"See that man, Barack? That's Ahmadinejad. He's tough, but reasonable. We can talk with him."
"Biden's political games have made him Tehran's favorite senator." "Biden's Blink on Iran," by Michael Rubin in the Washington Post, August 26 (thanks to JCB):
[...] As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Biden is well versed in policy debates and carefully choreographed trips. But his record on the Islamic Republic of Iran -- perhaps the chief national security threat facing the next president -- suggests a persistent and dangerous judgment deficit. Biden's unyielding pursuit of "engagement" with Iran for more than a decade has made it easier for Tehran to pursue its nuclear program, while his partisan obsession with thwarting the Bush administration has led him to oppose tough sanctions against hard-liners in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.[...]
Biden's political games have made him Tehran's favorite senator. As Gen. David Petraeus struggled to unite Iraqis across the ethnic and sectarian divide, Iran's Press TV seized on Biden's plan for partitioning Iraq and featured his statements with the headline "US plans to disintegrate Iraq." Biden's attack-dog statements about U.S. policy failures emboldened Iranian hard-liners to defy diplomacy. In the Dec. 7, 2007, official sermon, Ayatollah Mohammad Kashani speaking on behalf of Iran's supreme leader, declared, "This Senator [Biden] correctly says Israel could not suppress Hizbullah in Lebanon, so how can the U.S. stand face-to-face with a nation of 70 million? This is the blessing of the Guardianship of the Jurists [the theocracy] . . . which plants such thoughts in the hearts of U.S. senators and forces them to make such confessions." The crowd met his statement with refrains of "Death to America."
Obama picked Biden for experience, but he might also have considered judgment. When it comes to Iran, Biden could stare down dictators; too bad he blinks.
So this is the change in foreign policy America can believe in, that the world has been waiting for--headstrong empty-headedness. How did Winston Churchill put it? Resolutely irresolute; solidly for drift; firmly for indecision?
Shame on the Democrats to look other way at best and worst to go against strict sanctions against Iran. these politicians make me ill just to listen to them, and Biden is on the top of heap.
Biden recently held a fund raiser in the home of a prominent pro-regime Iranian lobbyist.
Good point, Cornelius--cupidity and cluelessness.
JCB thinks he's on a roll here--two attributions in the span of two days. Feels he's accomplished a notable undertaking, just like that Nigerian executioner about to create 86 widows with one blow!
Maybe Biden is getting what he deserves. As vice-president, he'll have to deal with, and maybe clean up, the mess he made. It might be fun to hear him talk about the evil Iranian regime after cutting it so much slack over the years. Obama will need at least one Islamic whipping boy, to prove he is not a Muslim. It would have to be Iran or Saudi Arabia.
Of course Biden is also a living example of why so few senators have ever been elected president, though many have sought the job.
Here's more about our buddy Biden and his love for Iran (and their money):
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_11_18/ai_84184979