When Iran Took Americans Hostage, Bernie Backed Iran's Defenders

[Zolorp]

When Iran Took Americans Hostage, Bernie Backed Iran’s Defenders

Bernie Sanders, a top competitor in the Democratic primaries, has attacked Joe Biden for bringing “just a lot of baggage” into the race. But if past views are a major consideration, consider the baggage that Sanders drags into the campaign.

Go back over 40 years, to the start of Iran’s long conflict with the United States. On April 1, 1979, the theocratic Islamic Republic of Iran was proclaimed. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who had returned to Iran from exile to assume command of the revolt, became Supreme Leader in December of that year. His rise was accelerated by the seizure on Nov. 4 of 52 American diplomats and citizens, and citizens of other countries, at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. The hostage crisis became the means by which the Ayatollah crushed political opponents in Iran. Dealing with the hostage taking became the overwhelming political crisis for President Jimmy Carter. It lasted 444 days.

Virtually all Americans—Democrats, Republicans and independents—united in support of the hostages and the international call for their freedom. One prominent political figure on the 2020 stage, then almost completely unknown, stood apart by joining a Marxist-Leninist party that not only pledged support for the Iranian theocracy, but also justified the hostage taking by insisting the hostages were all likely CIA agents. Who was that person? It was Bernie Sanders.

https://news.yahoo.com/iran-took-americans-hostage-bernie-100052053.html?soc_src=community&soc_trk=fb

We cannot have this brought up daily in the news throughout the general election.

Editing to add a note. This story really hits home for me. I was 16 and Junior in High School when the hostages were taken. I enlisted in the Army at the age of 17 in October of 1980 because of this crisis. I wanted to fight for our freedom. This story strikes to the very core of my being and my understanding of what it means to be American

[zentrum]

1. You may not know what America

....did to Iran. We took down their democratically elected leader and installed the sadistic Shah. I was in Iran during the Shah's time. It's hard for Americans to grasp how truly brutal he was. How even tourists lived in fear of his Stasi-like military presence. His narcissism, BTW, makes Trump a piker.

The media stirred up all our flag--raising without telling the truth at all about the suffering of the Iranians under our (oil) guy, to whom Carter was giving the best of medical care and protection.

We were responsible for a war criminal. The Iranians were protesting back. They wanted to put the Shah on trial.

If we'd left their democracy intact, there would have been no Khomeini. You have to begin with the really true punctuation of events. We were not the "good guys".

[sweetloukillbot]

2. Two wrongs Equals Right

Got it!

[Zolorp]

3. I don't care what you think the US did to Iran

This one fact disqualifies Sanders from consideration because the vast majority of voters in this country will NEVER vote for a man who defended Iran during the hostage crisis. It would be the biggest electoral victory for any candidate since Reagan in '84.

The fact that he did it repulses me. I am sick over him being that un-American at that time. I cannot think of anything any of our candidates could have ever done that would so ensure Trump would be re-elected than this one thing from Sanders.

It's a no-go. The man cannot win a national general election with this on his record. If he is nominated, this guarantees Trump wins and is likely the reason Trump wants Sanders to win.

Editing to add that this is also likely the reason Trump has been wanting to kill Iranian government officials, to set up a "with us or against us" election and with this on the Sanders record, he would win easily in such a scenario.

[Gothmog]

17. I agree

sanders was wrong in taking this position

[Cuthbert Allgood]

4. Read this passage from the article:

In his standard stump speech, Pulley condemned “Carter’s war drive against the Iranian people,” and said that the U.S. “was on the brink of war with Iran,” which would be fought “to protect the oil and banking interests of the Rockefellers and other billionaires.” Americans, he predicted, would soon “pay on the battlefields with our very own lives.” Their criticism of the Ayatollah was intended “to get us ready for war.” And, Pulley charged, the media who criticized those of us who were against “American imperialism” were “declared insane.” As for the hostages, Pulley said “we can be sure that many of them are simply spies… or people assigned to protect the spies.”

OK. I will grant the last line is historically not true and even at the time was a little harsh. But, please tell me how much of the rest of that passage doesn't make sense?

[Zolorp]

5. I backed Carter in this and joined the Army in '80 at the age of 17 over this.

Not one word of his stump speech makes sense to me.

[Gothmog]

18. Thank you for your service

[Sloumeau]

6. People who think that America will put a former Communist and

current Socialist in the White House really do not understand that, in 2020, there are not enough Independents who will vote for that kind of candidate in order for that to occur.

[Zolorp]

7. Precisely, then throw the backing Iran during the hostage crisis on top and it's disastrous.

There is no path to electoral victory for a Sanders candidacy in the United States.

None.

[dware]

14. That's been exactly my argument here against a Sanders nomination. nt.

[Gothmog]

8. I am so glad that sanders is being vetted

This story would make agreat attack ad

[MineralMan]

9. This is just one of the stories that will be trumpeted by the GOP

if Senator Sanders were to become the Democratic Presidential nominee. Just one. There are many, many more stories from the past that would hurt the Sanders campaign in voters' eyes.

So far, those stories have been held back and not publicized by the Republicans. That will not be the case if Sanders is nominated.

They're from long ago, but that doesn't matter in presidential elections. It doesn't matter at all.

[Gothmog]

10. This story would make a number of great attack ads

[Cha]

11. KR!

[Zolorp]

16. Thank you Cha.

[George II]

12. Thanks for enlisting, we need more like you!

[NurseJackie]

13. Thanks for posting this!

Glad you're here!

[Zolorp]

19. Thank you.

I hadn't returned to this thread since it was locked and then subsequently the appeal was granted!

[TexasTowelie]

15. K&R! nt