Deal With Iran

Two things at the very least are at stake in approving the international agreement with Iran on controls against them developing nuclear arms capability.

First, international agreements designed to protect the global community from nuclear blackmail. The ‘deal’ under discussion is not an agreement between Iran and the USA. It is a global powers agreement. If the US Congress does not approve the agreement, they dash the hopes of future agreements and foreign policy initiatives designed to protect the peace and hope of billions of people long into the future.

Second, Israel is not a direct party to this agreement. Yet they are vetoing it via advertising and public relations dollars spent to influence the congressional vote to approve or reject the agreement. This is a direct violation of our constitution. Israel is a friend of ours and receives huge financial support from the USA. They also benefit from economic, educational and military grants in aid. This special relationship has survived many decades. Yet they feel free to treat us as enemies whenever our actions appear the least bit unsupportive of their interests.

In the first instance, international agreements are crafted to gain the most for the most people by costing the fewest people the least amount of discomfort. This is not easy to do. It takes months if not years to gain trust of the negotiating nations. The details are many. The consequences of success or failure are huge. Only a handful of people are directly involved in the negotiations to maintain focus and enhance success of the process.

If such agreements are subject to endless second guessing and tweaking, nothing much of value gets accomplished. Meanwhile congressional personnel were kept in the loop during negotiations. So too were international persons of interest. This is a global community agreement, not one between only two narrowly defined participants. The deal is not designed to please Israel, or the US, or Russia, or China, or the rest of the Middle East. No; the agreement was made with all of those parties in mind and compromises were made to gain the support of each of the interested parties. The primary goal, however, is world peace, enhanced by keeping nuclear weapons out of the hands of Iran.

That is good for all of us. Israel. Iran. Saudi Arabia. Egypt. The rest of the Middle Eastern nations. All of Europe. Russia, China and the Pacific Rim nations. All of us. Safety and security were the aim. Is that not the result of this deal?

Israel says no. But this is Netanyahu’s stubborn voice again crying foul like the wolf who complained too often. Same of the conservatives in the USA. They complain but never offer a program of their own. Only to deride the sitting President, never to actually work for the good of the country they say they love. I wonder if they truly do? Perhaps it is their hubris they love? Or their party? Or their ideology?

While others are doing the work of the nation and the global community, the republicans, Israeli sympathizers, and conservatives continue their destructive campaign that leads to no good.

If world peace is to have a chance two things have to happen. First, the good guys have to work together to ensure they are all pulling together in the same direction to give peace a chance. Second, the first group has to band together to make sure the bad guys are boxed in so they do the least damage.

Armed with that simple standard, where does the international agreement with Iran stand? I think it is in the first group of good guys working together for the common good. There may be a middle ground position here, but those folks didn’t make the final cut of the agreement. So it is option the first, or option the second that must be decided between. Which will it be?

Time will tell who sits where in the spectrum of choice!

August 11, 2015