Stapp urges politicians to channel Bryan Adams: “Iran to you”
The Iran Nuclear Deal attempts to “limit Iran’s nuclear program to something that is small, safe, and peaceful—and to impose lots of invasive inspections to make sure Iran is keeping to its end of the deal. In exchange, Iran gets relief from some of the economic sanctions that have crippled its economy. Both sides, the thinking goes, also get to avert a war,” according to Vox.
Albert Einstein said, “I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but I do know that World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”
Lessons from the past: “The Iraqi dictator must not be permitted to threaten America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gases and atomic weapons” – George Bush, 2002.
“We’ll be greeted as liberators” – Dick Cheney, 2002.
“Don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud” – Condoleezza Rice, 2002.
“We know where [Iraq’s WMDs] are. They’re in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat” – Donald Rumsfeld, 2002.
“For bureaucratic reasons, we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction [as justification for invading Iraq] because it was the one reason everyone could agree on” – Paul Wolfowitz, 2002.
“We’re an Empire now and when we act we create our own reality” – Karl Rove, 2004.
“It’s funny how those who are most pro-war are almost always the guys who never had to fight in one” – Jerome P. Crabb.
A few hours after Barack Obama announced a nuclear deal with Iran, John Boehner and a chorus of GOP luminaries loudly and vigorously opposed it, without even reading it.
“… from everything that I’ve heard on the so-called framework, all it is is an agreement to keep talking,” said John Boehner (Try reading it, John).
“This president’s foreign policy is the most feckless in American history. It is so naïve that he would trust the Iranians. By doing so, he will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven,” opined Mike Huckabee.
“This deal makes war a certainty,” said Ted Cruz. “This deal threatens Israel; it threatens the United States…” added Chris Christie. “This isn’t diplomacy—it is appeasement,” argued Jeb Bush. Lindsey Graham concluded the deal is “… a possible death sentence for Israel.”
“…the next president could be called to take aggressive actions, including military action, on the first day in office,” said Scott Walker. (Excuse me Mr. Walker, Congress has to authorize the use of force. Try reading the Constitution.)
Can the Islamic theocracy of Iran be trusted? No! Muslim scholars teach that lying is justified in certain circumstances. “These circumstances are typically those that advance the cause of Islam—in some cases by gaining the trust of non-believers in order to draw out their vulnerability and defeat them,” according to the Guide to Understanding Islam.
The Iran Deal was negotiated by six world powers: the U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France, and Germany (P5+1 nations). The U.N. Security Council has endorsed the deal and authorized measures to end U.N. economic sanctions. The Council also approved a provision that would automatically reinstate the harsh economic sanctions if Tehran reneges on its promises. European Union foreign ministers have also endorsed the agreement and taken steps to lift EU sanctions. (92 nations currently support the deal.)
“We need to pull back on this deal, put sanctions back in place… and encourage our allies around the world to do the same,” said Scott Walker, presidential hopeful.
Congress will take up the Iran Deal as well as a number of other thorny issues when it returns from its month-long August recess. Before going on vacation, John Kerry, Secretary of State, testified before a Senate panel and denied the deal was a leap of faith.
“Nothing in this agreement is based on trust,” he said. “… If Iran fails to comply with the terms of our agreement, our intel community, our Energy Department, which is responsible for nuclear weaponry, are absolutely clear that we will quickly know it and we will be able to respond accordingly with every option available to us,” including war. (Bombing isn’t going to kill know-how.)
If Congress kills the deal, it’s hard to imagine Russia, China, India or other nations starved for commerce or oil will agree to continue their economic sanctions against Iran. Why would other nations respond to our Congress’s rejection of the Iran deal when American voters, asked in a recent Gallup Poll if they had a “great deal or quite a lot” of faith in Congress, gave Congress a pathetic eight percent—the lowest on record.
Karl Rove’s hubristic claim that America is an empire now and we create our own reality is about to crash again on the rocks of reality. It is more than Iraq’s descent into sectarian conflict and chaos, or Congress’s commitment to Israel’s nuclear hegemony in the region, or America’s attempts to distance itself from its nefarious involvements in Libya, Egypt, Sudan, Tunisia, Yemen, Syria… It’s the failure of Washington and those we send there to learn a single lesson from America’s massive misadventures and arrogance.
