Iranian Idiocy

Iran’s ‘supreme leader’, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Tuesday that the West had failed to bring Iran “to its knees” over its nuclear program, according to a New York Times report. He made the remark the day after a deadline for concluding an agreement was extended for seven months. He went on to state that “In the nuclear issue, America and colonial European countries got together and did their best to bring the Islamic Republic to its knees, but they could not do so- and they will not be able to do so.”

Six ‘major powers’- Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States- have been negotiating with Iran over the nuclear ‘issue’ for a year. All the ‘major powers’ insisted until days ago that the deadline for an agreement was hard and fast. But on Monday, with no basis for agreement in sight, they agreed to extend the deadline to June 30, 2015. Well, this sure makes us look tough. What integrity! No give here. Take our word, when we say something we mean it! Or not.

Britain, though a great friend, isn’t what she used to be. France…is France and only recently decided to hang on to  two new warships she was going to sell to Russia. And only then because of pressure from her allies. It would have been the biggest arms sale ever by a NATO country to the Kremlin. Germany is still in pacifist mode and the Chinese and Russian governments are simply thugs on the world stage.

                The United States, unfortunately, has in recent years  elected  and re-elected a leader who promised to fundamentally change the greatest nation on earth. In a pathetic, not heroic sense, he is the anti-Putin. Putin is determined to return his country to prominence by any (aggressive) means he thinks ‘necessary’. If he feels the need to annex a country or a part thereof, so be it. He will do anything to bring forth “the Soviet Union 2.0.” Bring on the next “Evil Empire.” He wants to take a nation with a brutal, totalitarian history and through bluffing and strength make it stronger.

Obama wants to take the nation that has demonstrably done the most good for its citizens-and the world as a whole- and through weakness marginalize it and make it weaker.

Back to Iran. In the Iranian ‘Parliament’, ‘lawmakers’ erupted in their ‘usual’ chants of  “Death to America.” The deputy speaker of the Iranian parliament said “Today, we can speak to the U.S. and its allies with the tone of power. A lesson can be taken from the recent nuclear talks that, for various reasons, the U.S. is not reliable.”

Certainly lessons can be taken from these talks. The U.S., when not steadfast in its commitments, is not reliable…to its allies or its foes. And that is dangerous, very dangerous indeed. See Vietnam circa 1975.

Can anyone imagine the U.S. Senate and House chanting “Death to Iran” or “Death to Russia or China?” because negotiations didn’t go the way we wished?

The real ‘lesson’ here is that we need to stand up and stand tall…and stand resolutely for our values. Our ‘diplomats’ should act less like diplomats and ignore communist/ statist Chinese and Russian wishes and tell the Iranian leaders to “go lay by their dish.”

Then, and only then, will an ‘agreement’ be reached.