Laughs about Iran

Telegraph | Opinion | Let's give Iran some of its own medicine

Mark Steyn's comments about what to do about Iran include this:

" Jack Straw has been at pains to emphasise that no military action against Iran is being contemplated by him or anybody else, but in a sign that he's losing patience with the mullahs Mr Straw's officials have indicated that they're prepared to consider the possibility of possibly considering the preparation of a possible motion on sanctions for the UN Security Council to consider the possibility of considering.

But don't worry, we're not escalating this thing any more than necessary. Initially, the FCO is considering "narrowly targeted sanctions such as a travel ban on Iranian leaders"....

Needless to say, the German deputy foreign minister, Gernot Erler, has already cautioned that this may be going too far, and that sanctions could well hurt us more than it hurts the Iranians. Perhaps this is what passes is for a good cop/bad cop routine, with Herr Erler affably suggesting to the punks that they might want to cooperate or he'll have to send his pal Jack in to tear up their tickets for the Michael Moore première at the Cannes Film Festival."

But really, even Steyn seems uncertain what can be done. Time for some creative thinking, world.

And finally, a (fairly rare) amusing but interesting bit from The Economist:

"IRAN'S president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, says Israel is an alien implantation whose people should return to Europe or perhaps settle in Alaska. So it is an irony that Israel's president, Moshe Katzav, is in fact a Farsi-speaker born in Iran. Ditto Israel's defence minister, Shaul Mofaz, who is doubtless preoccupied nowadays with how to destroy Iran's nuclear programme. He is advised by Dan Halutz, Israel's former air-force commander and now chief of staff. Lieut-General Halutz was born in Israel, both his parents in Iran. They seem to have taught him a sense of humour. Asked how far Israel would go to stop Iran's nuclear programme, he replied: “two thousand kilometres”.