The Iran nuclear deal will unleash an unprecedented fury

Watching what the NYT calls "dueling news conferences" on the Iranian nuclear talks is a fascinating experience. "Iran's foreign minister and the European Union’s foreign policy chief … appear[ed] together to make a general statement on the talks ...

But Obama administration officials have insisted that the current round of talks here produce more than a general understanding. They want a 'quantitative dimension' — that is, specific limits on Iran’s nuclear program that the White House can cite to push back against congressional moves for additional sanctions.

In their announcements on the "deal," the U.S. and Iran will "try to tailor the perceptions of the final agreement to meet … specific political imperatives," continues the Times. Yet confusion reigns. CNN is reporting that financial sanctions will be lifted immediately and in toto, and Iran's Mohammad Javad Zarif, the foreign minister, is assuring his homefolk that all sanctions will simply vanish. The actual time frames are vague and perhaps subject to further negotiation.

It is however safe to say that, domestically, none of that will make any difference. U.S. critics of a deal with Iran will scream bloody murder like they've never screamed before — which of course they were destined to do no matter what a "general understudying" produced.

And it goes without saying that Netanyahu will become completely unglued. This calls for another Bibi lecture before Congress!

***

President Obama just instructed the Washington press corps to ask the "inevitable critics" of this deal if it's "worse" than starting yet another U.S. war in the Middle East. Those critics can demagogue the hell out of that one. He further insisted that this is "bigger" than politics, but that, naturally, is the instrument by which the critics make war seem preferable to the benighted. 

 

Comments

[Peter G]

I wish I'd thought to have purchased shares in Pfizer before the news came down. Many bricks will be shat and Preparation H will surely see a spike in demand.

[David & Son of Duff]

Please, please, tell me that no-one here seriously believes that this, er, 'deal' is anything other than a fig leaf to cover Obama's nakedness and Kerry's incompetence.

"Peace in our time" - heh,heh, heh!

[Peter G]

Well David, the failure of Great Britain to live up to it's commitments or enforce the treaty terms which would have prevented the remilitirization of Germany after the first world war did have some consequences as I recall. Enforcement , that's the important part of agreements and treaties. We thank your country for the object lesson in exactly how not to do that.

[David & Son of Duff]

Alas, Peter, you will not embarrass me with a litany of historical British cock-ups, there are too many to count.

However, I am intrigued by your emphasis on "Enforcement"! Pray do tell exactly how your glorious leader and his somewhat dim-witted glove-puppet intend to, er, 'enforce' the 'agreement' made with Iran when, as you and I and "ev'ry fule do no", the Wily Oriental Gentlemen wriggle out of it?

Jest askin'!

[Peter G]

First let me say, you overdo the dialect thing. We all resort to it from time to time but when it becomes an inevitable affectation it loses it's charm. Now to the subject at hand, dimwitted pundits and neocon fabulists notwithstanding, the eternal verity is that countries have interests and they only occasionally coincide. Would a preemptive attack on Iran's hardened underground and very radioactive nuclear facilities have suited any of Iran's neighbors? If I were you I'd examine a map and check the prevailing winds. The answer is no by the way.
In fact the only acceptable method for bringing Iran's nuclear potential under control was a negotiated settlement and the only way to induce that was economic sanctions. Which will not survive the attempts by Bibi and the neocon nitwits to torpedo ANY negotiated settlement.

You might want to ask yourself why neither China nor Russia stopped North Korea from developing weapons when they were absolutely in a position to do so? And why the US and their allies could not prevent it through either military threat nor economic sanctions. Now this morning I listened while a particularly dense nitwit asserted that only the congress of the United States could relax sanctions against Iran. Which will come as news to the rest of the world. They can and will do that as soon as your crew makes clear that they are full of shit. Opportunity lost.

[David & Son of Duff]

"First let me say, you overdo the dialect thing"

Not an affectation, Peter, just a paraphrase often used in contemporary scribblings 'over here' and taken from the Molesworth books:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigel_Molesworth

There, an education for you and all for nothing! I will get around to your geo-strategic ruminations later.

[David & Son of Duff]

I have no definite views on what action the USA should have taken to avert Iranian nuclear ambitions for the simple reason that I do not possess enough information.

However, I know a man who does and his name is Bibi Netanyahu and as his, and his nation's, and his people's, existence depend on it I would rely on him rather than a 'wannabe' golfer in Washington who appears to have the strategic abilities of a corporal - I am an ex-corporal so I know where-of I write!

It is quite clear now that Obama detests Israel and cares not a fig for its future. Fair enough if you judge that the only working democracy in the entire middle east is not worth defending and that American interests dictate that the USA should cuddle up to Islamists - ** who hate America!**

Well, good luck with that one, Barack, old boy!