Israelis call a "freier," a sucker - if a guy is going to give away something for free, you take it.
For a person who claims to support the founding of a Palestinian state, Obama is certainly doing everything he can to prevent it. By clinging to the rotting corpse of "negotiations" as settlement building accelerates, he is less a referee than the guy pinning Palestine's arms behind his back while Israel beats him up.
If the real existential threat to Israel is fear, then the real enemy is the Israeli leadership that persists in fanning the flames of fear. The "Iran threat" is the product of Israel rhetoric. When Netanyahu repeatedly declares that Ahmadinejad is Hitler and it's 1938, he shouldn't be surprised when the consequence is to drive the Jewish population away from the neighborhood.
In doing this, he reveals clearly that the Zionist premise of finding safety in the "land of Israel" was always a false one. Nothing is more dangerous to the world's Jewish population than the project of concentrating it in one, small, vulnerable area. But given that Israel does exist, its only hope for safety now lies in making peace with its neighbors and extending the hand of friendship to them, instead of the hand of war.
Unfortunately, it never seems to occur to the Israeli leadership to extend the hand of friendship to Iran.
The remark about the Shah really sums it up. The constant Iranophobia that has never really let up in the US since the Shah was deposed is all about bringing back some form of the Shah, another a US puppet regime and imperial garrison. The neocons have a longterm plan of "perpetual hegemony" over central Asia, and anything like a free and independent state stands in their way.