Prologue: I took some time away from the blog to re-organize my house and routine. Now I'm re-organized, refreshed and ready to get back to it (though my cat is still supremely bummed that his chill spots aren't where they used to be; he'll get over it). What did I miss? Generally not much newsworthy stuff happens during the summer, not because the world stops spinning but because the people that bring us news like to go on vacation. Turns out even the 24-hour news cycle ain't exactly clockwork.
The What: The big news that I've missed is obviously the UN's nuclear deal with Iran. The UN will release Iran's sanction money that has accumulated since the world chose to rebuke Iran in 2006 in return for more oversight of Iran's internal workings. The complaint back in the day was that Iran was enriching uranium potentially to weapons-grade; Iran has denied this but clearly Iran has some kind of program at work and has for over a decade. Iran's lack of cooperation with the IAEA led to the sanctions. Sanctions will be lifted if Iran makes certain concessions with their nuclear exploration.
The How: This is a multilateral deal, such that President Obama has effectively removed Congress from the proceedings. Normally gov'ts don't want to a deal with lame-duck presidents, since they can't guarantee Congressional support or the practices of future administrations, then why bother to make a deal? But because this has the UN imprimatur, it is a little different. Congress could support new dealings with Iran though domestic politics makes that unlikely. But it's structured in a way that if Congress chooses to ignore this deal (which is basically what a 'no' vote would mean) then they miss out on what could be good about the deal while avoiding none of what's bad about it. So they can't really undo it (even if they actually could undo it, which I don't think they could). Congress doesn't win by challenging the president on this.
My take: we're paying Iran to build a nuclear weapon to international specifications and time frames. Did I misstate that? Is there something else at work? We're helping Iran build a nuclear bomb. The money was already Iran's, so no money out of our pocket; Iran's programs were already in the works and probably needed assistance anyway, better they get it from the Americans and the Euros as opposed to the Russians and North Koreans. Win-win.
Making sure that Iran definitely gets a bomb was always the point of the process. If we didn't want Iran to have one, our actions would've been entirely different. This is all part of the long-term re-balancing of American interests from Saudi Arabia back to Iran. The Persian Shia are the West's natural allies in the Gulf region and were until Aytollah Khomenei came to power in the 1980s, Coincidentally, the American relationship with the Saudis became increasingly strained and (I think) completely fractured after 9/11, The invasion of Iraq was atypical American policy in the region: it was the beginning of the grand move away from our Saudi alliances. I believe USA will eventually re-balance to Iran as opposed to Saudi Arabia, but until then the interregnum will be fanning the proxy wars between them.
Yemen, Syria, Iraq are the new battlefields for Iran and Saudi Arabia to mix it up. And the UN has just poured a bunch of money into Iran's coffers for just that battle. My liberal friends think this deal will yield peaceful results but that's absolute hogwash. We're giving Iran money precisely to fund anti-ISIS campaigns in Iraq and Syria, anti-Saudi campaigns in Yemen, anti-Taliban campaigns in Afghanistan (and hoping the money doesn't go to Hamas, though clearly Netanyahu assumes otherwise). The idea that this deal makes peace is misguided at best. My conservative friends think empowering Iran is the worst idea ever but I'd say they don't quite grasp the kind of relationship USA has with Saudi Arabia. Personally I think Saudi Arabia belongs high atop any list of repressive gov'ts with broken economies and poisonous cultures (and throw in anti-American activity a mile long to boot, though that's not the beginning of my concern) and supporting Iran can't be much worse than the support we've been giving the Saudis all these years. What about Israel? Israel is in the crossfire of anything that happens and they're well-prepared for any occurrence....so....not to be insensitive....it doesn't really matter because anything is potentially good or bad for Israel.
Obama is leaving the next Commander-in-Chief boiling pots all across the Arab world, a far cry from the Arab Spring Obama was unable to get with just a coupla years back. But he gets to champion himself a peacemaker, truly the work of a gifted politician.
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