jerseyhoya wrote:But it's not at all clear from the current deal framework that Iran violating the terms of the agreement would result in the sanctions beginning again, and if so how that would go about happening - Foreign Policy blog post about this. .

This objection is kind of silly:

Foreign Policy wrote:....Whatever U.N. sanctions are in place would be triggered not by Iranian action, but by the determination of Iranian misbehavior by an authorized body, probably the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). This process is anything but “snapback” in character;

How does the author of this kind of statement imagine such a sanctions provision is effectuated - by some kind of webcam signal? Of course it requires a body of observers to, y'know, observe and react. It's not on autopilot. And the UN sanctions are multilateral; there are other governments with a hand in.

It's almost worse coupled with this schizophrenic point of concern, by turns calm and matter-of-fact and Debbie-Downer-caliber negative:

Foreign Policy wrote:The unilateral U.S. sanctions are the ones that could be re-imposed most quickly, should the need arise. According to some descriptions of Obama’s plan, the administration intends to lift sanctions by exercising the various waivers built into the statutory bases of the sanctions. Some of these could be re-imposed at the stroke of a pen. Yet, even here, the process is likely to be more fraught than a quick and easy re-imposition. For starters, there is likely to be great uncertainty and internal debates about the nature of any Iranian violation.

"So whew, the unilateral sanctions can be reinitiated as fast as you can say Barry's yer uncle - but what if there's great uncertainty about the violations that we don't know about right now?!?!?!?!!11"

Happily the author has already previously admitted that

Foreign Policy wrote: There are still details that have yet to be revealed publicly — one suspects there some of these details are yet to be fleshed out among the negotiating players themselves — so perhaps negotiators have come up with something innovative and powerful...

Kind of surprised piece this found its way into Foreign Policy; they're usually more circumspect.

Having concerns make sense; having tangible concerns would make more sense.

But let's go beyond Foreign Policy navel gazing (or nail-biting): what sort of amendments should Bob Corker be ready to consider as acceptable from the cadre of Senate Dems he would need for a veto-proof majority for his 'not really a treaty but we want a say in this nuke deal implementation' bill? What about the compromises needed for the same in the House? Or is Corker prepared to be satisfied to be merely a slightly less kooky version of Tailgunner Tom Cotton?

Sometimes I feel like I'm the only Political Science major who remembers that most evidence points to sanctions being good if your goal is to inflict economic pain and bad if you are trying to coerce a behavior or response.

Hillary is setting up in Brooklyn



just wanted to play that, not exactly in biggie's brooklyn, eh dajafi?

edit:

jerseyhoya wrote:I don't think it is irrational that Iran wants to keep its underground nuclear facility stocked with centrifuges that are not enriching uranium as they abide by the terms of the agreement in order to get their sanctions lifted. It allows them to quickly reboot their nuclear enrichment program either when the deal ends or sooner if they want to break the terms early with the equipment in place in a place that would be really, really hard for us or the Israelis to bomb. The administration had singled out this facility as being something obviously unnecessary for a civilian nuclear power program, and everyone wanted it dismantled as part of an agreement. The Iranians refused. The administration, in trying to sell the deal to Congress/the American people, are playing this off as no big deal, just some prideful Iranians being irrational holding onto things that won't be developing nuclear material while the inspectors are around. The spin seems pretty transparent to me. Maybe there's something I'm missing here that wasn't in the article that you can see with your non team member glasses on.

All of this proceeds from the fantasy that Iran wants a nuclear weapon (it does) to use on Israel (nonsense). They know as everyone does that such a move would be suicidal. The BEST explanation I have ever heard for the preoccupation with keeping a relatively wealthy country with a relatively educated populace like Iran from getting a nuke is to prevent the possibility that radicalized non-state actors could somehow commandeer such a device: but honestly, how likely does it seem to anyone that any non-state actor could actually get a device away from the Iranian government - a government much more draconian and secretive than our own?

THEY CAN HAVE NUKES SECOND AMENDMENT FTW

A Canadian coworker of mine is fond of saying that the US and Iran have a lot in common. They are both ruled by a small group that uses religion and primarily social issues to control the populace, often getting them to do what is widely considered unpopular.

In my admittedly small experience with Iranian people, I have to admit that I really like them. I haven't met one who wasn't open-minded and polite. They have been mostly young, so I have hope for Iran.

Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, seems to produce the laziest, most dishonest, and morally questionable people of any country I have met. By far. I mean, it's not even close. I suppose we need to be SA's friend forever thanks to them helping us bury the Soviet Union or whatever, but I really wish we could drop SA and be friends with Iran. I suppose that would be like that Seinfeld episode where he tries to switch roommates... an impossible switch.

Monkeyboy wrote:Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, seems to produce the laziest, most dishonest, and morally questionable people of any country I have met. By far. I mean, it's not even close. I suppose we need to be SA's friend forever thanks to them helping us bury the Soviet Union or whatever, but I really wish we could drop SA and be friends with Iran. I suppose that would be like that Seinfeld episode where he tries to switch roommates... an impossible switch.

My experience is similar. Also, Persian women are typically smoking hot.

TenuredVulture wrote:

Monkeyboy wrote:Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, seems to produce the laziest, most dishonest, and morally questionable people of any country I have met. By far. I mean, it's not even close. I suppose we need to be SA's friend forever thanks to them helping us bury the Soviet Union or whatever, but I really wish we could drop SA and be friends with Iran. I suppose that would be like that Seinfeld episode where he tries to switch roommates... an impossible switch.

My experience is similar. Also, Persian women are typically smoking hot.

agreed.

Persian women? from Persia? ?

Monkeyboy wrote:A Canadian coworker of mine is fond of saying that the US and Iran have a lot in common. They are both ruled by a small group that uses religion and primarily social issues to control the populace, often getting them to do what is widely considered unpopular.

In my admittedly small experience with Iranian people, I have to admit that I really like them. I haven't met one who wasn't open-minded and polite. They have been mostly young, so I have hope for Iran.

Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, seems to produce the laziest, most dishonest, and morally questionable people of any country I have met. By far. I mean, it's not even close. I suppose we need to be SA's friend forever thanks to them helping us bury the Soviet Union or whatever, but I really wish we could drop SA and be friends with Iran. I suppose that would be like that Seinfeld episode where he tries to switch roommates... an impossible switch.

So this ends in a US/SA/Iran 3 some???

SK790 wrote:

Monkeyboy wrote:A Canadian coworker of mine is fond of saying that the US and Iran have a lot in common. They are both ruled by a small group that uses religion and primarily social issues to control the populace, often getting them to do what is widely considered unpopular.

In my admittedly small experience with Iranian people, I have to admit that I really like them. I haven't met one who wasn't open-minded and polite. They have been mostly young, so I have hope for Iran.

Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, seems to produce the laziest, most dishonest, and morally questionable people of any country I have met. By far. I mean, it's not even close. I suppose we need to be SA's friend forever thanks to them helping us bury the Soviet Union or whatever, but I really wish we could drop SA and be friends with Iran. I suppose that would be like that Seinfeld episode where he tries to switch roommates... an impossible switch.

So this ends in a US/SA/Iran 3 some???

SA would just lay there and demand that the other two do all the work, and then they'd demand that we all give up alcohol, the only thing that made having sex with them palatable in the first place.

I was just thinking about a tricky situation where we had to switch allegiances while not pissing the other off. I just jumped at the opportunity to bring up that episode.

The Iran Deal and Its Consequences - Kissinger and George Shultz on the negotiations/deal framework/long term consequences.

Welp, looks like the Iran deal is gonna collapse.

A neocon's wet dream! For 35 yrs, they've been yearning to...




...and Gohmert Pyle leads the charge...

jerseyhoya wrote:The Iran Deal and Its Consequences - Kissinger and George Shultz on the negotiations/deal framework/long term consequences.

Wherein 2 superannuated lions of bygone regimes - at least one in thrall to a multinational "engineering/construction" firm (defense contracting just one of Bectel's revenue streams) -
a) concede in the intro that methods of statecraft/warcraft used in their day essentially created the existing middle east mess,
b) ask rhetorical questions about what might happen under the deal in negative case scenarios (spending considerably less time appraising what might happen should the deal work something like advertised)
c) provide little in the way of illumination of their better ideas about what to do with respect to a big rambunctious Middle Eastern player that according to the Kissinger/Schultz narrative is 3 months from a nuke now anyway.

What they trot out at the end is a paragraph that could have been torn from the playbook each used decades ago:

Until clarity on an American strategic political concept is reached, the projected nuclear agreement will reinforce, not resolve, the world’s challenges in the region. Rather than enabling American disengagement from the Middle East, the nuclear framework is more likely to necessitate deepening involvement there—on complex new terms. History will not do our work for us; it helps only those who seek to help themselves.

a 'strategy', then, that overlooks the inconvenient reality that the US has seldom if ever had what could credibly be called a 'strategic political concept' in the Middle East - arguably intentionally - and stumps for a program that is a variant of Marshall Plan lite - basically, continued active meddling by the US and its semi-officially-deputized commercial exponents.

How convenient then that they managed to have gotten their opinion circulated in the US's business paper of record

jerseyhoya wrote:The Iran Deal and Its Consequences - Kissinger and George Shultz on the negotiations/deal framework/long term consequences.

A decent piece I obviously disagree with, and one that can be quibbled with back and forth due to positing an outcome we don't actually know, but I found this part humorous:

Some have argued that these concerns are secondary, since the nuclear deal is a way station toward the eventual domestic transformation of Iran. But what gives us the confidence that we will prove more astute at predicting Iran’s domestic course than Vietnam’s, Afghanistan’s, Iraq’s, Syria’s, Egypt’s or Libya’s?

jerseyhoya wrote:The Iran Deal and Its Consequences - Kissinger and George Shultz on the negotiations/deal framework/long term consequences.

Psssssh, wall street journal. 2/3 of the board has that site blocked.

drsmooth wrote:a 'strategy', then, that overlooks the inconvenient reality that the US has seldom if ever had what could credibly be called a 'strategic political concept' in the Middle East - arguably intentionally - and stumps for a program that is a variant of Marshall Plan lite - basically, continued active meddling by the US and its semi-officially-deputized commercial exponents.

The outlines of the agreement are far from punitive, and with a relaxed/unclear enforcement mechanism, provides a clearer roadmap for Iran getting nuclear weapon capabilities. It's fair to ask about the implications for the region, how that would affect other relationships in that region that do and do not have that capability, and how these development are affected by the rise of non-state actors. I agree with your implication that the previous "strategic concepts" have not been effective at promoting peace and stability, but I would argue that they have been successful at preventing the kind of massive risks as seen during the 6-day war.

Without a final agreement to evaluate, it's unfair to the Obama administration to directly criticize the agreement point by point; however, since this agreement will have a huge effect on US foreign policy in the coming decade, these broader objectives should be articulated by the admin in the near future.

Everyone on the Republican side of the 2016 race was invited to the NRA convention in Nashville this weekend. Except Rand Paul and Chris Christie. *THUD*

Werthless wrote:

jerseyhoya wrote:The Iran Deal and Its Consequences - Kissinger and George Shultz on the negotiations/deal framework/long term consequences.

Psssssh, wall street journal. 2/3 of the board has that site blocked.

prefer this retort:

Big Sexy Jeb Lund @Mobute · 18h 18 hours ago

adding this to my reader just after the Limp Bizkit roundtable on protest music in the rock and roll hall of fame