> Either way "Iran might make nukes" is bad reason to start a war.

I think we disagree here, but that's because I believe in nuclear non-proliferation. More countries have them, more likely they are to be used. If Iran gets them, well maybe South Korea, Japan, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Brazil... the list goes on. Is that a better and safer world? I doubt it. Not only are arms races probably bad, they take up resources that could be used for making the lives of everyone better.

> If "Iran is aiding Russia against Ukraine" was a good reason to start this war, then we should be a lot less wishy-washy about our support of Ukraine themselves.

I think it's a contributing factor, but not the sole reason to start (or depending on your perspective, continue) a war here.

> And Israel is, absolutely, unequivocally, America's problem. They exist because we decided they should exist, we armed them to keep them existing, and we get involved in absolute quagmires in the Middle East every time that they do something stupid.

I don't follow this line of reasoning. Israel has existed long before the United States. Admittedly the modern state of Israel as we know it today was carved out in the last century, but the fault there lies primarily with European countries who created empires and then failed to maintain them. But you sort of seem to be justifying things like October 7th or other aggressive actions perpetrated by Iran and its proxies as though Israel existing is just somehow a problem. Last I checked Iran is its own country. What justification does it have to bomb Israel in any way?

> But Israel bombing Iran is not the same thing. Israel and the United States are the aggressors in this conflict, plain and simple. We had half-normal relations with Iran, then because Israel decided they weren't content being one of two regional powers, we decided to kick off another damn war in the Middle East.

Don't recall the US being in a state of war prior to October 7th. Iran overplayed their hand, Israel absolutely fucked up Hamas and Hezbollah with little effort, and then we found out Iran was pretty weak and so we did something about it before they accumulate so much military power that stopping them from effectively taking over the Middle East is untenable. I'm not sure your cause-effect reasoning here makes a lot of sense. We haven't had half-normal or normal relations with Iran for a long time - like 50 years.

> I am not an isolationist. I fully recognize, and appreciate, the US's (potentially soon to be former) place as global hegemon. But we achieved that position by leveraging soft power, while maintaining the capability to absolute smite parties that won't play ball. And that worked. It worked great.

It seems that you're cherry-picking here. The US attacking Iran can just be another case of smiting parties that won't play ball. Same with Iraq, or Vietnam, or Korea.

> It's why backing Ukraine was a great play: No American lives at risk, we pay a few bucks, Ukraine damages Russia, we remind our allies just how great it is to be under America's umbrella.

I generally agree and watching Russia's military be absolutely humiliated was exhilarating, but providing money alone isn't enough to win or stop that war it seems.

The US is still helping, but for some reason when it comes to Iran actually selling and supplying drones that kill Ukrainians it's all of a sudden well that's not a good reason to go to war, Iran isn't the aggressor, Trump is bad, how dare the US stop Venezuela from evading US and EU sanctions, blah blah blah. You're twisting yourself into circles trying to defend Iran for some reason when they're murdering their own population for protesting, helping Russia bomb Ukrainians, and starting wars and destabilizing Yemen, Lebanon, and more. Speaking of the UN, weren't they supposed to stop Hezbollah from indiscriminately launching rockets into Israel? Now Israel is there cleaning house and all of a sudden well that's Americans problem, Israel is America's problem, how can Israel do this? Who cares about the UN in today's world?