Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

Add the Pope to the list of people who support the Iran Nuclear deal.  And yet somehow that doesn't dissuade certain members of our political class from denouncing the deal with apocalyptic zeal.  Granted there is room to disagree on many political issues, and no agreement or treaty is really fool proof when it comes to dealing with extremists and religious zealots, but there is enough widespread agreement that the deal that the Obama administration, through secretary of state Eeyore Kerry, had managed to wrangle with Iran is adequate, and maybe even pretty good.  Which brings me to the rather troubling reality, which I have been actually trying to talk myself out of for some time, which is that about half of our politicos are acting out of almost sheer malice for the man we the people have elected to the office of President. What really rankles me, as it should everyone regardless of political leanings is that these (mostly Republican politicians) are willing to put our nation and the lives of our children at greater risk because they don't like President Obama.

Whether it's something mundane, yet crucial, like passing a reasonable budget, or whether it's actually trying to stop Iran from getting A FREAKING THERMONUCLEAR WEAPON, they are bound and determined to stonewall anything that is going to be a feather in the cap of the President and/or the Democratic party.  Now look, I'm not so naive as to think that Republicans are all bad guys and Democrats are all good guys, in fact, my default position is that all politicians are bad guys, and that applies to blue and red pretty much equally.  However, it looks now like Democrats are sort of like the crooked small town sheriff who wants things nice and peaceful like and is willing to bend a few laws to keep things running smooth, while a significant segment of Republicans have become like Lex Luthor, absolutely bent on destroying their nemesis and they don't care who gets hurt.

Well, see, I understand that politics is hardball, and I understand that many of them have the certainty that only zealots seem to have about how their way is the best way, but they're shooting us in the foot economically with the budget and they stand a pretty good chance of getting a lot of people turned into charcoal and glass when they monkey around with a very sane and balanced way to restrain Iran's Nuclear program.

Also, while I'm talking foreign policy, I think it's generally unwise for us to continue throwing our weight around on the international playground. It's making people hate us.  Even some of our old buds are starting to think we're being a bit too much of a bully.  This approach is going to breed terrorists faster than we can bomb them and ferret them out of their hidey holes with our super awesome special forces guys (and now girls, how cool is that?  Women Rangers?  That's gotta burn the Taliban right in their AK-47).

Of course, I've always been more of a Picard man.  For me diplomacy is pretty much the bees knees, but I know there are a lot of people out there who think that makes you wimp.  But I'll tell you this much, I've been in fist fights, and I've also been able to talk a situation around and out of violence, both take courage of a sort, and both leave you feeling pretty adrenaline charged, but let me tell you which one you feel better about the next day, and the day after that.  Let me tell you which one is something you're proud to tell your kids about.

Both things can solve problems, but very rarely do bystanders get killed at a treaty signing.  Sure treaties can go wrong, there are those that will tell you that Versailles got us Hitler and that dropping that Bomb on Hiroshima shut the Japanese up but good for a long, long time, but count the cost, and nine times out of ten, war and violence do nothing but make more enemies and get us stuck in a really bad feedback loop.  Take out Saddam Hussein, you get ISIS, you're just trading in bad for worse.  What happens in Iran if we forcibly topple the Ayatollah?  Bad things. What happens if we open and normalize relations and stop crushing the people of Iran with trade sanctions, and let things like what has happened in Egypt happen there?  Well we don't really know, we don't if, we don't know when, we don't know what exactly, but we do know pretty surely what is going to happen if we keep playing the global tough guy:

I think I know how I'm going to vote.