White House loves the Iran deal, mocks Netanyahu

US President Barack Obama can’t boast enough over his new deal with Iran. Actually, his boasting began before the deal. In early March, 2015, he made the claim, “What I can guarantee is that if it’s a deal I’ve signed off on, I will be able to prove that it is the best way for us to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon” (Charlie Spierling, “Obama reacts to Netanyahu Speech ‘As Far As I Could Tell, There Was Nothing New’”, Breitbart, March 3, 2015).

Now, after the deal, he admits that his ‘historic’ deal allows the wait-time for Iran to develop a nuclear weapon to drop to ‘zero’ (“Obama: Iran Nuclear 'Breakout Time' Would Drop”, Voice of America, April 7, 2015). That means that his deal will not stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons.

Nevertheless, he argues that this deal is “a “once in a lifetime opportunity”. It will, he promises, curb the spread of nuclear weapons in the Middle East (Peter Baker, “President Obama Calls Preliminary Iran Nuclear Deal ‘Our Best Bet’”, New York Times, April 5, 2015).

Many, many Americans don’t believe him. For one thing, US Republicans don’t believe him (Daniel DePetris, “Republican Hopefuls for 2016 Hate the Iran Deal”, Huffington Post, April 6, 2015). Yes, this particular response could be called expected—and political. But Republicans control the Congress. Congress could play a spoiler role in negotiations that won’t end much before the final deadline, June 30, 2015.

What Republicans think is important. Right now, they don’t like what they see.

Two former US Secretaries of State, Henry Kissinger and George Schultz, have blasted the deal (Patrick Brennan, “Henry Kissinger and George Shultz Both Oppose the Iran Deal”, The National Review, April 7, 2015). These two former officials “don’t absolutely hate the deal, but they have problems with almost every aspect of its design and implementation — and with President Obama’s underlying theory about Iran, that engaging it as a partner in the Middle East can go a long way toward pacifying the region and reducing American involvement there. The secretaries definitely don’t see that happening” (ibid).

Former Vice President Dick Cheney doesn’t believe him (Amy Miller, “Cheney says what we’re all thinking about Obama’s foreign policy”, Legal Insurrection, April 8, 2015). In fact, Cheney is appalled. He’s just been quoted as saying about this deal, “if you had somebody as president who wanted to take America down, who wanted to fundamentally weaken our position in the world and reduce our capacity to influence events, turn our back on our allies and encourage our adversaries, it would look exactly like what Barack Obama’s doing” (ibid).

The American public doesn’t like how this deal was done (Meteor Blades, “Reuters/Ipsos poll shows deep divide among Americans over deal with Iran”, dailykos, April 8, 2015). According to Reuters, only 30 per cent of Americans approve of Obama’s negotiations with Iran (ibid). Americans are definitely unsure what Obama should do (ibid). But they don’t like what he’s done so far.

Perhaps Daniel Greenfield said it best (“Obama’s Admission that Deal Will Give Iran a Zero Breakout Time Should be a Gamechanger”, Front Page Mag, April 8, 2015): “This [admission] is the closest that Obama has come to admitting that his deal is a dead end. Even if it works as he has billed it, it passes the buck while promising that the time for action will always exist… unless there’s a miscalculation, in which case, Boom.”

The White House, meanwhile, won’t give up going after Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu gave a speech to Congress in March 2015 where he claimed that the deal Obama had been working on won’t end Iran’s road to a bomb; it would pave that road to a bomb. Now, a deal (kind of) in hand (nothing’s been put into writing), the White House has been accused of mocking Netanyahu for arguing against the deal (Bridget Johnson, “White House Mocks Netanyahu’s Bomb Drawing in Iran Graphic”, pjmedia, April 8, 2015).

Here’s the bottom line for the Iran deal: US and Iran sign nothing, US and Iran both claim ‘victory’, White House mocks the Jew.

How’s that going to work out?