What is the “spirit” of the weirdly unsigned Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran? The JCPOA obligates the parties to protect Iran’s nuclear program, arranges for its financing, and sets it on a path to fruition at a time of Iran’s choosing. Given that the Islamic Republic of Iran is an avowed enemy of the United States, I think the deal reeks of malice and delusion. Yet President Obama hold[s] it out as the harbinger of a rosy future.
Thus Obama expresses disappointment in the mullahs’ actions of late. He finds the actions inconsistent with the spirit of the deal, as in his press conference this past Friday:
Iran so far has followed the letter of the agreement, but the spirit of the agreement involves Iran also sending signals to the world community and business that it is not going to be engaging in a range of provocative actions that might scare business off. When they launch ballistic missiles, with slogans calling for the destruction of Israel, that makes businesses nervous. There is some geopolitical risk that is heightened when they see that taking place. If Iran continues to ship missiles to Hezbollah, that gets businesses nervous. And so part of what I hope happens is we have a responsibility to provide clarity about the rules that govern so that Iran can, in fact benefit, the Iranian people can benefit from an improved economic situation.” Obama professes to find this inconsistent with “the spirit of the agreement.
Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew has also invoked the “spirit” of the agreement. Lew seeks to facilitate the mullahs’ desire to access the international financial system despite sanctions to the contrary. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei last month accused his friends in Washington of “using roundabout paths to prevent the Islamic Republic from achieving its targets,” adding that “banking transactions come up against problems.” The Wall Street Journal explains in a related editorial: “The White House got the message. On Wednesday Mr. Lew gave a speech in Washington insisting that ‘since Iran has kept its end of the [nuclear] deal, it is our responsibility to uphold ours, in both letter and spirit.’” As always, the “spirit” is willing in the Obama administration even if the mullahs aren’t reciprocating.
The Reuters article on the recently unsealed indictments of seven Iranians for hack attacks on United States financial institutions and infrastructure buries this gem: “U.S. officials largely completed the investigation more than a year ago, according to two sources familiar with the matter, but held off releasing the indictment so as to not jeopardize the landmark 2015 nuclear deal with Iran or a January prisoner swap.” Now that’s the spirit.
Iran has stepped up its belligerency in the Middle East since signing the nuclear agreement, increasing its involvement in conflicts from Syria and Iraq to Yemen and flaunting its forbidden ballistic missile program.
The United States, for its part, has reacted fecklessly, fudging its redlines regarding the Islamic Republic and making empty threats.
Last week, U.S. President Barack Obama commented that Iran was obeying the “letter” of the nuclear agreement with the West, but not the “spirit” of it.
The president’s remark came after the second testing of ballistic missiles (designed to carry nuclear warheads) by the Islamic Republic. While Congress was originally told a moratorium on the Iranian ballistic missile program was part of the agreement, the administration decided it really wasn’t – and that the test constituted “merely” a violation of U.N. resolutions.
No matter that in the latest test, conducted while Joe Biden was visiting Tel Aviv, the missiles had Hebrew writing on them saying “Israel should be wiped out.”
The harshest criticism Obama could muster against the test was that such provocations would be bad for international trade as they would make countries “nervous” to do business with Iran.
Similarly, Congress was told the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) would be conducting inspections of all Iranian nuclear facilities and would have full, independent access. We then heard that two key passages of the Iran deal were kept secret – not only from Congress, but from the president himself.
The secret deal involved the Parchin military installation, which was under suspicion for years for conducting research on nuclear weapons and long-range ballistic missiles. The second centered on negotiations between the IAEA and Iran to resolve the issue of possible military dimensions (PMD) of Iran’s nuclear program.
Again, there was no reaction from the U.S. administration. Now, that inaction is (finally) prompting outrage in Congress. As Jennifer Rubin writes in The Washington Post, “Congressional leaders from both parties are firing back over what they see is evidence that Congress was blatantly misled about the terms of the deal and the administration’s willingness to confront Iran’s non-nuclear behavior.”
As Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.) said, “When multiple officials—including Secretary Kerry, Secretary Lew, and Ambassador Mull—testify in front of Members of Congress, we are inclined to believe them. However, the gap between their promises on the Iran nuclear deal and today’s scary reality continues to widen. We are now trying to determine whether this was intentional deception on the part of the administration or new levels of disturbing acquiescence to the Iranians.”
In the last weeks, it was reported that:
Iran warned the United States that it would be crossing a “redline” if it tried to stop Iran’s ballistic missile program. In the words of Iranian Deputy Chief of Staff Brig.-Gen. Maassoud Jazzayeri, “The White House should know that defense capacities and missile power, especially at the present juncture where plots and threats are galore, is among the Iranian nation’s red lines and a backup for the country’s national security and we don’t allow anyone to violate it.”
Iran is beefing up its military presence in Syria by sending an elite unit of commandos as “advisors” to be stationed near Aleppo. The elite force joins thousands of Iranian troops from its Revolutionary Guards Corps as well as Iranian-backed fighters from the Lebanese terror organization Hezbollah.
In two recent public speeches, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, in a pointed reference to a Tweet made by Expediency Council Chairman Rafsanjani, said that those who say that today is an era of talks, not of missiles, are committing treason. Khamenei rejected President Rouhani’s call to instate an economic and cultural model – which he termed JCPOA 2, 3, and 4 – for the benefit of society, and said that this would constitute an abandonment of the principles of Islam and of the Islamic Revolution. He further criticized the U.S., saying: “the Americans have not upheld their commitments” in the JCPOA.
A missile is seen inside an underground missile base for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force at an undisclosed location in this undated handout photo courtesy of Fars News. REUTERS/farsnews.com/Handout via Reuters
President Barack Obama said Friday April 1, that “Iran has so far followed the letter of the [nuclear] agreement [with the six powers], but, he added, “the spirit of the agreement involves Iran also sending signals to the world community and business that it is not going to be engaging in a range of provocative actions that may scare business off,” such as fire-testing nuclear-capable ballistic missiles, calling for Israel’s destruction and providing Hizballah with missiles.
At a news conference ending the two-day nuclear summit in Washington, Obama went on to say: “Some of the concerns that Iran has expressed, we are going to work with them to address.” But meanwhile, he said, the US and its allies are taking steps to help Iraq benefit from the agreement by facilitating trade and banking transactions with the Islamic Republic; and the US Treasury Department is seeking to set clearer investment guidelines for Iran.
Two days earlier, on Wednesday, March 30, the Obama administration was reported acting to give Iran limited access to US dollars, since the almost complete lifting of sanctions in January, which netted Tehran an injection of approximately $150 billion “hasn’t provided the country with sufficient economic benefits.”
DEBKAfile’s analysts note the inherent contradiction in the US president’s approach to Tehran: He wants Iran to be compensated with a never-ending shower of dollars for agreeing to limit its nuclear program, but “the US and its allies” cannot question how the money is spent.
So while the West, under orders from Washington, must scramble to boost the Iranian economy, Tehran may continue to test ballistic missiles until they are nuclear capable, and top up the Hizballah terrorists’ arsenal with ever deadlier tools of death.
This glaring inconsistency arises from a fact largely hidden from the world public: last year’s landmark nuclear accord was concluded by Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif – not by the real powers in Tehran, supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Revolutionary Guards chiefs and the ayatollahs at the head of the fundamentalist Shiite movement.
Indeed, even Rouhani was never allowed to formally sign the deal, much less gain Khamenei’s ratification.
But now, Rouhani’s fate depends on keeping those ruling elites happy. He has found himself in the position of their hostage, a cash machine for keeping the funds for the Islamic Republic’s projects termed by President Obama “provocative” constantly on tap.
Those projects which are currently in full spate clearly leave every little over from the $150bn to even start lifting the Iranian economy out of its mess, while the Rouhani’s government carries the can for that too. Indeed, DEBKAfile’s Iranians sources disclose, the president is forced to earmark 50 percent of the funds released by sanctions relief for items listed under “defense”, namely, the nuclear and missile development programs, Iran’s overseas military operations, including the Syrian war, subsidizing the Lebanese Hizballah, and establishing new terrorist organizations for attacks on Israel, such as the Al-Sabirin, on the Golan.
These enterprises eat up billions of dollars. Just Iran’s operations in Syria and support for Hizballah cost Tehran $2 billion every month.
Syrian president Bashar Assad didn’t surprise anyone when he revealed that the five-year civil war in his country had cost $200 billion so far. With this kind of spending on “defense,” the Iranian economy will continue to decay, while Rouhani’s government, which promised the people a better life after the nuclear accord, must bow to the will of the hard-liners or face the consequences.
Our Iranian sources report that Obama’s inconsistent approach to Iran has sharpened the discord between the two major political camps in Tehran and put the “reformists” in extreme peril should they dare to defy the hard-liners who hold the levers of power. Khamenei has publicly threatened to liquidate such opposition leaders as Rouhani and his ally, former president Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
President Rouhani has been put by Obama’s policy in the position of having to keep Tehran’s hungry war- and terror-mongers flush with cash, if he is to save himself and fellow “reformists” from “liquidation.”
The supreme leader was pretty blunt when he said on Friday, March 29, “Those who say the future is in negotiations, not in missiles, are either ignorant or traitors.” This comment underlined Iran’s overriding commitment to developing nuclear missiles and a warning to “traitors” of their fate: execution or a life sentence in a grim Iranian jail.
The Obama administration, ever eager to hand out more benefits to the enemies of Israel, the United States, and the rest of Western Civilization, is now planning to help Iran obtain access to U.S. dollars — which will help Iran buy more on the international markets, the Wall Street Journal reports today.
This concession by the U.S. to Iran is apparently being made because Iran has asserted that the unsigned, non-binding deal Iran entered into last year with the United States and other countries does not provide enough benefits to Iran.
At the same time that the Obama administration is trying to figure out how to give Iran access to U.S. dollars, the administration’s own Treasury Department still maintains that the entire Iranian banking system is one big “primary money laundering concern.”
Money laundering is a financial transaction designed to conceal what money is used for or where it came from. President Obama’s Treasury Department, not yet having completely unmoored itself from reality or common sense, sees Iran’s financial system as a money laundering operation because Iran moves money around to support a variety of programs that the rest of the world asserts – usually – are impermissible for Iran to engage in, such as funding terror organizations all around the world like Hezbollah and Hamas, as well as Iranian missile programs that some still believe Iran is barred from operating. To accomplish this, Iran conceals the true sources and uses of the money. That’s the money laundering.
But while the Treasury Department doesn’t want Iran to have access to dollars, the Treasury Department and the State Department want Iran to have access to U.S. dollars. Yes, you read that correctly. After all, says Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, we here in the United States must of course comply with “the letter and the spirit” of the unsigned, non-binding-on-Iran “agreement.”
Surprisingly for the most powerful economy in the world, the big worry here is not only that Iran will be unhappy with the U.S., but also that a continued ban on Iranian access to dollars “will ultimately drive business activity away form the U.S. financial system.” To say that more clearly: While the U.S. might prefer that Iran not engage in all these transactions, it’s going to do so anyway, and if we don’t help, Iran will simply conduct the transactions in another currency. Since we can’t beat ‘em, we might as well join ‘em.
The combination of these two pressures is apparently simply irresistible to the Obama administration, and as a result, in March, Lew told a congressional committee that the administration “will make sure Iran gets relief” from restrictions that limit its access to dollars. The relief will come in the form of changes in Treasury regulations, so no pesky Congressmen, or annoyances like a vote of the U.S. legislature, will be involved.
A few of those irritating Congressmen have complained to the administration about these proposed changes. They’ve written angry letters to President Obama and Secretary Lew. Those letters have had as much impact as your letters to The New York Timesabout its coverage of Israel.
Of course, readers with long memories may recall that back in the summer, when the Iran agreement was not yet an unsigned unbinding – usually – deal, Lew said this about the agreement’s impact on Iran’s access to dollars: after the agreement becomes final (he did not tell us it would be unsigned, of course, or non-binding, at least on Iran) “Iranian banks will not be able to clear U.S. dollars through New York, hold correspondent account relationships with U.S. financial institutions, or enter into financial arrangements with U.S. banks.”
The changes proposed now by the Obama administration and Secretary Lew will render all of those reassuring prohibitions true but irrelevant. That is because Treasury will create administrative work-arounds that enable Iranian banks to achieve the same effects as all of these direct relationships with U.S. financial institutions without Iran actually having any such direct relationships. Isn’t that special?
They’ll just be indirect relationships. No doubt the indirectness of the relationship will be a great comfort to people around the world who are blown up by bombs purchased with U.S. dollars provided by Iran. After all, it’s so much more comforting to be murdered by bombs purchased indirectly.
Omri Ceren writes from The Israel Project with the first of three updates on the Obama administration’s latest assistance extended to our enemies in the Islamic Republic of Iran. This is at least a good place to begin and I thought readers would find it of interest. Omri writes with his usual alphabetized footnotes:
Last week the AP revealed the Obama administration is planning to provide Iran with another wave of sanctions relief, because the Iranians are demanding it [a]. The Iranians started prominently demanding new concessions a few weeks ago, and their calls were then taken up by Iran deal supporters [b][c][d][e]. The planned concessions go way beyond the nuclear-related sanctions lifted by the summer deal, and include giving Iran access to U.S. financial markets and the dollar, something administration officials swore last summer would never ever happen [f][g].
The administration’s collapse will drive the conversation this week. There have already been a range of responses from policy analysts, from Congress, and from the press. I’ll send around highlights this morning.
First up: the policy implications. Mark Dubowitz and Jonathan Schanzer – executive director and vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies – have a new piece in the WSJ unpacking the debate over this new concession. Schanzer linked to it on Twitter this morning and summarized the argument: allowing Iran access to the U.S. dollar would be “a total implosion of US financial policy on Iran” [h].
The broad points from the piece:
The administration ruled out letting Iran dollarize until the Iranians made their new demand – Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew was adamant during a congressional grilling last July. “Iranian banks will not be able to clear U.S. dollars through New York,” he told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, or “hold correspondent account relationships with U.S. financial institutions, or enter into financing arrangements with U.S. banks.”… What explains this possible reversal? Most likely, Iran demanded it. Secretary of State John Kerry and Foggy Bottom, always fearful that Tehran will walk away from the nuclear deal, may be ready to comply.
The administration ruled out letting Iran dollarize for a good reason: it will nuke the U.S. greenback and poison the global financial system – Congress is getting ready for a fight. It’s not hard to understand why. The Financial Action Task Force, a global antiterrorism finance body, maintains a severe warning about Iranian financial practices. Last month it warned that Iran’s “failure to address the risk of terrorist financing” poses a “serious threat… to the integrity of the international financial system.” The Treasury Department also recognizes the danger, in 2011 labeling the Islamic Republic a “jurisdiction of primary money laundering concern.” That finding, which remains in place, cites Iran’s “support for terrorism,” and “illicit and deceptive financial activities.”
And now the technical stuff.
The Obama administration will likely claim that letting Iran trade in dollars helps monitor the deal and gives the U.S. leverage to enforce it. The bottom half of the Dubowitz and Schanzer piece dismantles those arguments. Most broadly, Treasury long ago assessed that the cost of giving Iran access to the U.S. financial system outweighed the intelligence benefits. Regarding monitoring, the Iranians won’t directly use their dollars for nefarious purposes – exactly because they know we’d catch them – but will instead use the newfound credibility that dollar access gives their banks for those purposes. Regarding leverage, the U.S. won’t gain any new leverage because Iran will keep their dollars where the US can’t get them. In fact the administration argument on leverage is backwards: Obama officials told Congress over the summer that access to the dollar was being withheld specifically to provide the U.S. with leverage over non-nuclear activities – ballistic missiles, terrorism, human rights, etc – so “why throw away that leverage in exchange for no new concessions?”
The technical policy issues are devastating but they may get overshadowed by the even more devastating political optics: the administration told Congress that it had made a final set of concessions to Iran and promised that access to the dollar would never be granted, then the Iranians came back and demanded access to the dollar, and now the administration is collapsing.
The Capitol in Washington is illuminated during a thunderstorm with the rotunda of the Russell Senate Office Building reflected on the rain-covered windows, late Wednesday afternoon, Feb. 24, 2016. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Leading foreign policy voices in Congress say they are preparing to fight against an Obama administration effort to provide Iran unprecedented access to U.S. financial resources as part of an expanded package meant to address new demands from the Islamic Republic’s for greater economic concessions, according to several conversations between the Washington Free Beacon and top lawmakers.
The Obama administration is currently exploring new options to grant Iran more sanctions relief than promised under the comprehensive nuclear agreement reached last year, just days after Iran’s Supreme Leader gave a speech accusing the United States of interfering with Iranian banking.
Top foreign policy voices in Congress told the Free Beacon in recent days that they are exploring a range of responses if the Obama administration goes through with reported plans to grant Iran further concessions beyond the purview of the nuclear deal, which dismantled key nuclear-related U.S. sanctions against Iran. At least part of this action could violate current U.S. laws, they said.
The planned concessions could include access to the U.S. dollar and financial markets, which the Obama administration promised would never take place under the deal, according to recent disclosures first reported by the Associated Press.
The Iranian government has recently heightened complaints that it is not being granted enough relief from international economic sanctions as a result of the recently implemented nuclear deal.
The Obama administration’s latest move to placate the Iranians comes on the heels of a Free Beacon report last week disclosing that U.S. officials engaged in secret talks with Iran for years before agreeing in January to pay it nearly $2 billion in taxpayer funds.
The reports have generated harsh responses from lawmakers, who say that the administration’s plans would endanger American economic influence and put the entire international financial system at risk from Iran’s illicit finance and money laundering activities.
“Any administration effort to get foreign financial institutions or foreign-based clearing houses to enable Iran’s terror-sponsoring regime to conduct transactions in U.S. dollars ignores American laws and the Financial Action Task Force,” Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.) told the Free Beacon.
“Such an effort would benefit Iran’s terror financiers while fundamentally undermining the USA PATRIOT ACT 311 finding that Iran’s entire financial sector is a jurisdiction of primary money laundering concern,” Kirk said.
It would also undermine “the Financial Action Task Force’s ongoing calls for international countermeasures to protect financial sectors from Iran’s terrorist financing,” explained Kirk, who is backing a new effort in Congress to increase sanctions on Iran as a result of its recent ballistic missile tests, which violate United Nations resolutions.
Rep. Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.), a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, warned that the Obama administration’s latest move could set the stage for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, or IRGC, to gain a foothold in the U.S. economy.
“As if a windfall of over $100 billion in sanctions relief was too small, and the massive cash influx into Iran from new business deals too paltry, President Obama appears to be looking for ways to make further concessions to Iran,” said Pompeo, who also has backed new legislation to sanction Iran. “This would be comical if it wasn’t so dangerous.”
“American and international businesses can’t ignore the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ vast control of the Iranian economy and the threat Iranian banks pose to the international financial system,” Pompeo continued in a statement to the Free Beacon.
“In contrast with the absurd policies of the Obama administration, I work with my colleagues in Congress to protect America’s national security interests—just as we have in response to Iran’s recent ballistic missile tests.”
Pompeo is independently investigating the Obama administration’s recent $1.7 billion payment to Iran, which he and others viewed as a “ransom payment” for the Islamic Republic’s recent release of several captured Americans.
Other longtime Iran critics in Congress also expressed concern over administration efforts to provide Iran with even more economic freedom.
“Further sanctions relief would mark the death knell for U.S. sanctions and would represent a boon to the Iranian regime and its Revolutionary Guard Corp,” Rep. Ron DeSantis, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told the Free Beacon. “The lengths to which the Obama administration is willing to go to empower Iran is breathtaking.”
Rep. Peter Roskam (R., Ill.) explained that the “administration has lost all credibility on Iran” as a result of its efforts to accommodate Iranian demands.
“President Obama and Secretary Kerry have played the pied piper so many times now,” Roskam told the Free Beacon. “Western companies have to make the determination themselves whether or not they want to make their employees and shareholders complicit in funding terrorism.”
When asked to comment on concerns in Congress, a State Department official told the Free Beacon that it is aware of lawmaker requests for more information on “additional sanctions relief.”
The official added that as long as Iran continues to adhere to the nuclear agreement, the United States “will continue” to do the same.
Obama administration officials first guaranteed last year that Iran would not be permitted to conduct foreign transactions in dollars. This promise, however, is being reevaluated as the administration seeks to keep Iran from walking away from the nuclear deal.
In his article “Iran’s Diplomacy for Dummies,” Jonathan Tobin, a totally reasonable individual, again misses the perfidy of Obama’s policies, towards Iran. We brought to the UN our concerns about Iran testing ballistic missiles being a violation of the Iran deal. Russia stated flatly that they “would not permit sanctions to be [re-] imposed because Iran’s actions did not violate UN Security Council resolutions.” Samantha Powers expressed frustration and dismay at the Russian reaction to our concerns.
However, Amb. Powers’ comments against the Russians in the UN were nothing more than a charade. Her comments were a pretense of being offended by Russia. The Obama administration was just playing politics with the issue, and using Samantha as the actress to give voice to our “concern” in this one-act political theater. We pretend to be standing up for real-time enforcement of the Iran deal, and then blame the Russians when enforcement is prevented. Whereas the truth is there was no real expectation or desire for enforcement by Obama and his lady advisors from day one of the negotiations or our sign-off. Powers and Obama are merely trying to appear earnest in their implementation of the treaty (which they falsely called an agreement).
The charade (i.e., playacting) can be seen at work over a variety of political scenarios. These bits of play acting are the modus operandi of the Obama administration. They seek to reverse the idea found in Shakespeare’s drama “Hamlet.” There we find the line, “The play’s the thing. Wherein [to] catch the conscience of the king.” For the Obama inner clique, the principle is “the play’s the thing” to deflect our understanding of the king’s dereliction of duty for God and country.
We see this playacting during a recent interview. During the course of the interview, Obama tried to appear measured and sincere in his thinking. For example, he says to the interviewer, “Real power means you can get what you want without having to exert violence.” He presented himself as a wise Solon who prefers negotiation to force. Here he may not be completely duplicitous but simply be in denial.
Many so-called peaceniks on the left fail to see the cowardly and traitorous underpinnings (motives) of their pseudo-pacifism. Thus, seen in a more honest light, we need to understand that preference for negotiation over force is, in reality, a preference for capitulation and a policy of fear. Capitulation is then interpreted as being wise and detached, whereas it is actually a flight from reality and the unpleasant experiences that accompany any of life’s confrontations.
He also pretended to be detached in the Shiite-Sunni conflict. According to Obama, the two sides “need to find an effective way to share the neighborhood.” Bret Stephens of the Wall Street Journal tags this remark as sounding more “like Mr. Rogers.” However, this writer finds it to be more duplicitous and sinister than Mr. Stephens thinks. In reality Obama has taken the side of the Shiites and of the Muslim Brotherhood wing of the Sunnis. He has decided to reject Sunni leadership that is not rooted in Muslim Brotherhood ideology — in Libya (overthrew Qaddafi), Egypt (overthrew Hosni Mubarak and is not working cooperatively with General Abdel el-Sisi, but did send F-16s to el-Sisi’s predecessor Muslim Brotherhood President Mohamed Morsi), and Yemen (allowed a pro-Iranian Shiite faction to overthrow the pro-Saudi government).
Further, the U.S. has not lifted a finger to prevent Iranian-backed Hezbollah from taking over Lebanon.
Lastly, and most important from a Jewish perspective, he has justified U.S. funding of Hamas via their alliance with the PLO in 2014. And we know that Hamas is a Shiite (Iranian-backed) organization with Muslim Brotherhood backing as well. Thus by saying to Goldberg that Shiites and Sunnis will just have to learn to get along, Obama was feigning a neutrality that in practice he totally rejects. His remarks are pure political theater, totally divorced from the policies and practices of his administration.
Although Bret Stephens characterizes Obama’s thinking as shallow, it seems to this writer that Obama’s playacting is not rooted in shallowness, but simply in his being wrong. His underlying principles are ultimately harmful. He is identified with left-wing pseudo pacifism (“pseudo” because violence is justified, but only for leftist ideals), a Marxist-derived anti-American bias that would portray the U.S. as an exploitative society, a bitter anti-Israel bias derived from his Muslim roots, and a false universalism (“false” because it is not God-centered).
His playacting is thus an attempt to distract from his deep ideological commitments. In Hamlet, the play was intended to reveal the hidden murderous action of the King of Denmark. With the present U.S. executive branch, the intent of the playacting is to hide the murderous intent.
(The views expressed in this article (aside from those espoused by my imaginary guest author, with whom no rational person agrees) are mine and do not necessarily reflect those of Warsclerotic or its other editors. — DM)
Editor’s note: This is a guest post by my (imaginary) guest author, the Very Honorable Ima Librul, Senator from the great State of ConfusionUtopia. He is a founding member of Climate Change Causes Everything Bad, a charter member of President Obama’s Go For it Team, a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Chairman of the Meretricious Relations Subcommittee.He is also justly proud of his expertise in the care and breeding of green unicorns, for which his Save the Unicorns Foundation has received substantial Federal grants. We are honored to have a post of this caliber by a quintessential Librul such as the Senator. Without further delay, here is the Senator’s article, followed by my own observations.
As any fool knows, saying things that upset folks is destructive to our peace and tranquility. No patriot would do that. As the Boston Globe observed on March 17th, true patriots can not and should not permit it.
Donald Trump slams protesters at his rallies as “thugs” but, as usual, the unhinged GOP presidential front-runner is dead wrong:
They’re patriots.
. . . .
With Trump nearly sweeping this week’s primaries, those rallies will become more hostile toward anyone pushing against his hideous rhetoric. Yet those patriots will still come, not just because they oppose Trump but for the love of their country which is being shoved toward the abyss. As poet Adrienne Rich wrote in “An Atlas of the Difficult World”:
A patriot is one who wrestles/ for the soul of her country/ as she wrestles for her own being.
Trump has been endorsed by Will Quigg, 48, a grand dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. So has Hillary Clinton, but that’s as different as night is from day; we all know that she is not a racist. The KKK endorsement of Trump shows, beyond dispute, that he is a vile racist. That’s why he despises our President and everything for which we stand.
Trump reminds me of the hateful Britainophobes who mocked Native Americans by wearing their quaint native garb to throw precious tea, violently, into Boston Harbor. For shame!
Trump hatefully complains that Islam is not the religion of peace and that since it is a violent religion Muslims should not be permitted even to visit the United States until it can be determined which are peaceful and which are not. Hogwash! Muslims are just as peaceful as Methodists. They love little children more than Methodists, particularly little girls, and marry them at what Trump probably thinks is too early an age — often at the age of ten. It’s their culture, so there’s nothing wrong with it and we should respect it. Isn’t this a pretty little bride? She looks so happy!
Muslims don’t occupy a country that isn’t theirs like filthy Jews do in Palestine. They don’t try to take over mosques sacred to Islam.
Palestine, unlike Israel, does not practice apartheid. Although Israel has nukes, Iran recently promised not to develop nuclear weapons. Trump, despite his claims to be a master negotiator, would never have got that deal; Obama, a very modest person, did despite obstructions put in his path by Israel and some Republicans.
Not all Jews are bad, of course: a major Jewish group warned that Trump is dangerous. As noted in the immediately linked article, the warning
came amid an impassioned debate in the American Jewish community around Trump’s plans to address an audience of over 18,000 next Monday at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual policy conference.
Who knows what might happen if Trump were to address that group. Might he claim, as he often does, that the peaceful Palestinians, not Jews, are to blame for Israel’s continued occupation of Palestine? Perhaps some of his antisemitic bullies might assault members of the audience. They might bring not only knives but guns as well! Remember, President Obama warned against bringing even knives to a gun fight!
Trump complains that our borders are not “secure.” He is stupid, ignorant and just plays on the fear of other racists. Hillary Clinton knows that the borders are secure.
PHOENIX — The United States has done a “really good job” of securing the border between Arizona and Mexico, Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton said in an exclusive interview Thursday.
“I think we’ve done a really good job securing the border,” she said. “I think that those who say we haven’t are not paying attention to what was done the last 15 years under President (George W.) Bush and President (Barack) Obama.”
Clinton said the federal government has added both border officers and obstructions, while the number of people attempting to cross the border has dropped.
“Immigration from Mexico has dropped considerably,” she said. ”It’s just not happening anymore.”
Lies, lies, lies. It’s lies all the way down for Trump
The protestors at Trump rallies do not want to silence him, as some far-right nuts have complained. They only want to make him stop saying things that offend them; there’s a big difference, as any fool knows. Like everyone else with two brain cells, we need our safe spaces and he violates our constitutional rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness by refusing to let us have them. Even the music played at Trump rallies is authoritarian and disgusting. That’s why we attend and protest at Trump rallies.
Trump is Hitler. All Republican candidates for president have been Hitlers for many, many years. Hitlerism is the foul soup in which they are conceived, born and raised. It’s high time to throw out the soup and Republicans along with it. Hillary will do that, and more.
*****************
Editor’s comments
As a courtesy to Senator Librul, I inserted all of the links in his article. The presence of supporting links is about the only difference between his screed and those of Democrats and the Republican elite (but I repeat myself) disparaging Trump for stuff he has not done and does not do; for what they claim he is and not for what he is.
It’s high time for us to take America back from those who have been trying to destroy her. She belongs to We the People, not to the Democrat or Publican party bosses. Never forget.
Obama did not build our nation. Our ancestors did and it’s our inheritance.
For whom would the pioneers in the video vote were they alive now? Our “leaders” who sit in Washington, D.C., break their promises and take our money to finance their reelection campaigns so they can continue the process? Those who have weakened our nation and made her a second class world power? Those who elevate political correctness and multiculturalism above reality? Those who rewrite our history so that they can condemn it? I don’t think so. Which candidates do you think they would support?
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