When a small group of ayatollahs decides who may not run in an election there is nothing free about it. The current president was permitted to run because the Ayatollahs agreed with his positions. They have excluded all "reformers" from the last two elections.

I tend to doubt the report of missing suitcase nukes simply because if some one like al Qaeda had them they would have used them by now.

Iran has stated its intentions and it would be a mistake not to believe them. Even the guy who lost to the current president has said that Iran could survive a nuclear exchange with Israel, but Israel could not. We are dealing with people with a death cult mentality in Iran and permitting them to have nuclear weapons is not acceptable. If Pakistan ever gets leadership as irresponsible as that in Iran we will have to deal with them accordingly.