wrongologist – Page 216 – The Wrongologist

Transformative Ideas – Part III, Make America A Humanitarian Force in the Middle East

What is our grand strategy in the Middle East? Do we have a strategy at all?

We are now escalating our military role in Yemen. The USS Roosevelt battle group is deploying from the Persian Gulf to the northern Arabian Sea to….do what?

Both the US and Iranian navies have now sent ships to the waters around Yemen, where a Saudi-led coalition has been bombing rebel targets since March. The press says the Iranians are bringing weapons to the Houthi rebels in Yemen; the Iranians say they are not. This sets up a scenario that can lead to miscalculation, like we saw in 1988, when US officials said they were trying to keep shipping lanes open, and a fight between Iran and the US wiped out half of the Iranian Navy.

Traditionally, we say that our Navy ensures freedom of the sea. So, are we again ensuring the freedom of the sea in the Bab al-Mandab Strait? Who threatens freedom of passage there?

Since 1980, US forces have invaded, occupied or bombed 14 countries in the Islamic world, and American soldiers have killed, or been killed, in them. Here’s the list:

Iran (1980, 1987-1988), Libya (1981, 1986, 1989, 2011), Lebanon (1983), Kuwait (1991), Iraq (1991-2011, 2014), Somalia (1992-1993, 2007-present), Bosnia (1995), Kosovo (1999), Saudi Arabia (1991, 1996), Afghanistan (1998, 2001-present), Sudan (1998), Yemen (2000, 2002-present), Pakistan (2004-present) and Syria (2014-present).

What is the outcome of our intervention in the Middle East? We should look at what we have accomplished in the Middle East, and what our sustained war footing has cost us.

Are Middle East nations more favorable to us? Are we more secure at home?

What of the millions of internally displaced persons and refugees in the Middle East? Estimates are that 3.1 million refugees are living outside their countries, while 13.1 million are displaced within Iraq and Syria alone.

A Brookings report, Arab Youth: Missing educational foundations for a productive life concluded that the percentages of primary school students who did not meet basic learning levels (average of numeracy and literacy) in 2011 was:

Around 90% in Yemen, 77% in Morocco, 69% in Kuwait and 63% in Tunisia. The best performers, with 30-40% of non-learning students, were Bahrain, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia, though in wealthy Qatar…over 53% of children at the secondary level were not learning.

It can’t have gotten better since 2011. These are flashing red lights. These tens of millions of uneducated young Arabs will prove to be homemade weapons of mass destruction, some directed at us. These young men and women cannot look forward to employment or meaningful roles in their societies. They are the feedstock for armed groups, criminal cults, and extremist militias, as we see in Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Sudan, and Libya.

Here is the transformational idea: It is time we move away from US military intervention in the Middle East. Since it has failed us as a primary means of US policy, let’s change direction.

Let America keep a forward military position in the region, but we should stop bombing, shooting and droning. The National Priorities Project estimates that we have spent $1.6 Trillion on ME wars since 2001.

Instead, let’s use a big slice of that money to become the primary supplier of humanitarian and educational aid to the refugees and displaced people in the Middle East. We should position ourselves as a positive force for change among many millions of Muslims, and not be just another country in a long line of crusading infidels.

We can’t use military might to bring stability wherever it’s needed. We can’t remake parts of the world in our image, and the world doesn’t want us to even try to do so.

America has many fine attributes, but there is a naïve and possibly ignorant side of the American psyche that gets us into trouble. It is the myth of American exceptionalism. It bleeds into our politics, our popular culture, and much of our military. It makes us very hard to like in the ME.

Mr. Obama decided that we should try something different in Cuba, when 50 years of doing the same thing didn’t produce results.

Well, we have been doing the same thing in the Middle East for at least 60 years. In 1953, Iran’s military, financed by the CIA, overthrew Prime Minister Mossadeq. The Shah took power and, as thanks for the American help, signed over 40% percent of Iran’s oil fields to US companies. You know the rest of the Iran/US story.

Let’s try something different in the Middle East.

(This is the third in an occasional series about transformative ideas. You can read the first about capitalism here and the second about restoring the military draft, here)

Monday Wake Up Call – April 20, 2015

Rep. Dave Brat (R-VA), is the guy that beat Eric Cantor in a Republican primary and then won Cantor’s seat in Congress in what was a huge 2014 electoral shocker, since Cantor was House Majority Leader at the time, and outspent Brat 40-1. Well, TPM reports that Mr. Brat said on a radio show that Obamacare was moving America away from a free market system and making the country more like North Korea. He went on to contrast North and South Korea:

Look at every country in the world…Look at North Korea and South Korea. It’s the same culture, it’s the same people, look at a map at night…one of the countries is not lit, there’s no lights, and the bottom free-market country, all Koreans, is lit up. See you make your bet on which country you want to be, right? You want to go free market.

Sadly for Mr. Brat, South Korea has a compulsory national health care system.

Brat makes Cantor seem like Einstein. It’s important to know that Mr. Brat was a professor of economics at Randolph–Macon College where he taught business ethics, among other courses. Earlier, he said that Obamacare would cost the country $2 Trillion, a statement that PolitiFact says is false.

There’s really nothing to do but laugh in Mr. Brat’s face. Today, a middle-school level of seriousness is all that the Republican Party is up for, with their racism, misogyny, xenophobia, homophobia, religious hypocrisy, moralism, and warmongering. By far their most dangerous characteristic is their juvenile and uninformed thinking. The sabotage of political discourse seems to be the only thing that matters to them.

So, in light of the Brat, rather than start your day with a head-banging tune designed to wake him up, Wrongo wants to try bringing you into the week in a kinder, gentler way. So for the next few weeks at least, we will start with: Your Monday moment of Zen.

Today we feature a Hermit Thrush, the state bird of Vermont. Walt Whitman made the hermit thrush a symbol of the American voice in his elegy for Abraham Lincoln, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”. Here is a singing Hermit Thrush:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9vHS6JdHog

For those who read the Wrongologist in email, you can watch and hear the Hermit Thrush here.

Monday’s Hot Links:

National Guard troops referred to Ferguson protesters as ‘enemy forces’, emails show. Documents detailing the military mission divided the crowds that the National Guard would be likely to encounter into “friendly forces” and “enemy forces” – the latter apparently including the protesters.

Cirque du Soleil is in advanced talks with two private equity groups to sell a majority stake. Cirque du Soleil has been working with Goldman Sachs since last year to find a strategic partner. The valuation looks to be between $1.5 and $2.0 billion. Guess who is about to jump the shark?

These gorgeous maps of the moon were put together at the request of NASA using data captured by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Wide Angle Camera (WAC) and the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO). All named features larger than 53 miles (85 km) in diameter or length were included.

Iowa chiropractor loses license after sexual contact while performing exorcisms on several patients. “My back hurts,” so, he prescribes treatment in the form of an exorcism, which followed some sexy time.

Investors want to build a multi-tier mall at the Grand Canyon. They want to construct a retail complex based around a tram that planners are calling the Escalade, which will stretch from the rim down to the floor, providing easy access to both a fragile ecosystem and sacred place to Native Americans.

Roommates stab each other in iPhone versus Android debate. Two roommates in Tulsa, Oklahoma took the usual geek argument to the next level, stabbing each other with broken beer bottles. When the police arrived, they found the roommates had been drinking and arguing about smartphones.

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – April 19, 2015

Sunday’s reason to fear for humanity:

Médecins Sans Frontières, (MSF, or Doctors Without Borders) just announced that it will launch search and rescue operations for undocumented migrants trying to reach Europe by boat from North Africa. Last year more than 3,400 people died at sea. This year, the death toll is predicted to be even higher, since more are trying to make it, and the European Union has cut funding for at-sea assistance by 80%.

The BBC reports the prevailing view in Europe is that helping save boat people will just encourage more to take the risk of a Mediterranean crossing. In fact, the EU has funded a border control operation, called Triton, with fences in some countries, and which only operates vessels close to Europe’s coast at sea. From Arjan Hehenkamp, MSF’s general director:

Europe has turned its back on people fleeing some of the worst humanitarian crises of our time…The decision to close doors and build fences means that men, women and children are forced to risk their lives and take a desperate journey across the sea.

So, Europe is saying, “Stay away, and should you try, be prepared to die”.

Some of the boat people are not prizes either: According to CNN, a boat with 105 people trying to get from Libya to Italy reported that Muslim passengers threw 12 passengers overboard because they were Christians. All 12 died. The remaining passengers said they avoided the same fate by forming a human chain and putting up a fierce fight.

Is this cavalier treatment of human life becoming the new normal? There has always been violence between clans and religions since prehistory. But when a refugee is on his/her way to (supposedly) a shot at a better life, why would a reflexive thought be; “kill the infidels”?

And why would the 28 member states of the European Union so willing to let “other” people die? Wotta world.

On to cartoons. It was a busy week for JEB!, Hillary and Rubio. And a gyrocopter dropped an info bomb about Citizens United on the Capitol:

The Park Police seized the mail the pilot was carrying, and why not? The letters were useless to Congress-critters — there was no money stuffed in the envelopes.

JEB! tries to explain checking the “Hispanic” box on his voter registration form:

Sen. Rubio explains his reasons for running:

But it looks like Hillary vs. Jeb, so everything old is new again:

Fortune Magazine says 42% of American workers make less than $15/hour. That means minimum wage workers will miss the boat:

Friday Music Break – April 17, 2015

A new Bloomberg poll indicates that Republicans think that “patriotism” doesn’t mean we should support America’s interests first when it comes to Israel. From Bloomberg:

Republicans by a ratio of more than 2-to-1 say the US should support Israel even when its stances diverge with American interests…Democrats, by roughly the same ratio, say the opposite is true and that the US must pursue its own interests over Israel’s.

Let’s focus on that again. The poll asks: Given the choice of agreeing with the view that “Israel is an ally, but we should pursue America’s interests when we disagree with them [Israel]” or, alternatively, “Israel is an important ally, the only democracy in the region, and we should support it even if our interests diverge”, Republicans said that Israel comes first by a 67/30 margin.

OK, this shows that we now have evidence that “patriotism” now means something different to Republicans. As Ed Kilgore says:

You can have all sorts of disagreements over what constitutes your country’s interests, of course. But flatly asserting they should be subordinated to another country’s interests is hard to accept from people who have a bad habit of thinking of themselves as the only real Americans.

Maybe Bloomberg’s use of the word “support” in the question created some ambiguity, but that can’t account for the result that 2/3 of Repubs think we should support Israel’s interests over our own.

So if Republicans say we should put the interests of a democratic state located 10,000 miles away, one that is edging up to apartheid as national policy, ahead of the interests of our country, well, that’s that. It’s the new patriotism.

For Republicans, our interests simply can’t diverge from Israel’s. To them, that’s an ontological impossibility, like God making a rock he can’t lift, or Jesus helping the poor.

Aren’t Republicans our flag-waving hyper-patriots? Those who say “love it or leave it”?

Israel is a major ally. One that most Americans support, but since when do patriotic Americans believe that our government should put the interests of a foreign country above the interests of our own?

That used to be called treason.

Unless there is something wrong with the Bloomberg poll, what Republicans believe means we are facing huge trouble domestically. We may be seeing a three thousand mile wide Yugoslavia in the making.

On to music. In recognition of the Israel First Republicans, here is a plea for them to come back, and believe in America again. Let’s watch Journey’s, “Don’t Stop Believing”, from a 2006 live concert in Houston:

For those who read the Wrongologist in email, you can view the video on YouTube here.

Hard to believe that The Sopranos ended 8 years ago.

See you on Sunday.

Tax Day and the Estate Tax

Today is tax day, and most good American doobies will have filed their taxes by midnight tonight. It takes the temperament of an accountant who’s passed the relevant CPA exam parts to self-prepare your taxes, and Wrongo has that temperament for less than 2 hours a day, so doing the Wrong family taxes never gets easier.

You might like “Tax Rap” by Go Remy. It was a submission to a Turbo Tax contest. While it didn’t win, it is very funny:

For those who read The Wrongologist in email, you can find the song on YouTube here.

On Tax Day, we have to talk about the Estate Tax, or as the Republicans call it, the “Death Tax”. Why? Because House Republicans are going to repeal the Estate Tax this week. In their ham-handed way, they will link the two events to show Americans that Republicans are lowering taxes for the people.

But as Bloomberg points out, the Estate Tax is now paid by only 0.2% of US estates. That translates into about 5,500 households a year. The Hill reports that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that repeal of the Estate Tax would add $269 billion to the federal deficit from here to 2025.

The Republican logic for repeal is that the tax unfairly steals the family jewels from ordinary hard-working Americans, but the current estate tax doesn’t kick in unless an individual has assets totaling more than $5.43 million. For married couples, the threshold for avoiding the tax is $10.86 million.

Not chump change.

Under the Republican plan, estates would pay no taxes. Furthermore, families would be able to pass assets across generations and avoid paying capital gains taxes on both real gains and so-called phantom income attributed to inflation, a loophole called “stepped up basis” in the tax code. Subsequent heirs could continue this strategy so that the gain is effectively never taxed.

Here are a few quotes from Republican supporters of Estate Tax repeal:

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.):

This tax doesn’t just hit the big guy, it hits the little guy — like the small business and the family farm.

Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX) made the “double taxation” argument:

The death tax is the wrong tax at the wrong time, and it hurts the wrong people…They are double and triple taxed.

Sen. John Thune (R-SD):

The death tax imposes a tax rate as high as 40 % on family farms, ranches and small businesses, which hurts economic growth by discouraging savings and development.

But, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimates that only 120 farms and small business, where at least half the assets are in farm or business assets, had to pay the estate tax in 2013. And double-taxation shouldn’t be so hard for Republicans to understand. No one claims that when a worker gets paid a wage, and pays a tax on that income, and who later spends some of that after-tax income paying someone to mow their lawn, that it is double-taxation for the lawn guy to pay income tax. This is really simple: Money moves from entity, to entity, to entity, and each time, tax applies.

So, the facts don’t support the case against the estate tax, but this does not matter to Republicans.

It has become an ideological issue, even if the data show that that relatively few small farms or businesses appear to be affected. Even if it’s only a handful, that’s apparently too many for Republicans.

The truth is that repealing the Estate Tax would mainly benefit the very wealthiest Americans. In 2016, the wealthiest 1,300 or so estates (those worth $20 million or more) would receive 73% of the benefit, with each receiving a tax windfall averaging roughly $10 million, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation’s analysis of the repeal proposal approved by the Ways and Means Committee.

This is a special kind of welfare. It is welfare for the rich. This will give multimillionaires, who are the only people we are talking about, an additional 40% of wealth transfer upon the death of a parent. This undresses Republicans as planning to create a permanent aristocracy based on inherited wealth.

And Republicans say they will address income inequality if only America votes for them in 2016?

The GOP proves again that they are not what they claim. They claim to be for balancing the budget and decreasing the deficit, but leap at the chance to lavish more $ billions on the rich, while increasing the deficit.

The facts mean nothing to President Nordquist, or to our right-wing friends when discussing taxes.

Happy Tax Day!

Monday Wake Up Call – April 13, 2015

Today’s Wake Up is for the House Judiciary Committee, who last month cleared a bill to the House floor that if passed, would grant asylum to families who want to home school their children, while it would restrict current levels of asylum-granting to children fleeing violence in Central America. The committee vote was 21-12.

Think Progress reports that this provision of the bill grants asylum for up to 500 individuals fleeing home school persecution in countries where home schooling is illegal (Germany is one). The bill refers to people who home school as a “particular social group” and indicates that a person is eligible for asylum if he/she is:

Deemed to have been persecuted for failure or refusal to comply with any law or regulation that prevents the exercise of the individual right of that person to direct the upbringing and education of a child of that person.

This provision seems to put homeschoolers ahead of others seeking asylum who experience much more dire circumstances. The bill also includes provisions to limit asylum claims generally, prohibiting:

• Unaccompanied alien children, like the ones who crossed the southern US border last year, from applying for asylum if “such child may be removed to a safe third country”
• Increasing the number of full-time immigration judges and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) lawyers

In addition it raises the information standard for those children who try to prove that they would be threatened if they were deported back to their home country.

So, the Republican Party is saying that home-schooling is a priority for asylum, ahead of murder, rape, or child abuse. They say that the denial of the right to home-school is persecution, while most lawyers would say it is religious discrimination, a bad thing, but not a reason to let homeschoolers into the US.

Today, applicants must prove that they would face persecution, torture, or even death if they were returned to their native countries. Out of 3,996 asylum requests from Mexico, only 38 were granted.

So sure, homeschoolers, just cut to the head of the line.

This is the state of the Republican Party: Escaping from drug cartels makes you a moocher. Escaping from the tyranny of public education makes you noble.

Or, as Thoroughly Republican Jesus might say: “That which you did for the Home Schooled, you did for me.” Forced to learn about evolution? You’ve got asylum. Forced into prostitution or drug-muling? You better be able to prove it, kiddo.

So, wake up Republicans! To help with that, and in honor of yesterday’s Masters golf tournament, listen to The Texas Tornados doing “A Little Bit is Better Than Nada” from the movie, “Tin Cup“:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7p8H_ESwrWg

For those of you who read the Wrongologist in email, the song is here.

Monday’s Hot Links:

The avocado is ‘transgender’ and has overnight sex changes, a botanist has discovered. Soon, the “avocado-phobic” brigade will be all over this! Apparently, eating avocados does not make you bi-sexual.

The Onion has a list of The Pros and Cons of body-cams for police. The #1 pro? Provides accurate record of where the cop was when he turned off the body-cam.

Muck Rock reports that Homeland Security can download your PC’s hard drive when you enter the US. Based upon the opinion of any US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) officer, your device can be searched and its contents read. With approval of a supervisor, the device can be seized, its contents copied in full, or both. This is despite the Fourth Amendment of the Bill of Rights. Because, terrorism.

Huge oil find near London’s Gatwick airport hypes stock of tiny company. The BBC says it could be as much as 100 billion barrels. The North Sea field has produced 40+ billion barrels over the past 40 years.

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – April 11, 2015

Big week. Another black man killed, Hillary announces to no one’s surprise, the anti-Iran deal resistance cranks it up a notch and a Cuban handshake for Mr. Obama.

Let’s start with the cop-involved killing in North Charleston SC. Two memes that appear every time a cop kills an unarmed black man are “one bad apple” and “the victim probably deserved it”. Let’s unpack this: The knee jerk response in some quarters is that since there are so many good cops, and so few bad ones, that the cops who kill merit the benefit of the doubt, particularly when the shooters say they were in fear for their lives. No need to look at a systemic problem in policing.

The second is the steady drip of “facts” that amount to character assassination of the already-dead victim. They had a record, they were late with family support payments, they resisted, or they made a sudden move. Or, a cascade of other facts that indicate the victims were no saints.

But, none of these things merit vigilante justice.

It’ll always be “one bad apple” but that bad apple will most often be a white cop killing a black man. It’ll always be “maybe the victim deserved it”, and it will most often be a black victim who deserved it.

Here is the value of video:

“Comply or die” is the state of the art in policing:

Republicans want Iran deal to go away. Obama too:

Chicken Hawks count noses on Iran:

Iran hears a familiar song and dance:

SS Hillary launches:

In 2008, Barack Obama wrapped up the delegates he needed to be the Democratic nominee at a shockingly early point in the campaign. Even a very strong finish by Hillary Clinton did nothing to improve her chances. She was finished before she knew what hit her.

She learned a huge lesson. This time, getting the nomination seems more inevitable, but she’s out of the gate early.

Given the lack of bench strength in the Democratic Party, it’s no wonder that the New Republic worries that she is a single point of failure for Dems.

What could go wrong?

Friday Music Break – April 10, 2015

Friday’s Music break is late, but worth your time. When Walter Scott was first pulled over in North Charleston SC, much of the initial traffic stop was caught on the dash-cam of Police Officer Michael T. Slager. These dash-cams capture video and audio from inside the police car in addition to what transpires in the traffic stop.

The dash-cam video was released by the South Carolina authorities on Thursday, showing Walter Scott getting out of his car and running away after a traffic stop moments before he was killed by Officer Slager. As Slager drives up behind the green Mercedes-Benz driven by Scott, there’s a song playing in the background inside the police car. That song is “What It’s Like,” by Everlast:

Sample Lyrics:
We’ve all seen a man at the liquor store beggin’ for your change
The hair on his face is dirty, dread-locked, and full of mange
He asks a man for what he could spare, with shame in his eyes
“Get a job, you f*** slob, ” is all he replies
God forbid, you ever had to walk a mile in his shoes
‘Cause then you really might know what it’s like to sing the blues

It is the last song Walter Scott heard before being gunned down by a killer cop. For those of you who read the Wrongologist in email, you can see song on YouTube here.

Does this song playing in the background of the cop car tell us anything about patrolman Slager? Probably not. It was a #1 song in 1998 from an album that went double-platinum.

But the song’s message, of “Don’t Prejudge” means that it should be the anthem of an America that wants an end to police violence. We are a country where you are 55 times more likely to be killed by a police officer than a terrorist.

One reason is that many law enforcement officers consider failure to comply with the officers’ demands as an excuse for using lethal force. Police have become so militarized in modern America that we are gradually losing the rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution.

Cops need to make quick judgements. Everyone accepts that.

But, “What it’s Like” should become a part of their training.

Sen. Cotton Must Bone Up on Strategy

“Empires are lost when inadequate men become leaders and wage war for base reasons or no reason at all.” – Sun Tzu

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) Cotton accused President Obama of a “false choice” between his framework deal on Iran’s nuclear program and war. He then downplayed what would happen if we just bombed Iran: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)

It would be something more along the lines of what President Clinton did in December 1998 during Operation Desert Fox. Several days of air and naval bombing against Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction facilities for exactly the same kind of behavior. For interfering with weapons inspectors and for disobeying Security Council resolutions. All we’re asking is that the president simply be as tough in the protection of America’s national security interest as Bill Clinton was.

Who cares what the generals, intelligence analysts and foreign policy experts think after war gaming various scenarios for a war with Iran? Hint: it’s not a pretty outcome.

But, for Sen. Cotton, the only opinion that really matters is Sen. Cotton’s, America’s new military strategist. Sen. Cotton was elected in part because of his prior military service, having served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He left the military in 2013. Sadly, not everyone who was in combat while serving is a strategic thinker. Given his military experience, he should know that geopolitics is not a Hollywood movie.

This guy has a romantic vision of how a “quick war” would proceed. He says it would be a few days of air and naval bombing against Iran’s nuclear facilities. He apparently thinks that Iran would not move against American shipping in the Gulf, against Israel, or even attempt to take out our military in the ME. And our allies? Who would support us, except Israel and Saudi Arabia? And once the party is over, and Iran dusts off and picks up the pieces, they would surely build nuclear weapons. Wouldn’t we then have to bomb them again?

Wouldn’t that make the US a pariah state?

This reminds us that Republicans, in their eagerness for war, often diminish the costs to America of pursuing the military option. Yep, only a four day war, and then we declare victory! Or, longer, and messier, and then what? Consider this:

• “We will be greeted as liberators”
• “Oil revenues will pay for it”
• “There is no insurgency”
• “The insurgency is in its last throes”

It was 12 years ago that pundits and politicians were touting how fast and cheaply we could turn Iraq into a model democracy. Well, the results are in, but they apparently haven’t registered for Sen. Cotton, who needs to come up with some new and better neo-con talking points.

The neo-cons, the hawks and their spokespersons, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, have rarely met an international issue that doesn’t require more American military muscle, and this includes Iran. Perhaps Sen. Cotton is auditioning to replace the decaying Sen. McCain or Sen. Graham in the permanent warmongering Senator chair on the Sunday talkies? He is much younger (38) and could conceivably remain on the national political stage for the next 40 years. Would Sunday Show status give him the credibility to run for POTUS like McCain did, and Graham is attempting to do now?

A strategy tip for Sen. Cotton: “Negotiating from a position of strength” doesn’t mean, “We should negotiate only after we have our boots on their necks”, so if they refuse to accept our terms, we crush them, claiming that they wouldn’t negotiate. He thinks that anything that prevents us from exercising the “boot on the neck” option means we’re in a position of weakness. That’s awful on a lot of levels.

How can a smart guy, a Harvard grad, a lawyer, someone with significant military service, get it so wrong when it comes to geopolitics and military strategy? He should know the difference between Iraq and Iran. In Iraq, we had already decimated their military, destroyed their air defense system and made their airspace into a no-fly zone before our 2003 attack. Iran, which despite crippling economic sanctions, still has its air defense systems, its anti-ship missiles, (which, some war games showed can cripple our fleet in the Persian Gulf) and its military is intact.

Iraq was fractured by sectarian division. It has about 31 million people and is 60% the size of Texas.

Iran is not Arab, it is Muslim, and unified. It has 80 million people and is twice the size of Texas.

Sen. Cotton needs to bone up on military strategy and the Middle East.

It’s Over Between Us, Israel

“Le mieux est l’ennemi du bien” – (The best is the enemy of the good) – Voltaire

Now that a Manhattan Supreme Court Justice is allowing a woman to serve her husband with divorce papers via Facebook, The Wrongologist wants to break up with Israel via his blog.

Wednesday’s NYT had an editorial about Israel’s newest demands regarding the proposed Iran negotiations by the P5+1 nations: (brackets by the Wrongologist)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has gone into overdrive against a nuclear agreement with Iran. On Monday, his government made new demands that it claimed would ensure a better deal than the preliminary one…announced last week. [Israel’s] new demands…would not mean a better deal, but no deal at all.

Israel must accept that their objectives are qualitatively different than those of the UK, France, Germany, China, Russia and the US (P5+1) regarding Iran’s nuclear program. Based on Mr. Netanyahu’s rants, and the incessant punditry in the media and commentary (mostly by) Republican members of Congress, it seems that the US has just one ally, Israel, and that our goals in the ME are perfectly aligned. They are not.

The Iranian framework agreement has the potential to become a historic game-changer. As Robert Parry said: (Emphasis by the Wrongologist)

The April 2 framework agreement with Iran represents more than just a diplomatic deal to prevent nuclear proliferation in the Middle East. It marks a crossroad that offers a possible path for the American Republic to regain its footing and turn away from endless war.

Move away from endless war. Who would be against that? We are still a Satan to Iran, but maybe no longer the Great Satan, now, just a pretty bad Satan. When we think about Iran, we should think about how we have played both sides against the middle with Iran for decades:

• Iran holds our people hostage in 1979
• We enter Iran/Iraq war on Saddam’s side in 1982
• We sell Iran HAWK missiles in 1986 as part of the Iran-Contra debacle
• In 1988, we accidentally shoot down an Iranian civilian airliner, killing about 300. The US paid compensation, but never apologized or acknowledged wrongdoing
• Iran helps us hunt down Al-Qaeda personnel fleeing Afghanistan in 2002, after we sent the CIA in to flush them out
• We first sanctioned Iran in 1979, with the UN joining in, in 2006

Can this kind of inconsistent relationship lead to warm feelings? Maybe not, but should we sacrifice a possible game-changing initiative for Israel’s sake? More Americans are saying “no”. A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed that:

• 31% of US Republicans favor the nuclear deal with Iran
• 30% of Republicans oppose the pact, while 40% are not sure
• 50% of Democrats supported it, while 39% were not sure
• Among independents – 33% voiced support, 21% were opposed, and 45% are unsure

And Israel itself is losing American political support. From David Atkins:

The number of Americans who view Israel as an ally of the US has sharply decreased, according to a new poll…Only 54% of Americans polled said that Israel is their country’s ally, a decline from 68% in 2014 and 74% in 2012. Rasmussen Reports, who conducted the poll, said Israel had “tumbled down the list.” By contrast, 86% and 84% see Canada and Britain respectfully as the US’s allies.

When broken down along party political lines, 76% of Republicans view Israel an ally of the US compared to only 45% of Democrats and 47% of Independents.

Given how politically divided the US has become, it’s not surprising that an Israel that aligns itself in a strongly partisan way with one US political party, while it finds itself losing support from citizens of the country it relies on most for aid and defense.

So, we have different objectives. Moreover, our relationship has largely one-sided. We defend and support Israel, but what do they provide in return? Well, they buy our weapons with our aid money. In fact, the special relationship has hurt us geopolitically. If Bibi’s administration thinks it’s a good idea to play partisan politics in the US, then the appropriate response of the US administration should be: “Good luck with your ME follies”.

And why the Israeli hysteria? Israel has several hundred nuclear weapons (assessments are 80-400). If Iran builds nuclear weapons, and then attempts to obliterate Israel, Israeli nuclear submarines will obliterate much of Iran. If the Iran nuclear deal fails, nuclear Israel and nuclear Iran will have to live in a Balance of Nuclear Terror, as does America, and many other countries. It’s not pleasant, but the rest of the nuclear club has been able to live with the existential menace.

If the US leaves the marriage with Israel and goes back to being simply their ally, Israel’s security will not be affected, since the US continues to make clear that we will defend them. But, we would finally be free to give clear voice to our own policies. For too long it has been the Israeli tail wagging the US dog when it comes to Middle East policy.

An Iran deal potentially opens the door to an eventual US withdrawal from its hugely expensive, and failed history in the Middle East. A completed deal would pave the way to shrink our war machine, one that has spilled much American blood and treasure in a region of the world where we have little business meddling.

So, Israel, the Wrongologist is changing his status with you to “its complicated”.

The Wrongologist

Geopolitics, Power and Political Economy

Author: wrongologist