Warning: Denny Crane over the top alert. Readers with no sense of humor, irony or wit should either turn back now or get a life because I don’t want to hear the whining in the comments section like those infernally serious supporters of Julian Assange.
Well. It seems that the Mullahs in Iran have their turbans in a twist about an entry in the Navy Correspondence manual. It seems that they are deeply hurt and offended that the United States Navy has made official what we have been doing for decades. We have offended these mangy Mullahs by using the nomenclature Arabian Gulf rather than the Persian Gulf for the body of water that lies between the Arabian Peninsula and the land formerly known as Persia.
You see for centuries this body of water was known as the Persian Gulf and everyone but the Arabs thought that it was okay. But in the 20th century the Persian for some reason relabeled itself Iran for some ungodly reason. I mean they took a great historical brand name and chucked it for something that only the namby pamby do, they ran to I-ran. They even admit that they ran from the great label of Persia. Think of it, the Persians, ruled half the known world till the Greeks kicked their ass. I’m sure that was like the Yankees losing the 2004 ALCS to the Red Sox but the Yankees didn’t change their name to the Spankees did they? No they didn’t. I’ll tell you what they did; they just went out and kept buying talent until they won another World Series.
Then they compounded their bad marketing by throwing out their King, taking hostages and doing all sorts of other unseemly stuff like not allowing women to wear mini-skirts or men to drink booze in public. I mean it was like they were trying to create Bob Jones University in the sand. I for one think that one Bob Jones University is enough and by God it’s an American institution and shouldn’t be exported to people that won’t wear suits and power ties.
I’m sorry but these Iranians want us to keep calling the Arabian Gulf by a name they don’t even call their own country anymore. Sounds like whining to me. After all the only reason it was called the Persian Gulf was that they were the Big Kahuna way back when and stomped all over the Arabs whenever they could and the Arabs loathe them for it. That’s why the Arabs want us to whack them and wouldn’t object to the Israelis doing it to though they wouldn’t say so publicly. For crying out loud the Arabs have rights too and they have about the same amount of coastline around this body of water as the county that won’t call their own country Persia anymore. Sounds like sour grapes to me. I think that if you change your country name then any right you have to the old name goes away. You don’t see the Washington Nationals putting on Montreal Expos uniforms on old timer’s day, no they use Washington Senators uniforms.
They act like the USA is insanely jealous of them. Like hell we are. We are a self confident bunch that believes that even if things are really sucky that we will find a way to make lemons out of lemonade even if we have to squeeze a lemon grower or two do it. If we were so petty we would be calling the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America because we like circle half of it and anytime oil spills it ends up on our shores not Mexico’s. But we don’t spite our neighbors to the south by doing this because we’re better than that. However if Mexico was to up and change its name to France or something like that we would be under no obligation to keep calling it the Gulf of Mexico would we? I dare say not. Pleasantries aside we tell them that if they don’t like their name we call the Gulf whatever we want. Of course the Mexicans have enough real pride and self respect not to rename their country unlike the country that used to be called Persia until they renamed it.
So the “proud” Iranians are upset. Perhaps if they start calling themselves Persia again they would have room for this whiney jibber-jabber. Until then my friends they can pound sand, which I understand that they have a great deal of in their country and the United States Navy can go ahead calling it whatever we want.
Two words my friends,
Padre Steve+
The Inglorius Padre Steve's World 
And you know what the best point of the Iranian government is? You can find insane (or inane) silliness in fact, as well as hyperbole. They banned from the sport, for LIFE, a weightlifter and his coach who participated in At the World Masters Weightlifting Championships held in Poland recently. Why? Because the Iranian, who came in second, stood on the podium next to an Israeli, who came in first. Seems the government didn’t like their guy appearing beside an Israeli, even though the Iranian chap refused a handshake from the winner!
(ALERT-SARCASM AHEAD!) Then again, when you name your country after an early 80s song from a British synth-pop band called Flock Of Seagulls, how the heck can you expect ANYBODY to take you seriously?
And forgive me, Padre, for my typos, as I forgive those who commit typos against me. Strike that last word (“At”) in the third line – I gotta be more careful with the old cut and paste!
Because it has always been Persian Gulf and will be for most well educated people.
This is not about what is happening in a championship or with the Iranian Government. The proposal of changing the name of Persian Gulf is something new with its own reason. In your discussion we cannot have any conclusion about the name of Persian Gulf but you expressed very well your opinion about some criminals representing themselves as the actual Iranian government.
Also, please do not talk about the Iranian government as a legitimate government. As you already know the actual Iranian government is imposed by a minority of well armed people like SS Schutzstaffel Protection Squadron in the second world war. Like in Germany in the past, these people are mostly criminals and are not appreciated by lots of Iranians. Personally as an Iranian I like Israeli and Israel or any other group of people willing to live in a world of peace and Democracy. This opinion is shared by many other Iranians. Unfortunately the Arabo-Israeli problem has been long time linked to the actual Iranian government. In a world that the UN accept a criminal as an elected president, you cannot expect more. If you are looking for the truth, please just look at the recent news and see what is really happening in Iran.
You can use the keyword of Neda and Iran in Youtube (Absolutely not for children).
Amir
My friend I apologize if I have offended your sensitivities. The post is simply to lampoon and make fun of the current regime not the Iranian or more correctly the Persian people. The current regime has subjugated the Iranian people to its tyranny for too long. I am an ardent supporter of those who have sacrificed and continue to suffer under the injustice of the criminal regime. I am well informed as to what happens in Iran and pray for the day that the Iranian people will overthrow the thugs of the current regime.
As for the Gulf I understand that historically the Persian Gulf is just that, it is the Persian Gulf no matter what anyone else calls it. The post as I said was lampooning or making fun of the current regime using this as another means to prove its own legitimacy.
I pray for the day that those like Neda who have paid the price of freedom with their lives will see that sacrifice rewarded and that those that continue to resist and suffer the consequences will meet success.
My best to you my friend and if I caused you offense I am sorry as that was not the intent. At some point I will get around to writing about the situation in Iran in a serious fashion but when I saw the way that the regime was complaining I had to poke my finder in their eye.
Blessings and peace
Padre Steve+
Amir- First off, you missed the disclaimer at the top of this post. This whole thing is SUPPOSED to be humourous. A joke. A jape. NOT SERIOUS. Okay?
Second, starting with snide comments about “educated people” ain’t a real good way to earn you friends. I would wager my educational level equals or surpasses yours in matters of world affairs. And to equate Iran and Persia is itself a joke. Iran is no more Persia than France is part of Rome or Kiev part of Germany. Persia is a long-gone territory, long gone from the modern map. The islands are called Nippon by their natives – why not the Sea of Nippon instead of the Sea of Japan?
And, no support of the current Iranian regime is expressed or implied. I think you would be hard-pressed to find ANYONE on this site who wouldn’t like that collection of clerical crackpots punted in favour of some variation on a representative government.
Lastly, (and in deadly seriousness) I think we all here are PAINFULLY familiar with who Neda is, about the 2009 protests for freedom, and the current Iranian government’s bloody crackdown on its’ people. The man who writes this blog has put his life on the line for the safety and freedom of others, and I have spent my life trying to help his kind and get their sacrifice noticed and properly rewarded. NOBODY here is a friend of the current Iranian regime.
In conclusion, Amir, please check the headings of posts before you plunge in with aspersions and insults. We try to be a friendly group here, and from time to time indulge in bouts of wild lunacy. You can insult the life out of me, and I’m tough enough to take whatever you can dish out – but I won’t have as noble a person as the owner of this blog berated because of a failure to understand this post as comedy.
So please, feel free to come back, Amir – but please check the top of the post to see if this is reality or hyperbole.
Bud
Thank you for your support and come back often.
Peace
Padre Steve+
Thank you, PadreSteve. Based on a bunch of Mr. Erickson’s comments here and on some other blogs I’ve found him on, and you’re ability to put up with his wise-acre comments, I’m certain to return! 😉
Not to worry laddie, all my friends here at the Starlight home for retired nurses, have started knitting the crying towels.
You will probably need a lot of them
Hurting people was not my intention too.
I apologize for this misunderstanding. I guess this misunderstanding started by the choice of the words in the title that I found very unfriendly.
For the rest of the discussion I trust your judgments.
Pingback: Padre Steve’s World Top 12 of 2011: A Big Thank you to my Readers | Padresteve's World…Musings of a Passionate Moderate