I continue to be amazed by the number of American politicians that are opposed to the Iran Agreement. Those who know about these kinds of things are in support of the agreement. They know it may not be perfect, but diplomatic agreements rarely are perfect -- and this one actually has a chance to work.
The U.N. Security Council voted 15 to 0 to accept the deal, and to remove the sanctions against Iran (and are not going to re-impose those sanctions just because the U.S. Congress doesn't like the deal). In addition, numerous nuclear security experts, over a hundred U.S ambassadors, three dozen high-ranking retired military officers support the agreement.
All of those people know that there is no acceptable alternative to the agreement. The only alternatives are to allow Iran to build a bomb, or to go to war with Iran to try and prevent that. The congressional Republicans also know that -- and that is why you don't hear them offering an alternative. They just keep repeating that it's a bad deal, but have no acceptable alternative to offer.
To be blunt, they are opposing the deal because the bulk of their base voters don't like the president -- and opposing anything the president does plays well with that base (even if there is no acceptable alternative to the president's action). In other words they are playing politics, and in doing that, they could well be making the world a much more dangerous place -- and leading this country into another war in the Middle East.
And sadly, a few Democrats are following the Republican lead, and playing politics with this dangerous issue. The most important one of these is Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer of New York. Instead of supporting the president and the agreement, he has announced that he will vote against the agreement. And like the Republicans he is emulating, he has offered no reasonable alternative to approving the agreement. He has to be smart enough to know he is playing a dangerous political game, but doesn't seem to care.
Making this even worse, Schumer is the favorite to become Majority (or Minority) Leader in the Senate in the next term (because Harry Reid is not running for re-election). I think this should disqualify him from that important leadership role in the Democratic Party. The Majority/Minority Leader post is one that needs to be occupied by a Democrat who is loyal to the president and his party -- not someone who can't be counted on to support the president, or someone who puts his own political well-being above the good of this country.
(This cartoon is by Dana Summers at Tribune Media Services.)
