Agresto's Op Ed. Iran Receives, America Gives! Demwits-Socialists - Not A Dime's Difference!

AC

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My friend, John Agresto, has an op ed in Saturday's WSJ. (See 1 below.)
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Comments re my Cabinet:

I like your Cabinet construction .... E.I

I could vote for them who is your candidate for president? A.M
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Obama and Perry's Iran Deal, alters, in a major way, America's strategic position in The Middle East! (See 2 below.)

I spoke with a dear relative and fellow memo reader this morning and he made the cogent point that Obama and Kerry's Iran Deal, extracts nothing from/imposes nothing on Iran, that is realistically enforceable whereas, America is called upon to give everything.

This general point has been enumerated in many op ed articles, is the basis of Netanyahu's disagreement with Obama which caused Bibi to call this a bad deal, etc. The argument my relative makes is he believes a concerted campaign emphasizing "Iran Gives Nothing, America Gives Everything" has yet to drive home how bad this deal
 is and must be devised.

Perhaps before the 60 day period has passed such will happen.  (See 2a and 2b  below.)
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Demwits-Socialists, not a dime difference! (See 3 below.)
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Gerald Seib, makes an interesting observation and divides the top ten Republican nominees into two categories - the fighters and the statesmen. (See 4 below.)

In the long run, one would hope the statesmen embrace some of the spiritedness of the fighters and vice versa but then, that would be expecting leopards to change their spots and who knows, even if they could, what you would get.

The level of dissatisfaction with government, with both Democrats and Republicans, is high so a degree of moxie would be healthy but, in the long run, voters want to hear candidates articulate what they believe needs 'fixin' and how they will go about same. I put my money on the statesmen approach but it is still fun watching the 'food fight.'
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Dick
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1)-

The Suicide of the Liberal Arts

Indoctrinating students isn’t the same as teaching them. Homer and Shakespeare have much to tell us about how to think and how to live.

ENLARGE

‘Achilles Slays Hector,’ by Peter Paul Rubens, circa 1630. PHOTO: ART RESOURCE

By 

JOHN AGRESTO

I was a few minutes early for class. Father Alexander, my high-school sophomore-homeroom teacher, was standing outside the room, cigarette in his mouth, leaning on the doorjamb. “Morning, Father.”

His response was to put his arm across the door. “Agresto,” he said, “I have a question I’ve been thinking about and maybe you can help me.”

“Sure, what’s up?”

“Do you think a person in this day and age can be called well educated who’s never read the ‘Iliad’?” I hadn’t read the “Iliad,” and am not even sure I had heard of it. “Hmmm. Maybe, I don’t see why not. Maybe if he knows other really good stuff . . .” His response was swift. “OK, Agresto, that proves it. You’re even a bigger damn fool than I thought you were.”

***

I grew up in a fairly poor Brooklyn family that didn’t think that much about education. My father was a day laborer in construction—pouring cement, mostly. He thought I should work on the docks. Start by running sandwiches for the guys, he told me. Join the union. Work your way up. There’s good money on the docks. And you’ll always have a job. He had nothing against school, except that if bad times came, working the docks was safer.

I also grew up in a house almost without books. All I remember is an encyclopedia we got from coupons at the grocery store and a set of the “Book of Knowledge” from my cousin Judy. Once in a while I’d head over to the public library and borrow something—a book on tropical fish, a stamp catalog, a book by someone called Levi on pigeons. It never dawned on me to look at what else there was. Who read that stuff anyway?

So now I’m a professor and former university president who grew up without much real childhood reading until eighth grade, two or three years before the “Iliad” question. Sister Mary Gerald asked me one day if I read outside of class. I told her about the pigeon book and the stamp catalog. No, she asked, had I ever read any literature?

Whereupon she pulled out something called “Penrod and Sam,” by a guy named Booth Tarkington. She said I should read it. I did. I can’t say that “Penrod and Sam” is great literature, but it changed a small bit of my neighborhood. Penrod had a club. So my friends and I put together a club. Penrod’s club had a flag; we had a flag. Penrod would climb trees and spy on the surroundings. We had to be content with climbing on cyclone fences.

Who would have thought there was a new way of having adventures, learned from a book? A book, by the way, of things that had never happened. Something had pierced the predictable regularity of everyday street life. And that something was a work of someone’s imagination.

So I started to read, and with the appetite of a man who finally realized he was hungry. I became a reader of fairly passionate likes and dislikes. Dickens was fine, though he could have gotten to the point sooner. O. Henry, Stevenson and later Tolkien, Lewis, Swift.

Even though I thought it was in a terribly sappy poem, when Emily Dickinson said there was “no Frigate like a Book/To take us Lands away,” I knew she was telling the truth.

I didn’t go to the docks but wound up at the Jesuit prep school Sister Mary Gerald told my father I had to attend. Yes, fathers are nearly all-powerful in Italian-American families. But in my 1950s Brooklyn neighborhood, nuns trumped fathers.

Nonetheless, this tension between getting an education—specifically a liberal arts education—and studying something practical or simply going off to work was hardly unique to me. Yes, this “liberal education” is worth something. But so is making, doing, building and working—so is knowing other good stuff. And that tension—between the practical and productive on one hand, and the intellectual and more academic or cultural on the other—has been and still is at the heart of America’s historical ambivalence toward liberal education.

Parents often still ask, “But what exactly does one do with a major in philosophy, classics, lyric poetry, women’s studies, or the literature of oppression and rebellion?” With jobs so scarce, students ask themselves the same questions.

Still, it’s not simply the high cost of higher education, or their supposed uselessness, that has buried today’s liberal arts. More important, professors in the liberal arts have over-promised, or promised wrongly. We have these lovely phrases, like making our students “well-rounded,” that are more or less just words. Are those who study medicine or nursing not “well-rounded”? Are those who major in film studies or contemporary “lit crit” more intellectually worthy than those who study economics and finance?

Often enough over the years I’ve heard my humanities confreres say that a liberal education makes us finer people, more sensitive, more concerned, more humane, even more human. Pretentious shibboleths such as these, expressed in our egalitarian age, are an excellent way to lose one’s audience. And that’s exactly where the liberal arts are today.

Liberal arts has not been killed by parental or student philistinism, or the cupidity of today’s educational institutions whose excessive costs have made the liberal arts into an unattainable luxury. In too many ways the liberal arts have died not by murder but by suicide.

To restore the liberal arts, those of us who teach should begin by thinking about students. Almost all of them have serious questions about major issues, and all of them are looking for answers. What is right? What is love? What do I owe others? What do others owe me? In too many places these are not questions for examination but issues for indoctrination. Instead of guiding young men and women by encouraging them to read history, biography, philosophy and literature, we’d rather debunk the past, deconstruct the authors and dethrone our finest minds and statesmen.

But why would any student spend tens of thousands of dollars and, rather than see the world in all its aspects, instead spend his time being indoctrinated and immersed in the prejudices of the current culture and the opinions of his tendentious professors? The job of teachers is to liberate minds, not capture them.

Reform at the university level will require brave work by deans and presidents. A hundred-course set of “distribution requirements” with minimally guided choice fosters intellectual randomness. Instead, the best faculty should put together a coherent program of core studies to introduce students to the finest books, to alternative answers to the most compelling questions, to great literature and art and pivotal historical events. Contemporary political issues of race, class and gender do not define what’s truly important. That’s the greatest fallacy of higher education today.

Second, find ways to increase interaction with departments of business, engineering, pre-med and the like. Most students will properly go on to work in various vocational, professional or technical fields. They should be offered our civilization’s best work and its broadest vision—but humanities teachers should not begin with the notion that business and law will be “improved” by the humanities. The benefits flow both ways.

Finally, a word to secondary schools and their teachers: You may be the last hope many of your students will have to think broadly and seriously about literature, science, math and history. If they don’t read Homer or Shakespeare, or marvel at the working of the universe, or read and understand the Constitution, they never will. The hope of liberal learning rests on your shoulders. Please don’t shrug.

When properly conceived and taught, the liberal arts do not by themselves make us “better people” or (God knows) more “human.” They don’t exist to make us more “liberal,” at least in the contemporary political sense. But the liberal arts can do something no less wonderful: They can open our eyes.

They show us how to look at the world and the works of civilization in serious and important and even delightful ways. They hold out the possibility that we will know better the truth about many of the most important things. They are the vehicle that carries the amazing things that mankind has made—and the memory of the horrors that mankind has perpetrated—from one age to the next. They teach us how to marvel.

I wasn’t completely wrong when I told Father Alexander that it was fine for people to know “other really good stuff.” Still, he had the better argument. Some literature, even “Penrod and Sam,” might “take us Lands away.” But some of it, perhaps the greater part of it, takes us back to ourselves.

Some of it holds up mirrors labeled “courage” or “friendship” or “smallness of soul,” to see if we can see ourselves in there. It tells stories of Lear’s daughter loving Lear, though her father is a fool. It has us walk with Virgil through the dismal rings of hell and ask at which circle Virgil might turn ’round on us, then walk away and leave us.

While books might not make us more humane, they can surely show us and lead us to examine creativity and desire, love and treachery, giddiness and joy, hope and fear, and facing death alone. They can have us ponder law and justice, the nature of innocence and causes of moral culpability, forms of government and the ordering of societies that can preserve and refine our civilization.

Literary, philosophical and historical studies may not teach us the final and absolute truth about these matters, but they can help us see the great alternatives, and the reasons the best minds have given. None of this is trivial.

I know I would have learned much by working on the Brooklyn docks. Vinnie the butcher and his brother Angel would have opened my eyes to things I’m still clueless about. The pay and job security might have been better than life in academia and government. And, yes, I might have encountered a modern-day Achilles or Hector or Agamemnon. But I think that, at least for me, it was better to meet them first in the “Iliad.”

Mr. Agresto is the former president of St. John’s College in Santa Fe., N.M., and the American University of Iraq.

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2)----The Writing is On the Wall for the U.S. Military in the Persian Gulf

By Stephen Bryen and Shoshana Bryen

The long U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt is likely drawing to a close. What once worked to assure stability in the region and keep the oil flowing will not work in the face of Iranian nuclear capability, and the administration is disinclined to rethink a workable strategy. The United States will likely reengage, but only when the resulting chaos spreads to our shores, as it surely will.

How different it was twenty-five years ago this month, when President Bush (41) said Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait “would not stand.” American and allied forces rushed to the battlefield despite concerns about Iraq’s unconventional weapons -- primarily poison gas, which had already been used against the Kurds in the north. But Israel provided a counter-threat to Saddam, letting him know that if Israel were threatened with chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons it would join the war. It was a threat Saddam took seriously, as his nuclear program at Osirak had been destroyed by Israel a decade earlier.    

Israel’s counter-threat worked. Iraq fired some 80 Scud missiles at Israel and Saudi Arabia. None had chemical or biological warheads; and, of course, none were nuclear.

Without actually fighting, Israel proved to be a key security asset that allowed American troops to operate with relative freedom against Iraq.

Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, on the other hand, will similarly constrain American military planning, but this time Israel will not be able to offer a counter-threat. In the simplest terms, the U.S. facing a nuclear Iran will either have to significantly change how it deploys to the Middle East and Persian Gulf, or get out of harm's way. The weakening of the overall American military posture under sequestration makes the latter most likely.

There are a number of factors that need explication:

(1) Prior to the Israeli strike on Osirak, Iran had sent its own Phantom jets to try to knock out Iraq's centrifuge facility adjoining the reactor; reports have it that the Iranians also shared photo reconnaissance with Israel of their raid to help Israel pinpoint the right targets and finish the job. Israel's strike caused a firestorm in American policy circles because Washington had a secret relationship with Saddam Hussein and was turning a blind eye to the transfer of nuclear technology to that country. But Iraq could never be sure whether/when Israel would strike again. Thus Israel created an enforceable red line. The U.S. has none with Iran.

(2) The Shah of Iran was after nuclear weapons and delivery systems. The work started by the Shah simply continued under the Mullahs. As with Iraq, technology from many countries, Western and otherwise, flowed into Iran and is still pouring in. The scope of the Iranian nuclear drive dwarfs anything Iraq attempted.

(3) All "wannabe" nuclear powers follow multiple paths to weapons development. No country can afford to risk everything on a single solution that could fail for technical reasons, be blocked politically, or destroyed by a hostile force. Iran may be unique because it has positioned some of its nuclear weapons development capabilities outside the country, most notably in Syria where there were at least three sites, one of which was destroyed by Israel, and North Korea. Iran also has a very sensitive relationship with South Africa, which has highly enriched weapons grade uranium, enrichment facilities, and knows how to build nuclear weapons.

(4) Once Iran reaches nuclear weapons operational capability, if the United States wants to continue as the guarantor of regional stability it will have to introduce active nuclear forces into the region as a deterrent. Or, alternatively, it can decide to pull back from the area. But no responsible American planner can overlook the fact that Iran can achieve an operational capability in perhaps as little as five years. Not for nothing did the Obama administration keep the Pentagon out of the Iran negotiations. President Obama and Secretary Kerry were seeking a political -- not a military -- deal. The JPCOA is not an arms control agreement.

(5) This leaves Iran as an emerging nuclear power facing Israel, which is also a nuclear power. What isn't clear is whether the Israelis can risk a nuclear Iran or whether Israel has to conjure a way to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons capabilities. Prime Minister Menachim Begin acted on multiple fronts to kill the Iraqi program: before Osirak was taken out, Saddam's nuclear accomplices in Europe were raided and bombed and at least one top Iraqi scientist was killed in France. Iran is much farther down the road than Iraq was and it has moved some of its assets offshore -- in some cases to points outside Israel’s reach, i.e., North Korea. Europe will likely step up its cooperation with Iran to supply nuclear knowhow, just as the Russians are upping the ante.

(6) An American pullback from the Gulf is not anathema to the Obama administration or to the American public, and one can argue it has already happened. The U.S. is gone from Iraq and nearly so from Afghanistan. It is no longer either the protector of European and Asian energy supplies or the strategic partner of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, or Israel. Middle Eastern oil is no longer essential to the United States, which is nearly energy independent. Americans generally see no reason to protect oil resources for other countries, and are horrified by a culture war in the Middle East that is entirely alien to American values. The American public may be inclined to accept a decision that the U.S. can reduce its posture in the Gulf and not seek to play a significant military role in the area.  

This is an uncomfortable and dangerous situation and without some dramatic intervention does not augur well for the future. The spread of chaos under Iran’s nuclear shield will ultimately require a return of U.S. power, but it will happen under conditions far less favorable.

2a)  Beware the Hyde-and-Jekyll Defense of the Iran Nuclear Agreement

by Gary C. Gambill
Foreign Policy Research Institute

After two years of negotiations with Iran over the fate of its nuclear program, the Obama administration has unveiled an agreement abandoning the pursuit of a decisive reduction in the Islamic Republic'sbreakout capacity – the ability to quickly and successfully produce a bomb – and lifting the economic sanctions that have hobbled its economy. The agreement not only sanctifies Teheran's retention of sufficient enrichment infrastructure to produce a bomb in a year or less, but also drops or dilutes a range of other longstanding demands, from closing a once-secret, heavily fortified underground enrichment facility to providing inspectors with a full accounting of its bomb-making research and development.

As the Obama administration and its supporters seek to rally domestic and international support for this historic compromise, listen for what can best be described as a Hyde-and-Jekyll defense.

The Obama administration has abandoned the pursuit of a decisive reduction in Iran's nuclear breakout capacity.

When discussing what will happen if the P5+1 world powers maintain their long-standing refusal to accept Iran's retention of proliferation-prone nuclear infrastructure, the administration has often depicted the Islamic Republic as a menacing force hell-bent on continuing its march toward the brink, whatever the consequences. Secretary of State John Kerry has suggested that Iran might "rush towards a nuclear weapon" if the talks collapse. Obama has characterized the alternative as "letting them rush towards a bomb." Outside of the administration, supporters of the pending nuclear agreement have typically offered more measured warnings that the Iranians could "take the lid off their program" and "rapidly ramp up their uranium enrichment." Most believe that war will be likely, if not unavoidable, if there is no agreement.

However, when speaking about what will happen if the P5+1 recognizes and validates Tehran's nuclear threshold status, the administration and its supporters have depicted the Islamic Republic as an eminently rational actor likely to abide by the letter and spirit of a prospective agreement. Obamasees the P5+1 as offering the Iranians the prospect of being "a very successful regional power" in return for accepting monitored limits on their nuclear program. "Without in any way being under an illusion about Iranian intentions ... [or] the nature of that regime, they are self-interested," accordingto Obama. "It is possible for them to make a strategic calculation that, at minimum, pushes much further to the right whatever potential breakout capacity they may have."

If we demand that Iran unclench its nuclear fist, we will supposedly get Mr. Hyde. If we give in, we get the friendly Dr. Jekyll.

Put simply, if we continue refusing to lift sanctions until Iran fully unclenches its nuclear fist (dramatically downsizes its enrichment infrastructure, acknowledges past weaponization work, gives inspectors wide latitude, etc.), we will get Mr. Hyde. But we will get the friendly Dr. Jekyll if we give in and accept the agreement Obama has put before us. And this is only if we give in – proponents of the agreement are quite certain that the good doctor won't pop up if the international community stands firm (i.e. that the Iranians won't, upon further reflection, make more concessions on the nuclear issue, or otherwise try harder to win international confidence).

Obama administration officials warn that Iran could "rush" for a bomb if the international community demands a more decisive reduction in its nuclear infrastructure.

Oddly enough, the Hyde portraiture isn't one of Iran reverting to its nuclear posture before direct talks with the Obama administration began in early 2013. Back then, the mullahs weren't "rapidly" ramping up enrichment capacity (let alone "rushing" for a bomb), but increasing it slowly enough not to cross certain thresholds deemed likely to trigger Israeli and/or American military action (e.g., accumulating enough near-20% enriched uranium to produce through further enrichment sufficient weapons grade uranium for a bomb). The Iran they suggest will emerge from our failure to compromise is far more unhinged and oblivious to its people's welfare than the one they sat down with two years ago. And dumber, too – an attempt by Iran to "rush" for a bomb or significantly narrow its nuclear breakout time by ramping up enrichment capacity would be supremely stupid when international resolve is at a peak.

While some proponents of the agreement are simply cherry-picking diametrically opposed characterizations of Iran to fit mismatched legs of a bad argument, many appear to genuinely believe that a nuclear threshold détente will somehow transform Iran into the kind of partner one might trust to linger near the finish line of producing a bomb, and that lack of one will put it on a path to war.

There are three overlapping strands of reasoning in this argument. All have an elegant logic with a weak empirical track record outside of Iran and little applicability to the particulars of the case at hand.

"More to lose"

The first holds that lifting sanctions will accelerate Iran's integration into the world economy, creating disincentives to misbehave. "If in fact they're engaged in international business, and there are foreign investors, and their economy becomes more integrated with the world economy, then in many ways it makes it harder for them to engage in behaviors that are contrary to international norms," explained Obama in April.

Lifting sanctions isn't likely to result in Iran's headlong integration into the world economy.

Although there is much to be said for free markets and trade, economic integration hasn't reliably inhibited the aggression of states. The European continent was more economically integrated on the eve of World War I than at any time prior and for many decades after.

In any case, lifting sanctions isn't likely to result in Iran's headlong integration into the world economy. This isn't a situation where a bankrupt dictatorship opens up to the world out of desperation and falls prey to socio-economic forces beyond its control. The Iranian regime is getting a direct financial windfall out of this (access to frozen Iranian assets worth as much as $150 billion, ability to sell oil, etc.), which it can simply pocket while forgoing the kind of increased trade and foreign investment that might constrain its freedom of action later.

"More like us"

The second line of reasoning holds that drawing Iran into closer economic and socio-cultural contact with the rest of the world will cause religious extremism, xenophobia, and other unsavory attitudes among the public at large to give way to materialist and individualist concerns that will constrain government decision-making. Obama "believes the more people interact with open societies, the more they will want to be part of an open society," says Ivo Daalder, Obama's former NATO ambassador and head of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

There's little evidence that Iranian public opinion supports the regime's nuclear brinksmanship.

But this presumes that the Iranian public has influence over its government's aggressive regional and international policies. As was made clear in the deadly aftermath of the rigged 2009 elections and at many other times, the Iranian government can and does ignore public opinion.

In any case, there's little evidence that Iranian public opinion supports the regime's nuclear brinksmanship. While most Iranians do express support for a civilian energy program, few attach a high priority to it. Despite a steady diet of government propaganda heralding the nuclear program as the sacred right of the Iranian people, only 6% of respondents in a September 2013 Zogby poll said that continuing Iran's enrichment program was one of their top two policy priorities. Iranian leaders threaten world peace because of ideological and strategic reasons, not public opinion.

"Empower moderates"

Obama has argued that the pending nuclear agreement could "strengthen the hands" of President Hassan Rouhani and other "moderates."

Finally, Obama has argued that an agreement "could strengthen the hands of more moderate leaders in Iran." President Hassan Rouhani and other "moderates" will gain clout in Iran's government if there is a deal on his watch, while "hardliners" will gain influence if there isn't one.

But this is a misreading of what causes the strength of moderates in government to fluctuate. This variable is in large part a function of how aggressively radical mullahs vet who can run in elections. So-called "moderates" are allowed to ascend the ranks of power when the system is under threat and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei needs them to safely channel public dissent and/or soften international hostility to Iran, but they lose clout when they are no longer needed to deflect such challenges.

Moderates are allowed to ascend the ranks of power when the system is under threat, but they lose clout when no longer needed.

Might not the exorbitant financial payoff to the Iranian state of having sanctions lifted boost the legitimacy of the system and thereby weaken moderates? Alan J. Kuperman, head of the Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Project at the University of Texas at Austin, is concerned that such a windfall "would entrench the ruling mullahs, who could claim credit for Iran's economic resurgence."

Moreover, Kuperman adds, the Iranian regime will acquire "extra resources" to "amplify the havoc it is fostering in neighboring countries like Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen." And once a nuclear deal is signed, fear of provoking Tehran to violate it will surely discourage the international community from punishing it for its terrorism sponsorship and bloody proxy interventions in the region.

Rouhani may get a personal boost from getting sanctions lifted on his watch, but it's a mistake to translate that into broad advancement of "moderates." The Iranian president may be a soft-liner on some domestic issues, but he is no less committed to realizing Iran's nuclear ambitions than so-called hardliners.

Indeed, he is arguably more so. Many hardliners are more interested in using the nuclear program to throw a wrench into Iran's relations with the West and keep it on a "rogue" footing than in the delicate task of preventing the international community from stopping its eventual construction of a bomb. Not surprisingly, the above-mentioned Zogby poll showed that Iranians who believe Iran should have nuclear weapons are more likely to self-identify as Rouhani supporters than those who don't.

Conclusion

The reality is that we don't know what will happen inside Iran in the years to come. But it's a good bet the nature and temperament of the regime won't change dramatically for better or worse as a result of whether or not the international community sanctifies Iran's nuclear threshold status.

The nature of the Iranian regime likely won't change dramatically for better or worse as a result of the nuclear agreement.

Although Obama administration officials are quick to insist that their proposed nuclear agreement with Iran is a good idea regardless of the nature and intentions of the Iranian regime, no one really believes this. If Iran is completely unchanged by its opening to the world, then the best case scenario is that we'll be exactly where we are today when modest restrictions on its enrichment capacity expire in 10 years, only Iran will have recovered economically from the impact of sanctions, shattered the global coalition arrayed against it, and obtained the internationally sanctioned right to ramp up enrichment.

The worst-case scenario is, well, a lot worse.

Gary C. Gambill is a frequent contributor to The National Post, FPRI E-Notes, The Jerusalem Post, Foreign Policy, and The National Interest. He is a research fellow at the Middle East Forum and was formerly editor of Middle East Intelligence Bulletinand Mideast Monitor.

2b)  Why Empower Iran?

by Alexander H. Joffe
The Times of Israel

 Unless the US Congress votes in opposition, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) deal with Iran with go through. What really happened and why did it happen the way it did?

What happened is gradually becoming clear. It is revealed daily just how horrendous the deal really is. On every point — enrichment, centrifuges, stocks of fissile material, inspections, sanctions on the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps members and businesses, "snapback," etc. — the Obama administration caved completely.

Concessions on ballistic missiles and arms sales were thrown in at the last minute; the administration lied about it all, while Iran touted its victories and American capitulation. All this went on amidst a background of Iranian chants of "death to Israel" and "death to America," which entered not at all into American calculations.

The Obama administration caved completely on every major point of contention.

Iran is thus empowered; it will shortly be gigantically richer, its proxies strengthened, its nuclear program at best slowed but fundamentally unimpeded, and its missile and terror programs shifted into overdrive.

But why this occurred is unclear. Clownish performance by the chief negotiator, Secretary of State John Kerry, a man driven equally by incompetence, ego, and pacifism, has long been the norm. But otherwise competent functionaries like Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz were dragged into negotiating and defending the deal. They have been no less implausible.

But their presence, along with Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman, previously the midwife of the North Korean nuclear program, suggests the process was directed from the top. In contrast, the defense establishment was written out; protests by General Martin Dempsey, outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as well as retired leaders like Defense Intelligence Agency head General Michael Flynn and NATO commander Admiral James Stavridis, fell on deaf ears in the administration and have been ignored by a compliant media.

Lead US negotiator Wendy Sherman previously brokered an agreement with North Korea that failed to prevent its construction of a bomb.

Three factors suggest why President Obama himself effectively guided the negotiations to this point. As with various other administration scandals — think the IRS targeting of conservative and pro-Israel groups, or the Justice Department's eavesdropping of reporters — it was not necessary for him to make every decision, only to set a tone that was interpreted by underlings. What then were the strategic goals that Obama established?

First was American withdrawal from the Middle East and to diminish the possibility of a return to a Pax Americana. Withdrawal from Iraq was a stated campaign goal that was accomplished, and is now being slowly reversed as the threat of ISIS grows. American forces remain in Afghanistan to confront a growing Taliban threat. In both cases the number of troops will be deliberately inadequate to directly confront threats.

Re-escalation of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan appears inevitable, but the larger reality of an American defense umbrella has been diminished by the administration's alienation of traditional allies in the region, namely Israel, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. This was done through its Iran policy and more broadly through US engagement with Islamists.

When coupled with enormous defense cuts at home, reducing the military to pre-World War II levels, any restoration of American influence, much less a defense presence in the Middle East, would be a protracted and expensive affair necessarily left to a future president, if ever.

A perverse pacifism is also at work. "There is no military solution" and "Ideologies are not defeated with guns" are pacifist mantras, repeated at the very top and used to avoid use of force, or the support of others using force, in Ukraine, Iraq, and Syria.

Obama has said the agreement offers Iran a path to being "a very successful regional power."

This pacifist, non-interventionist policy is nominally offset by the administration's machismo; the never ending reminders about killing Bin Laden, the continued leaks and sympathetic press accounts regarding the president's involvement in approving targets for drone attacks and special forces raids, and the much-vaunted, but little seen, "pivot to Asia."

But these narratives do not offset the reality that conventional forces, of the sort necessary, say, to fight ISIS in Syria, will never deployed, no matter how many Christians and Yazidis are kidnapped or killed. And despite utterances that a military option was "on the table," it seems inconceivable that the administration ever contemplated using force against Iran.

But there are deeper reasons for the outreach to Iran. Some have suggested that the long-term Obama policy, from at least 2008, has been to reintegrate Iran into the Middle East, putting it on the path to becoming a "very successful regional power," as Obama put it, against an even longer term bet that moderate forces will become ascendant.

The White House expects Iran to act as a bulwark against the very Sunni extremism it helps provoke.

Iran, as Obama admits, has "a track record of state-sponsored terrorism ... [and] has engaged in disruptions to our allies," while its "rhetoric is not only explicitly anti-American but also has been incendiary when it comes to its attitude towards the state of Israel." It is nevertheless expected to act as a bulwark against the Sunni extremism it helps provoke, help resolve the Syria crisis its client Assad created, and abide by "international norms and international rules, and that would be good for everybody."

The theory of Iranian reintegration, however, captures only part of the administration's motives. At the root is something deeper still, reflected in Obama's most personal and idiosyncratic policystatement; that "America is not — and never will be — at war with Islam," that it is "part of [his] responsibility as President of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear," that "Islam is not part of the problem in combating violent extremism — it is an important part of promoting peace," and that "America does not presume to know what is best for everyone."

These and other elements from Obama's Istanbul and Cairo speeches are the core of policy towards Iran, the Middle East, and the Muslim world as a whole. They have been translated directly into policies to support and facilitate "authentically" Islamic regimes in order to prove they can govern.

This was the theory behind support of the Muslim Brotherhood's short-lived election to rule Egypt, and the distance the US created when Egypt's military overthrew the increasingly tyrannical rule of Brotherhood President Muhammad Morsi. It has been the foundation of American support for the oppressive and bizarre rule of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the AKP party. And it accounts for the constant disclaimers from administration spokespersons denying any connection between Islam and terror, the incessant "religion of peace" rhetoric, and support for the "Islamophobic" mindset of victimization among American Muslims.

Other policies as large as outreach to Iran, as dangerous as purging mentions of jihad from US counterterrorism training, and as absurd as the President's order to NASA "to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math and engineering," reflect the administration's goal of inculcating Islamic authenticity, self-esteem and good will.

In contrast to authentic Islam is "violent extremism." In this view Al Qaeda and ISIS are not Islamic at all but have, as the president stated in Cairo, "exploited these tensions in a small but potent minority of Muslims." They are simply groups with no real relationship to Islam, despite their resolute Islamic self-conception and careful textual exegesis. Fatwas from Obama, Kerry and others, painstakingly separating Islam from the terror done in its name, are both perplexing, unpersuasive, and grist for ISIS and domestic Islamic terrorism. But they are self-satisfying.

The non-nuclear consequences of the Iran deal are already coming into view. European businesses are rushing for deals worth billions. Hamas has announced that Iran is financing new attack tunnels into Israel. Hezbollah, though badly bloodied from its defense of Iran's client, Syria's Assad regime, is reemphasizing its anti-Israel rhetoric and capabilities before what will be a horrifically violent war. Iran's subversion in Yemen, the Balkans, South America and the Gulf is at new heights. International legitimacy has brought neither Iranian moderation nor domestic development. It is unlikely to do so soon.

At the end of the day, an American administration led by social justice ideologues was fated to understand nothing about a revolutionary Islamist regime with global aspirations. The favor done Iran in the name of Islamic authenticity and regional reintegration will be a curse on the world for generations.

Alexander H. Joffe, a Shillman-Ginsburg fellow at the Middle East Forum, is a historian and archaeologist.

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3) Democrats: They're All Socialists Now

By Larry Elder

Socialism, according to Dictionary.com, is defined as: "A theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole."

Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, recently appeared on MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews." Matthews asked, "What is the difference between a Democrat and a socialist?"

Wasserman Schultz laughed, looked stunned, and began hemming and hawing. Matthews helpfully interjected, "I used to think there was a big difference. What do you think it is?" Still, Wasserman Schultz refused to give him a straight answer. "The difference between -- the real question," she said, "is what's the difference between being a Democrat and being a Republican."

Matthews tried again: "Yeah, but what's the big difference between being a Democrat and being a socialist? You're the chairwoman of the Democratic Party. Tell me the difference between you and a socialist."

Still, Wasserman Schultz wouldn't answer the question.

A few days ago Chuck Todd of NBC's "Meet the Press" offered her a chance for a do-over. He replayed the exchange with Matthews, then asked: "Given that (Democratic presidential candidate) Bernie Sanders is an unabashed socialist and believes in social democratic governments -- (he) likes the ones in Europe -- what is the difference? Can you explain the difference?"

And again she either could not or would not answer, and wanted to discuss the difference between Republicans and Democrats.

On the one hand, Wasserman Schultz might have refused to answer because she did not want to put her thumb on the scale of the self-described socialist candidate Bernie Sanders or the likely nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton. No matter what Wasserman Schultz would've said, it would injure one while helping the other.

That's one explanation. But the more likely explanation is simple. There is no real distinction between today's Democrats and socialists. A few years ago Congresswoman Maxine Waters, D-Calif., conducted hearings in which she grilled oil executives for alleged price fixing. She threatened to nationalize their business. Did any Democrat speak out against her threat? No.

Newsweek, in 2009, ran a cover story with the headline: "We Are All Socialists Now." Jon Meacham wrote:

"The U.S. government has already -- under a conservative Republican administration -- effectively nationalized the banking and mortgage industries. That seems a stronger sign of socialism than $50 million for art. Whether we want to admit it or not -- and many, especially Congressman (Mike) Pence and (Sean) Hannity, do not -- the America of 2009 is moving toward a modern European state. ...

"... If we fail to acknowledge the reality of the growing role of government in the economy, insisting instead on fighting 21st-century wars with 20th-century terms and tactics, then we are doomed to a fractious and unedifying debate. The sooner we understand where we truly stand, the sooner we can think more clearly about how to use government in today's world. ...

"... This is not to say that berets will be all the rage this spring, or that Obama has promised a croissant in every toaster oven. But the simple fact of the matter is that the political conversation, which shifts from time to time, has shifted anew, and for the foreseeable future Americans will be more engaged with questions about how to manage a mixed economy than about whether we should have one."

Polls, too, show that most Democrats are quite comfortable with socialism. A recent poll found 52 percent of Democrats had a favorable opinion about socialism.

Bernie Sanders has always caucused with Democrats, and they are perfectly comfortable with him. He's still a long shot for the Democratic nomination, but he is rising in the polls. If there is a distinction between him and President Barack Obama on anything major, what is it? Both pushed "universal health care." Both oppose the Keystone pipeline. Both believe taxes should be raised on "rich" people. Both believe in the redistribution of income. Obama wants two years of "free" community college. Sanders wants to make college "free" altogether. Both attack "corporate greed" and both belong to the school of economics that says, "you didn't build that."

Andy Stern, then the head of the Democratic Party-supporting Service Employees International Union, said, "I think Western Europe, as much as we used to make fun of it, has made different trade-offs which may have ended up with a little more unemployment but a lot more equality."

That's an acceptable trade-off in today's Democratic Party.

Jack Kennedy, a tax cutter, defended his plan by arguing it would invigorate the economy. He wanted growth and said, "A rising tide lifts all boats." Today's Democrat, like Wasserman Schultz, would deride Kennedy as a greedy Republican advocate of "trickle down." 

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4)

Capital Journal: GOP Debate Sorts the Fighters From the Statesmen

Distinction raises question about the electorate: Do voters want a candidate who channels their anger, or one who acknowledges it yet moves beyond it?

By 

GERALD F. SEIB

167 COMMENTS

The initial Republican debate Thursday night provided entertainment aplenty, but also this bit of enlightenment: It divided the GOP field into two distinct camps, the fighters and the statesmen.

It says something about the national mood of 2016 that it isn’t entirely clear which is the better place to land.

Donald Trump is, of course, the leader of the fighters’ camp, as he showed again on the debate stage. Any expectation that a more sedate Mr. Trump would appear was blown away within seconds, when he opened the official Republican campaign season by threatening to run as an independent if he doesn’t get the nomination.

But it wasn’t only Mr. Trump. Sen. Rand Paul and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie also signed up for the fight card, as did former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in his own, more folksy way.

While they were engaged in a kind of debate demolition derby, there was another group that seemed more interested in a calmer drive down the political parkway. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Sen. Marco Rubio,Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Ohio Gov. John Kasich leaned more toward a policy discussion in the traditional mode. More than that, they appeared to think that the correct image to project in a presidential debate was the statesmanlike one, even if that might leave them appearing understated and even plodding at times compared with the crashing sounds around them.

Mr. Christie, who got good reviews from some on the right for his performance, which hasn’t always been the case, appeared Friday at a gathering of conservative activists organized by the website RedState in Atlanta. Two other candidates trying to capitalize on strong notices also attended the event: Mr. Rubio, who was generally praised for his performance in the prime-time debate, and former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Carly Fiorina, who was widely considered the star of an earlier debate Thursday among seven contenders who weren’t invited to the prime-time event.
The question lingered Friday as GOP candidates moved on from the debate in Cleveland, with all sides agreeing it was a significant milestone in the nascent campaign. Nielsen figures indicated the prime-time event on Fox News drew a whopping 24 million viewers, making it the most-watched primary debate ever.This distinction reflects a deeper philosophical divide within the field. It also raises a broad question about the mood of the electorate—and the Republican primary electorate in particular—as the 2016 campaign gets serious: Are voters looking for a candidate who channels their anger, or one who acknowledges it, yet moves beyond it as the contest matures?

Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and former Texas Gov. Rick Perry—both of whom were relegated to the earlier debate—also appeared in Atlanta.

But as in the run-up to the debate, much of the attention in the aftermath focused on Mr. Trump. His aides are considering following up with a multi-million-dollar television advertising blitz in early nominating states, though they also said Mr. Trump himself is resisting, arguing that advertising isn’t necessary considering how much free media attention he is receiving.

As is often noted, Mr. Trump’s candidacy has tapped into feelings of anger, disillusionment with the system and annoyance at the political establishment. Mr. Kasich, for one, acknowledged as much at Thursday night’s debate, saying almost admiringly: “Donald Trump is hitting a nerve in this country. He is. He’s hitting a nerve. People are frustrated. They’re fed up. They don’t think the government is working for them.”

Mr. Trump didn’t create these feelings, however; they were already there to be revved up. Less noted is the fact that Messrs. Huckabee and Paul were there first, mining the same vein. Mr. Christie, by virtue of his personal style, has always played in this direction as well. He brings substance to the table—most notably his plan to trim Social Security and Medicare benefits for wealthier Americans to preserve the systems—but will be remembered more for the fight he picked Thursday night with Mr. Paul over government surveillance.

But if that kind of approach appeals to a certain slice of the electorate 15 months before Election Day, does it really appeal to the broader electorate, particularly when it comes time down the road to get serious and cast ballots?

Similarly, Kevin Madden, who worked on Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign, says “these races ultimately always shift towards becoming a contest of who is the most presidential.”Some have their doubts. “The fight camp is about dividing folks, like Obama has done,” said Scott Reed,who managed Bob Dole’s 1996 presidential campaign and now directs political operations for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. “Statesmen are more about growth--growing the party and being upbeat and optimistic about the future.”

Ultimately, says Republican pollster David Winston, this race will move to a candidate in “the economic policy camp. This election is likely to be focused on jobs and the economy.”

That helps explain why Mr. Bush talked studiously of 4% growth, fixing a “convoluted tax code” and immigration as an economic driver, and why Mr. Kasich talked not about a revolution but about a movement “to restore common sense. A movement to do things like provide economic growth.”

The question is whether anyone can bridge the fighter and statesman camps. On Thursday night, at least, the candidate who came closest may have been Mr. Rubio, who talked about “an economy that has been radically transformed” and offered a bit of Dodd-Frank regulation wonkery, while also picking a fight—though with Hillary Clinton rather than fellow Republicans.