CSotD: Meanwhile, Back on the Battlefield
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He’s only a bird in a gilded cage, Rowe says, but it’s a cage of his own devise, and while, as the dove of peace says, we’ve heard it all before, the telling aspect is the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action he uses as a paper at the bottom of that cage.
You don’t have to like the treaty, though it’s not fair or necessary to lie about it, as those did who wrote that Obama had given Iran pallets of cash instead of saying their frozen assets were unfrozen as part of the agreement.
But the plain fact is, even if Trump could get everything possible in exchange for peace, the world will be worse off not only in comparison to the JCPOA but because his foolishness showed Iran just how readily they could shut off Hormuz and paralyze the world economy.
Duginski has it right: The peace deal is a mirage, and Trump is not lying so much as hallucinating. No good asking if he really believes the counterfactual things he says, because the answer is “What difference would it make?”
Whether it’s a lie or a mirage, there was a deal in the making, until he jumped in with both feet and announced that, in order for it to go through, the Arab nations would have to sign on to the Abraham Accords.
It was either a poison pill to blow up the treaty, or a damned foolish blunder, because signing on to the accords would be totally unacceptable to the vast majority in those countries, and any leaders who agreed would be out of office before the ink was dry.
It would have been nice to stop and think and perhaps plan a bit before loosing the bombers. Morland’s accusation brings to mind a proposal I’ve had for Presidential debates, in which each person would draw six slips from a jar, each containing the name of a nation, and be required to place them on a blank outline map.
In campaigning, candidates complain about “Gotcha Questions,” but assessing someone’s basic qualifications for the job they seek is not a trick. It’s an obvious part of making a responsible choice. If you were hiring a chef, it would not unfair to ask the ingredients of bechamel sauce, or to ask a prospective mechanic why cars have pistons.
But while Kellyanne Conway invented the notion of “alternative facts,” her ex-husband George has documented Dear Leader’s grasp of “alternative geography.”
It’s a lot funnier when you are far away from the explosions and flying shrapnel.
Juxtaposition of the Day
“Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace– but there is no peace,” as Patrick Henry said, and while Derenne and Hudson are addressing those in the shadow of Israeli attacks, their cartoons apply in Iran as well. Having declared a ceasefire, the Americans have resumed bombing, saying it is only of military targets and doesn’t count because it’s in self-defense
Which won’t comfort anyone who has the misfortune to become collateral damage.
It is unfair to claim that America deliberately bombed an elementary school, but the fact that it was a mistake caused by outdated information cannot possibly matter to the families of the children and faculty members killed in the event.
Nor, if Iran decides to act in self-defense during this ceasefire, will that explanation make a difference to shipping or neighboring military bases that come under fire.
As for the rest of us, whether it is self-defense or Yankee imperialism, shutting off the supply of liquid helium will erode our supply of MRI devices and shortages of fertilizer will impact the harvest and increase the price of food. These consequences will not be reversed quickly, nor will gas prices drop immediately.
The Trump and Netanyahu administrations have sown the wind, but the entire world is suffering from the resulting whirlwind.
Brodner depicts a failing, flailing Trump, desperate for an exit from the disaster, but he may be giving Dear Leader too much credit for self-awareness, though shouting “Let me up, you’re had enough” should send a clear message.
Trump has a talent for surviving disasters, honed by years of bankruptcies and blunders, and Artley points out that his interest in the invasion and subjugation of Cuba seems like a distraction from the Epstein files.
A whole lot of things seem like distractions from the Epstein files, and the prospect of a quick victory over a small nation also seems like a distraction from the abject failure of having attacked a large one.
And “Remember the Maine” is a good slogan from which to pun, given that historians strongly suspect that the explosion on that ship in Havana harbor was not sabotage by Spanish forces but an internal disaster that might have happened to the ship anywhere.
Mox nix — whether or not the Americans knew the facts, it provided expansionist hawks with an excuse to finally launch a war against Spain.
Americans watched the rebellion in Cuba for years before the sinking of the Maine gave McKinley an excuse to intervene, and Americans have been watching Cuba in current times since Castro overthrew Batista in 1959.
The term “filibuster” came into vogue describing freelance warriors from this country who tried to assist the Cuban rebels against the Spanish colonial government, an effort that can be seen as a parallel to the disastrous Bay of Pigs incident in 1961, in which the US landed a force of Cuban exiles, expecting the local populace to rise up with them.
It didn’t happen, but hope springs eternal. The Maine likely wasn’t targeted by saboteurs in 1898, and it seems a stretch for a nation currently attacking alleged drug runners in international waters to suddenly hold Cuba account for shooting down a pair of exile-piloted airplanes 30 years ago.
But any excuse will do for a person bent on brawling.
As Riddell suggests, Dear Leader likely expects that other nations will jump at the chance to aid us, which is an example of the triumph of hope over experience, and of Dear Leader’s eternally optimistic view of his world.
Jim Glover remembered this song at a memorial for his late college roommate:
Mike Peterson has posted his "Comic Strip of the Day" column every day since 2010. His opinions are his own, but we welcome comments either agreeing or in opposition.
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