Hellscape: Iran

I know I've gone quite far with the Orwellian metaphor relating to the Bush administration. But to put things into perspective, I've been doing a little research on Iran. Iranians are very poor, despite the oil-wealth of the nation, and they have terrible drug problem with Afghani opium. Yet, they have this group called the Basij, which is basically a Hitler Youth to enforce the fundamentalist Islamic moral code.

These young folks were orignially recruited as cannon fodder in Iraqi minefields during the Iran-Iraq war of the eighties. Their role has changed quite a bit in peacetime. While they have some legitimate responsibilities like disaster relief, they mostly man checkpoints where they make sure women aren't wearing makeup, are dressed in proper hijab, and are accompanied only by male relatives. They also do other wonderful things like suppress student protests for freedom, break up mixed-gender parties, and tear down satellite dishes.

Sucks to be in Iran. So lets go bomb them to bring freedom. (Also see this article on the Iranian drug problem. We have to realize that they are frail people, just like us, despite the monolithic fundamentalist talk from our government.