Right on cue

The terms of the Geneva Accord announced last night are virtually designed to expose U.S. domestic criticism of them as either political hackery or demagogic hawkery.

The diplomatic agreement is little more than a watchful feeler. Its conditions concede the potential fluidity of the Iranian situation and thus stipulate a punishing status quo ante, should things flow backward; it's a beginning testament to "trust, but verify"--by now a veritable commandment of Republican foreign policy scripture. 

The agreement is, in short, a Churchillian invitation to jaw-jaw rather than war-war and a Reaganesque test of earnestness, from all sides.  

So sure enough, today's American conservatives want no part of it--a sentiment they insist on broadcasting with a stunning, and of course deliberate, obtuseness.

"Unless the agreement requires dismantling of the Iranian centrifuges, we really haven’t gained anything," tweeted Lindsey Graham, who doubtless will go right on insisting that throughout the history of practical diplomatic accords, "Z" has always come before "A."  

Kelly Ayotte also sourly tweeted her profound "skepticism" of the agreement, which in itself is a near renunciation of the sainted Ronald Reagan's verification scheme; Marco Rubio inexplicably stated that "this agreement makes a nuclear Iran more likely"; and Eric Cantor slimed the deal with his "concern" that ...

Oh, who the hell gives a damn what Eric Cantor thinks.

It was Sen. John Cornyn, though, who best displayed contemporary conservatives' gut-level, adolescent maturity: "Amazing what WH will do to distract attention from O-care."

Thank goodness for what The Hill's foreign affairs blog described as Secretary of State John Kerry's deadpan response to the aforementioned absurdities, which no longer stop anywhere close to our waters' edge: "Gee, you mean the members of the other party are criticizing the president? I can't imagine that."

 

Comments

[Janicket]

Ha! That Kerry response is dead-on perfect.

[shsavage]

The GOP response is essentially the same as their position has been in Congress since PBO took office. Give us everything we demand (though they don't know what that is from moment to moment), and then we'll "negotiate." Otherwise, it's WAR. Absurdist demands and empty threats, which are, in this case, simply channeling Bibi. And, like Bibi, they find themselves increasingly isolated and running out of options.