Iran has repaid our outstretched open hand that allowed the regime to arrest and brutalize the protesters with this decision:
A Cabinet meeting headed by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ordered the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran to begin building five uranium enrichment sites that have already been studied and propose five other locations for future construction within two months.
But why should we be surprised? We are retreating. So they advance.
UPDATE: And it should not be surprising that our various outstretched hands and resets are viewed as retreats and opportunities to gain at our expense:
Usually aggression, bullying, and nationalist agendas evolve into wars—when the aggressive party is convinced it has more to gain through war than lose. And such perceptions, wrong or not, emerge when a Xerxes, a Napoleon or a Hitler are assured that their targets either cannot or will not stop them. Or, if they belatedly try to roll the dice, the resulting losses will be small in terms of what might be perceived as gain.
Our president believes his enlightened and nuanced foreign policy will spare us the wars that Bush "chose" to start. We shall see.
