There has always been a contradiction between the Obama administration’s reluctance to state “red lines” on Iran and its tough talk about never allowing the Islamist regime to achieve their nuclear ambition. The president’s supporters have resolved this piece of cognitive dissonance—at least in their own minds—by sticking to the belief that sooner or later Tehran will yield to reason and start negotiating toward a compromise that the U.S. could live with even if such a deal might scare Israel. This assumption was based on the idea that sanctions are gradually bringing Iran to its knees and that its leaders are reasonable people who understand their position is unsustainable.
Given the Iranians’ record of intransigence and duplicity in diplomatic encounters, such assumptions were always more a matter of wishful thinking than serious analysis. But the latest rejection of an American attempt to reach out to Iran should conclusively demonstrate that any hope that sanctions or diplomacy will persuade Iran to back off on its nuclear quest is entirely unrealistic. The statement by the supreme leader of the regime, Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to the effect that he completely rejects any idea of direct talks on the nuclear question with the United States indicates that the latest bright idea about Iran hatched in the Obama administration was just as much a failure as its predecessors. Though some are interpreting the ayatollah’s statement solely through the prism of the power struggles inside Tehran, there should be no mistake about who is in charge and what his veto of new talks with the U.S. means.
The ayatollah’s cutting and sinister remarks about any Iranian who might consider talking with the Americans illustrates how deeply committed the government is to the nuclear program. He also gave a not-so-subtle hint about what would happen to any official who was foolish enough to think of compromising either on nukes or on warming up relations with the United States:
“I’m not a diplomat; I’m a revolutionary, and speak frankly and directly,” he said. “If anyone wants the return of U.S. dominance here, people will grab his throat.”
This puts a period on the notion of a new engagement policy in Iran that might have relieved President Obama of the obligation to make good on his promises about Iran. Negotiations might have yielded some sort of accord that might have been able to be represented as a victory for U.S. policy even if it fell short of actually removing the Iranian nuclear threat in the long run. But Khamenei’s contempt for Obama is so complete that he will not deign to negotiate directly with him. Instead, he seems to believe that if he sticks to his position on the nuclear question, he can eventually run out the clock through multilateral talks via the P5+1 group in which Russia and China will prevent anyone from applying real pressure on Tehran.
Khamenei can hardly be blamed for thinking the administration isn’t serious about rejecting any thought of containing them rather than forestalling their nuclear program via force even as a last resort. The nomination of Chuck Hagel as secretary of defense—a man who not only opposes force and supports containment but also can’t even be counted on to lie persuasively about it during his confirmation hearing—may have persuaded them that the president never meant what he said about Iran throughout his re-election campaign. The Iranians also read the American press and know that one of the rising figures in the Republican Party—Rand Paul—also supports containment.
The Iranian confidence that they can ignore American threats puts the administration in a pickle. The president will not pull the plug on the next round of P5+1 talks but even he knows that effort will never yield success. But he now knows, even if he didn’t before, that Khamenei would never yield on the nuclear question. Sooner or later that leaves him with either containment or force as his only two options on Iran. Given the consequences of allowing Iran to go nuclear, let’s hope he hasn’t been bluffing all along about leaving no option off the table.
According to MEMRI Special Dispatch Series No. 325, “Former President Ali Akhbar Rafsanjani, in the annual Al-Quds (Jerusalem) sermon given on December 14, 2001, said that if one day the world of Islam comes to possess nuclear weapons, Israel could be destroyed. Rafsanjani said that the use of a nuclear bomb against Israel would leave nothing standing, but that retaliation, no matter how severe., would merely do damage to the world of Islam.” n nRafsanjani was calling for genocide. He said he was willing to suffer severe retaliation, as any good terrorist would. n nAnti-Zionism, like anti-Semitism, is a totally selfless movement. Hitler had nothing to gain by killing Jews, and Iran–an anti-Arab, anti-Sunni country–has nothing to gain by attempting to destroy Israel. The worst enemies are those that have no rational motivation.
Unfortunately, the Koran, Hadiths, ect.. are the only justification that are required. Logic and reason are antithetical to the ideology of Islam.
Yes, take something an Iranian Mullah said more than a decade ago when Pakistan already had that bomb and claim it's valid now. n nIf you're not a "Israel First" American, I don't know what is. n n
I don't recall Pakistan ever threatening Israel or the United States with its weapons; their beef is with India. nYou're right, you don't know what an Israel Firster is.
fwiw, this IS proof of the Ayatollah's intransigence, which has to be on record to appease all those who even pretend to believe that a Shi'a millenialist theocracy is "rational". n nSo, does Intrade have odds on whether Hagel gets his up-or-down vote? n n
Yes. The inevitable will soon be upon us. The Jihadists in Iran cannot possibly take this administration seriously. Nominations of Hagel, Kerry, and Brenner speak volumes about the underlying weakness of Obama. Either Israel does the dirty work , or it won't get done. n Incidentally, Bush must take a great share of the blame for the impending disaster. By removing Saadam from power–the only threat that truly worried the Iranians– Iran has been empowered , and feels immune from the consequences of its intransigence. The Iran-Iraq war was a blessing for the non-Muslim world. It went on for seven years , but should have gone on forever. Iran was, and has always been , the real threat to the Western world. I think it highly doubtful that Iran would be successfully bidding for global hegemony if they had Saadam to contend with. The absolute inability of US policy-makers –the stupidity is bipartisan–to think in terms of the global strategic interests of this United States is a catastrophe that will have a steep price. I suppose , though, the elites will mostly be immune from those consequences, and it will be ordinary Americans who will have to bear the brunt of the costs.
Well Paul Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld and Cheney et al. had a bug up their nose about the guy. He really pushed their buttons since Iraq War i. But we did the Kurds and the Shia a big favor by getting them out from under his toxic family satrapy. No good deed goes unpunished…But in or out the Iraq-Iran war had already drawn to a close. That was over by 1988. If Hussein had his junk together he wouldn't have gone from one disaster to another. The war with Iran was a war of choice. The war over Kuwait ditto. And his baiting Bush over the WMD he didn't have but appeared to be protecting another unforced error. We all get locked into the perception of the present–this thing now that bugs us–and finally it gets like we gotta do something about it, *now* and we convince ourselves everything will be all better and resolved afterwards. One door closes and another opens. Lady or the tiger etc. etc. etc. Israel faces some tough choices ahead for sure.
besht, the problem was that Bush and co. didn't know jack squat about the ideology of Islam, what it inculcates in its adherents , its atmospherics, and the inevitable catastrophic failures -political, moral, economic, intellectual- that result from it. Bush was going to bring democracy and good government to "ordinary Iraqi moms and dads". That line will have me guffawing for the rest of my life. And do you think the Kuwaitis are grateful for America saving their behinds? Not a chance in hell. The only ethnic group to show gratitude for the whole mess is the Kurds who, though Muslim, are not Arabs of course, and resent Arab imperialism and domination. Ditto for the recent Mali liberation by France. The predominately Muslim Malians despise Arab imperialism , and the history of Arab slave trading that only officially ended in the 1960's! Needless to say , it never really ended, as one only need look at Darfur and South Sudan. But I digress. I opposed the war in Iraq because , unlike the Hagels of this world , who also opposed it, but see no menace in Islam, and The Brenans of this world who think Jerusalem is called "AL Quds" and think Hizbollah is an interesting "organization", it is because Islam is such a menace that we need to take a quarantine approach and stop mass mUslim immigration into Western lands, and not prevent the Shias and sunnis from slaughtering each other in Iraq or anywhere else, but quite the contrary, encourage the sectarian strife that is part and parcel of the camp of Islam – as this means less resources to wage Jihad on the credulous Kuffar. I'm sorry to pontificate, but I firmly believe this is the wise course to deal with the greatest global threat of our time.
Of course the talk about "going to bring democracy and good government to "ordinary Iraqi moms and dads" was pure claptrap. But do you think that WMD was just pretext, and bogus pretext at that, Bush et al. not really believing that Saddam had or was working toward having WMD? Cheney didn't go with the "1%" risk stuff? n nAnd it should not be forgotten that Bush et al. were by no means alone in believing that we would bring about a new and better "world order" (Bush Sr's aspiration) by bringing the Arabs around to the joys of democracy. There are still plenty around, including many in the current Administration, who think that the so-called "Arab Spring" will prove to be a great thing for everyone. (How did Charles Krauthammer stand on bringing democracy to the Arab world as a rationale for going to war with Iraq in 2003? William Kristol? Other neocons? Frankly, I don't recall and don't know how to easily look it up, but I'm pretty sure that some did.)
It seems that Saadam was largely bluffing about his possession of WMD. Why the bluff? To scare the Americans and Israelis? No! It was to intimidate his most immediate and lethal enemy– an enemy he had fought a bloody seven year long war with: Iran. The Western world need not have worried about any existential threat from the Saadam regime,and when Saadam did try to build an enrichment facility at Osirak, the Israelis quickly snuffed it out. The fact is if Bush and team had been thinking with any degree of strategic foresight, there is no way they topple Saadam! Now, if Iran had not had the Islamic revolution and was still a US ally, we would have had different strategic situation , as it were. But such was not the case. At the time of the US invasion of Iraq, many thinking foreign policy observers were asking what will be done with an empowered , aggressive, intransigent Iran once you remove its natural enemy? Does it make sense for the well being of the non-Muslim world, and those non-Muslims who have the misfortune of living in Muslim lands? Ask any wild-life expert what happens when you remove a natural predator from an ecosystem, and how the natural prey of that predator , now without the balancing influence of that predator , begins to exponentially increase in population and aggressiveness -becoming a menace , and throws the whole system out of whack. I think it is an analogy worth considering.
"It seems that Saadam was largely bluffing about his possession of WMD. Why the bluff? To scare the Americans and Israelis? No! It was to intimidate his most immediate and lethal enemy– an enemy he had fought a bloody seven year long war with: Iran." Correct, but he did so good a job of the bluffing that along with leaving Iran in doubt about whether or not Iraq had WMD, that he lead a great many others to believe it was likely that he did, including the intelligence services of all our allies. n n"The Western world need not have worried about any existential threat from the Saadam regime,and when Saadam did try to build an enrichment facility at Osirak, the Israelis quickly snuffed it out." 22+ years earlier Israel did destroy the nuclear reactor that France built for Iraq and they were harshly rebuked by Reagan for doing it. In 2003, when we invaded Iraq, the concern wasn't so much about Iraq having any nuclear capability other than to build a "dirty" bomb, that is a conventionial munition laden with highly radioactive material to use on a city, but there was substantial concern, rightly so, about the potential for Iraq having and using chemical and/or biologic weapons, the former of which they had used in the past. So, do you count a "dirty" bomb atop a Scud missile direct at Tel Aviv an "existential" threat? n nI fully agree that it was too bad that the Iran-Iraq war did not continue endlessly. But the US figured that Iran was the greater threat and was afraid that Iran might prevail over Iraq, so we aided the Iraqis, tipping the balance in their favor and bringing that most wonderful of wars between two forces of Evil to a premature conclusion. And yes, to your ecologic balance analogy.
dcdoc1, I appreciate your response to my comments. In answer to your queries: I don't know if Saadam had WMD or not, but I do know none were ever found, and by using theWMD argument to justify toppling Saadam, the Bush administration created a lot of bad blood for himself, and, by extension, the republican party and conservatives in general. And as we now see the "Iraqi nation" reverting to its default state of being-that is sectarian and ethnic strife- , we must ask ourselves what all the blood and treasure was for. As for my opinion on a "dirty" bomb, certainly it's a threat, but we were keeping Saadam hemmed in before the invasion with no-fly zones ect.., and there was no reasonable rationale for toppling a polity that was keeping the Iranians tied down. Besides, look at the situation now! We need not worry about Iran building "dirty" bombs; they're working on the real McCoy. As for US assistance to Iraq forcing a close to the Iran-Iraq war, I'm a bit skeptical of that conclusion. Although Saadam received some weapons assisstance, don't forget the Iran-contra scandal whereby Iran also received some US weapons. Actually, the Iran-Iraq war was going rather smashingly for the well being of the Western world, as they pretty much fought to a standstill, which was ideal. Unfortunately, I guess they just spent themselves out. Too bad! Again, thanks for your responses.
I agree with most of what you say. But… n nWe believed on the basis of the intelligence we had, and Sadam's great dissembling, that he did have or was working toward WMD capabilities. You can't start from a later point in time when we found out that it was a bluff. Now if you want to argue that even if we had been right about the WMD, we were wrong to undertake the course we did, but that would take the conversation on a very different path from the one the balance of your remarks follow. n nKnowing what we know now, do I regret that we invaded Iraq? Yes, I definitely do. I also regret that we went about Afghanistan the way we did, that is attempting the impossible task of making a reasonable country out of it, rather than undertaking the much more limited objective of wiping out al Qaeda's base there, going after OBL (which was probably botched before we got the next crack at him almost a decade later), and other things to disrupt terrorist operations. But again, much of that is in hindsight, and we don't get to do hindsight, only what is now and prospective. n n(Also, we didn't have Iraq under nearly as tight control as you imagine before we went to war with them the second time. Sanctions would have come to an end because they were due to expire and the Russians and Chinese were opposed to them, and it wasn't feasible to maintain those no-fly zones indefinitely.) n nI earnestly wish there was reason for encouragement, but I don't see any. Certainly the nomination of Hagel isn't cause for such. Nor is the possibility of Rand Paul.
Well, I'm glad we agree that the whole Iraqi fiasco was a fool's errand, and I agree we , that is you and I, know a lot more now than we did in 2001, or even 2003. But therein lies part of the problem, because the government is suppose to have experts on the region who understand the strategic dynamics involved. Where were they in 2003? I knew in 2003 the invasion was problematic, although I didn't know enough to articulate exactly why this was so. The so-called "experts" should have known. Now, of course, the pc leftest-nutters are running the show , and greater folly is sure to be the order of the day.
If you wanted to be still more disturbed than you are now about what are 2003 invasion of Iraq led to, then go look for a film clip of Dick Cheney from 1997(maybe from 60 Minutes, but not sure) in which he explained why we didn't go all the way to Baghdad and depose Sadam in 1991 when we could have done it very easily. Cheney set forth the reasoning then, which was that if Sadam were deposed, then what would follow would be a very messy civil war rather than a stable, peaceable government, with the Sunni and Shia going at each other and the Kurds going their own way. n nIt was eerie to see how much resemblance there was between what would happen if we knocked off Sadam in 1991 and what did happen after we did knock him off in 2003. You'd think we would have been much better prepared for the occupation phase than we were. The fighting we did just fine with in 2003, just as we had in 1991.
Wow! I almost forgot about that interview that Cheney did explaining with great clarity why it was decided not to topple Saadam during the first Gulf war- and then they go ahead and do it anyways! It's really mind-boggling stuff, isn't it?
What about those who thought all the Arab world need was to be rid of the despots that ruled there and a wondorously positive transformation would surely follow? They saw Saddam and Iraq as a good place to start, and adduced that as another reason to invade. Were Krauthammer or Kristol among them?
I do believe both Kristol and Krauthammer were among those who believed in this wondrous transformation. Again, it comes down to a lack of knowledge of what Islam is all about , and how its atmospherics affects even so-called "secular" Muslim leaders as well as the hard core believers. The biggest joke was seeing Anderson Cooper rooting on the "revolution" in Egypt every day ,but next thing you know Lara Logan is gang-raped , and the Oafish Morsi is installing his Islam-centered dictatorship , and hocus-pocus, like magic, Cooper scarcely mentions the Arab winter again! Unbelievable. These people are shameless and disgusting. Of course, the MSM was taking its marching orders from the wise oracle himself- peace be upon him- and will never deviate from the Obama line. The irony is that in many respects the Obama policy in the ME mirrors the Bush policy. Bush toppled Saadam with the ensuing mess, and Obama toppled Qhaddafi and Mubarak , and we see the results all to well of that absurd policy.
I was nodding my head in agreement with you on most of that until coming to the last sentence. Qhaddafi and Mubarak were both going down, Obama didn't "topple" either of him, he couldn't have saved them if he had wanted to. n nI, like you, disagree with much about our ME policy under Obama (let's remember that Condeleeza Rice played a huge role in empowering Hamas in Gaza), but the basis of what in fact he has and hasn't done, which is provides more than adequate grounds to criticize him and those he relies upon harshly.
He certainly did topple Qhaddafi. It was NATO power that ultimately undid Qhaddafi, and the US is the preeminent power in NATO. It is true Mubarak was going down anyways, but Obama forced him out too prematurely , so that the only alternative was the Muslim Brotherhood. Remember, the US has great influence with Egypt due to the billions in military and financial aid we have been giving them for 35 years. Obama chooses not to use that leverage, but the billions keep flowing.
Where were they in 2003 indeed. And are these the same experts who reported time and again that Iran had no ongoing program to develop a nuclear weapon?
If it was entirely a bluff, where did Syria's stock of nerve gas and other CBW come from? Do you totally discount the reports of Iraq's WMD being shipped over the Syrian border?
I don't know where Syria got its CBW agents. Was Iraq under Saddam a weapons supplier to Syria? We know that Russia has been a major source of Syria's weapons and Iran seems like a not at all unlikely source too.
"The president will not pull the plug on the next round of P5+1 talks but even he knows that effort will never yield success." n nHe (and you) know nothing of the kind. Obama is right to do everything possible to prevent all-out hostilities. On their side, the Iranians well understand the enormous firepower that can be unleashed on their nuclear sites no matter how deep they are buried.
Possessing all the state of the art weapons in the world are of no consequence if your enemies know you fear to use them. Such is the case with Iran. But then again, I doubt you consider Iran an enemy; I can assure you they consider all non-Muslim states THEIR enemy-as they could do no other in accordance with their Koran and Hadiths.
"I doubt you consider Iran an enemy" n nWell Jeff, we all have our doubts. I have my doubts about you but prefer to keep my comments civil.
How was his expression of doubts about your position uncivil? And can't you give expression to your reciprocal doubts about him without being uncivil?
Well dcdoc1, HillelA is one of those dudes who thinks Israel and the Jews are the source of all the ills of the Middle East, if not the world.
Sure we do. Like, I dunno, the history of the past 4 years. Counts for something. He isn't doing all that is in his power to prevent hostilities–that implies a strategy. This is a man who had to be badgered into taking out bin Laden. This is a man who when notified that that the American consultate was under fire talked to Bibi for an hour (that's nice) then went to bed without making any decisions. n nHe is easily immobilized and will under no circumstances ever pre-empt Iranian nukes. n nIran knows all about this. Which is why the Ayotalla made the statement he made and has the policy he has. n n
Thanks for the crystal-ball gazing. Keep up the bad work.
How much money and at what odds would you wager that besht2003 is right and you are wrong about "He (Obama)…will under no circumstances ever pre-empt Iranian nukes." Or you don't do predictions and just gainsay those who do?
it's actually about reading the past not the future HA: n nObama has a proven history of bsing about Iran about Israel about domestic affairs–he lies. He has conducted "outreach" to Iran long after it proved fruitless. As in the past, so the future. Just as HA over and over substitutes insulting Bibi, supporters of Israel, and the GOP for Jewish culture. Oh, and Obama idolatry–the HA Torah.
Sanctions don't work, they'll never work and anyone with a brain knows they hurt the wrong people. Would we ask our government, whatever our disagreements with it, to capitulate to pressure from another country, even when that pressure brings with it significant economic hardship? n nOh, yeah. I forgot. We already do that.
you mean Israel? . Now appalachian cooks are foreign policy savants.
Oh ya, he's a regular foreign policy wonk this JimmyBobby. He's probably gonna be Hussein's next go to guy on Iranian policy.
yesh. The skeet shooter in chief is under the influence of the Elders. n nOh wait, that's Lee Elder. n
I live in California. I can hardly fry an egg. So you're wrong on those counts. And it doesn't take a "savant" (congratulations on your French, you smart, smart person).
Wrong cook. The reference was to Bone Winter, Breaking Bad, or Bear gleefully confessing "I guess I was just a good cook" or Bob Dylan''s "Johnny's in the basement cooking up the medicine" or the Persian IRGC in their labs and weapons facilities stepping up the quantity and quality of their product–they aren't cooking up research isotopes. It's the handle. In 1969 on a backroads Exxon station nearby the Appalachian trail we actually saw a still next to the garage in working order. The attendant shook his finger at us "Watch out for the grizzly bears" he said. It was our fate to run into the Owsley Bears instead. A door opened. We got a glimpse. And then the presiding angels slammed it shut. On one level you have to respect the Iranians. The door is still open for the top guys and the Revolutionary Guards. They see their destiny and they are set on marching through it. Sadly, it's uncertain as to how many of us they intend to be the doormat.
The Wests unwillingness to confront the Islamic Republic right from the very beginning will come back to haunt us and the world in the years ahead. Nukes or not, the Islamic Republic has been THE major behind the scenes player in so much of what we see as terrorism around the world since 1979. Focusing solely on their nuclear ambitions is akin to losing site of the forest through the trees. Unfortunately, getting the WORLD to agree and even more to the point confront the mullahs has proven to be fools errand in every sense. Thinking we can contain their virulence is sheer folly while in the meantime, Russia and China use the Iranians as a perfect foil to any meaningful change in the gulf and the Mideast in general and as a check against western 'meddling' in the area… The rise of the Brotherhood in Egypt and Turkey marks and even more immediate threat to the West and Israel but still, the West in total, wrings it's collective hands while being a 'paper tiger' which the mullahs no doubt laugh themselves silly over every single day.
What did Obama believe the response would be? How deluded and living in a bubble can one person be?
but O has two options–a) let sanctions die gradually w/out getting an excuse from Iran in the shape of some phony deal b) get the phony deal and take them down all at once. Kerry is even now as we speak pleading for b) in public forums *after* the Ayatollah's pronouncements. n nbut he'll take a) if he has to.
Most kinda stupid or merely rabid folk don't quite unnerstan' that offering the EYEranyuns a chance to come to the table and holler "uncle" is a necessity for the West an'fer the US in partikiler. n n nDon't cost us nuthin to offer them a chance to cave and helps plenty to gather world support for the sancshunnin' and fer later iffin we hafta smack them 'round.
You miss the point. Obama's continued imploring for talks even as Iranian leaders insultingly rebuff his overtures, publicly, while scaling up the quantity and quality of their enriched uranium has multiple implications: a) the "smack them 'round" option is at this point nothing more than a bluff; b) the Iranians believe it to be a bluff; c) by continuing to plead for them to give him a face-saving excuse to end the sanctions regime he has convinced them they will get an end to sanctions for nothing when all is said and done. n nHagel as SecDef, current SecDef Panetta's see-hear-speak-no-evil insistence that the Iranians gosh may not even be interested in nuclear weapons, and the cascade of Iranian outreach speeches even as Iranians tell Obama to take a hike are all the clues we need to know that O is no Johnson, this isn't Nam, there wil be no military action before, up to, during, or after the first Iranian nuclear weapons testing
no, I don't at all miss the point that Khamanei has publicly rebuffed the overtures, besht. n nmerely accepting the offer at this late date, when the sanctions are putting a serious hurting on Iran's economy, carries a cost for Khamanei, as it highlights Iran's weakness and mocks their endless rhetoric about standing up to "the global arrogance". n nmaking a deal that puts Iran's nuclear activities under full inspection will hurt the regime very badly. n nwhat we've done is give them two choices that both are bad for them ….and all they can do is hunker down and try to hold out. n n nit's possible that their best alternative is to hope that the US or some other party drops a few bombs on them as a small military action will probably help them more than anything else.
no bombs will be dropped ldubinsky and your empathy for the Iranians imo continues to contravene empirical evidence that the psychological motivations for the contour of their public diplomacy is secondary to the strategic and ideological motivations for acquiring nuclear weapons n the first place. n nIf they expected pubic acceptance of their development of nuclear weapons, yes, their choices are bad from that view point. given the current *stated* terms of Western negotiations. If however they actually were only runniong a medical research isotope enrichment program as *they claim*, no, the choices are not a Hobson's alternative. America is currently proposing allowing them to have nuclear energy *and* enrichment. n nTheir refusal to consider this and insistence on keeping their entire mixed use infrastructure imo continues to indicate that your argumentation is backwards–arguing from secondary interpretations of their hypothetical bind vis a vis international and domestic imaging backwards to the implied premise that they aren't seeking nuclear weapons. n nBut taking the evidence at its face value, including the multiple weapons testing protocols discovered, the unsanctioned facilities either walled off from inspection or made public (and then walled off from inspection) when discovered, and their insistence on increased purity of their refinement notwithstanding the original NPT restrictions—if we accept that they are pursuing nuclear weapons then the rest falls into place. That is their choice. The other things are tactical choices they have to opportunely make at each successively hesitant and conflicted opposition raised by the Western powers. n nThe sanctions they'll live with until they fade away. n nBut they aren't in a bind. They are doing what they want to do with an inconvenience. They'll live with the inconvenience even at the cost of disruption because they prize the goal sought. n nbtw if you had continued your dialect for 90 pages you wouldn't have another Huck Finn or As I Lay Dying on your hands but you would have written the sequel to Norman Mailer's "Why Are We in Vietnam?" and probably better than the original. n nBut that's a long long long way in the rear view mirror now.
my empathy for the Iranians extends to wishing great harm to fall upon their theocratic oppressors….. and my admiration for your wit does not keep me from finding your characterization of our offers to talk with Iran's regime to be a good one.
Gib nisht dem troll Dub vos tsu essen.
The behavior of the Obama Administration on this issue recalls to mind Winston Churchill’s 1936 characterization of the foreign policy of the Baldwin government: “And so they go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent.”
From your initial post it's hard to tell whether the brunt of your ironic paradox was Israel firsters importuning the American government to cave to Israeli interests or Hispanics insisting America cave to Mexican demographic pressures. From an AC perspective it could be either. n nBut AC isn't making an argument for sanctions are no sanctions. n nThe actual argument since they are resolutely opposed to military intervention is about the desirability and feasibility of letting Iranian get a nuclear weapons infrastructure. That's the argument they are making. n nIn ACs instance there's a hypocritical back text as they would be willing if they have not already embraced the concept of sanctions against *Israel*–their editorial advocating BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) against the Zionists is down the pike if it already hasn't been written. So, against Israel I have no doubt that all the arguments about sanctions not working would disappear in a nanosecond. n nObama isn't even an advocate of sanctions–they are his excuse to avoid proactive military intervention and he now has Kerry on the speaking trail importuning Iran to just give O some deal to put an end to them. n nAC is saying that sanctions don't work, military means are non-thinkable, ergo let us realize that actually Israeli foreign policy is the true threat to American and international peace and order and we ought to be unconcerned about the Iranians developing nukes as a counterweight to the Zionists. n nThat's the argument. If they were talking about sanctions against the Zionists sanctions would be a great thing.
besides motive or disingenuousness the article misrepresents what sanctions are supposed to do–the goal is not some psychological "turning" of the population against a regime through mass immiseration but the restriction of regime options, specifically as regards a targeted activity and generally. Significant segments of the population may already be opposed to the regime before sanctions, as in South Africa or Iran, and, on the other hand, the regime may have the resources to oppress opposition anyways . If the regime's targeted activities continue through sanctions and they are able to prioritize internal resources to fund elite supporters of the regime then sanctions have failed. Nobody would see continued decline in living standards as an indicator of coming success. The "masses" may be turned off but powerless to do anything, or they may resent the sanctions sponsors. Who knows? The main thing is that if the regime is able to continue through the sanctions they aren't working. n nAs a counter-example, Israel, a high-tech dependent nation with limited barriers against emigration could be highly vulnerable to sanctions. Whether the population rallied for the state leadership or not, critical personnel would be tempted to leave. And the technological and economic underpinnings of national governance could be undermined critically. Everyone in Masada, at the extreme end here, rallied behind their leadership. To no avail. n nThe article's assumptions are simplistic and misdirected.
from the same deep thinkers currently celebrating Joe Sobran. We have your number don't we JB?