I question your evidence for some of those atrocities, but nonetheless, some points:
"Despite Iran's shutting down the internet and disrupting phone service, some Iranians managed to evade restrictions to share witness accounts and hundreds of videos, many of which The New York Times was able to collect and authenticate."
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/0...
"As many as 30,000 people could have been killed in the streets of Iran on Jan. 8 and 9 alone, two senior officials of the countryâ(TM)s Ministry of Health told TIME - indicating a dramatic surge in the death toll."
https://time.com/7357635/more-...
1. You're making an assumption that the US has not only the right and obligation to invade another country in order to stop atrocities, but that intervention would be effective.
Nonsense, I've done no such thing. Stop lying. What I have done is respond to your manifestly absurd claim there is no "moral right". To be perfectly clear I have NOT at any time over the last two decades supported a US invasion of Iran. I voted against John McCain for president in 2008 simply for having joked about it.
I do presently very much support "finishing the job" now that a war has started following the January massacres.
You're assuming that intervention by the US ensures success.
Again you brazenly misrepresent my position. Please do not lie about me or put words into my mouth. I didn't say this here nor have I ever made any such assumption. I believe the current US intervention is more likely than not to end in failure (e.g regime survival). A statement I have made repeatedly in the past.
Recent experience in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya strongly indicates the opposite.
Those interventions made things much worse: hundreds of thousands of people killed and millions displaced from their homes, producing millions of refugees.
I believe the war in Afghanistan was warranted and justified following 9/11 and further believe the Doha betrayal / surrender was a mistake. I also strongly disagreed with KSA getting a pass. I did not support wars in Iraq or Libya and publicly advocated against them. No matter what happens in Iran going forward there are no safe options.
2. Moral principles must be universal to be respected. That is, if I assert that you have a moral obligation to do or not do something, that implies that I also have the same obligation. So if the US has a right or a duty to intervene in Iran to stop their government from doing evil (as decided by the US), then Iran has the same right and duty to intervene in the US, based on their judgment.
While I believe in the golden rule I reject this absurd abstraction whereby dueling sensibilities are deemed equivalent. I have a problem with the value judgements of twelver fundamentalists who promote sigheh with 9 year old girls, murder civilians for "waging war against god" (e.g. protesting) and intentionally massacre tens of thousands of unarmed men, women and children enmasse.
I refuse to accept your absurd framing of universal equivalence of any and all moral judgements. I do not accept the morality of dark age bullshit being promulgated by the zelots of the Iranian regime and I don't give a f*** if they disagree with my moral judgements.
Do you agree that Iran has a right to attack the US, invade, or try to overthrow the US government to stop some action which, in the estimation of the Iranian government, is immoral? To impose Islam, for exampe? Estimates of the number of people who die in the US every year because they lack health insurance vary between 26,000 (2006) and 68,000 (2020). Does Iran have a duty to correct that?
No absolutely not. I support intervention only where feasible factoring in a great deal of deference and tolerance for sovereignty of states. I disagree with the premise every reason that any dark age crackpot comes up with is equally valid as any other reason. That is patently absurd. In short I believe the Iranian regime has a "duty" to get itself wrecked if it tries to invade the US.
3. If the US has a responsibility to protect people in Iran from their own government, surely it has at least an equal resposibility to protect people in Gaza from the government of Israel. Instead, the US has facilitated violence in Gaza by providing funding and war materiel to Israel.
I don't give a fuck about the Gaza issue and refuse to pick a side. There is no party to that conflict worth giving a shit about. Gaza is governed by a death cult that intentionally massacred over a thousand civilians also taking hundreds of hostages in 2023. It is no kinder to its own population which it terrorizes, wholesale murders political opposition and rules by force with summary executions. The Israelis for their part under BB are hyper militant.. infinite settlement expansion, blockades and oppression that is more interested in settlement expansion than living in peace. When it responds to attacks it has little regard for collateral civilian casualties. They deserve each other.
So what's up with that? Is there really a responsibility to protect, or does that only apply to countries the US considers unfriendly?
I would say the Biden administration did at least try to open humanitarian corridors and demand that aid get into Gaza but I didn't agree with the administrations actions. If I were president I wouldn't give shit to Israel. Trump's idea of taking over Gaza and turning it into a real estate development is genocide and he should face justice accordingly if he ever tries it.
