Stop Me Before I Vote Again

Modest Proposal:

Iran to invite Pakistan to operate several nuclear missile bases along the border of Iran and Iraq, sort of like US bases in Germany. A few dozen deliverable nukes rather closer to the Zionist state under the full control of the Pakistani armed forces with the operating costs covered by deliveries of Iranian natural gas to Pakistan.

At that point everyone can start faking mutual respect.

The Iranians, then, need no nukes, but, in a sense, have them. The few square miles effectively ceded to Pakistan should be of little concern to such a huge nation as Iran. The Pakistanis will feel proud to have stuck a peace-promoting thumb in the eye of Uncle Sam, who has been violating their sovereignty, thus regaining much of the self respect lost in recent years.

Iran can proceed with their nuclear energy program, burying everything as deeply as their hearts desire and inviting the IAEA to come on down and look whenever they want.

So the GF got me watching the Golden Globes where "A Separation" won best foreign film. The film (I gather) tells the melodramatic story of the tension between finding a better life for the couple's daughter abroad or staying and caring for the Alzheimer's-afflicted father. And it's set in Iran. In other words, Art House gold.

Of course, one suspects the win as much to with a sense of patronizing sympathy for the oppressed Iranians as artist merit. However that may be, watching director Asghar Farhadi walk to the stage to accept the award I felt a very genuine sense of tension. What would he do? -- the US's threats of attack -- vain though they may be -- couldn't be far from the surface of his mind. Bury whatever integrity he might have and politely efface the topic? Create an embarrassing scene and ruin his fifteen minutes of Art House fame? ... Well, he chose a comprise -- and yet, what he achieved with subtlety was perhaps far more eloquent and pointed than calling the Academy (or whatever the GG equivalent is) a bunch of imperialistic hypocrites, as I would have liked.

Why don't Iranians build 'a false wall' to separate the front lobby of their nukes plant from the assembly floor and shipping areas before inviting US observers to pay a visit? It seems fairly easy to jaw-jaw your way to victory over American negotiators through such a gambit, with some "Talmudic-like discussion" over definitions thrown into the mix to seal the case.

To restate the obvious, if the US insisted on transparency from the Eretz, it would soon follow that the "only democracy in the region" would no longer serve the purpose of being run by a rogue's gallery of ineptitude and parochialism, whose actions "forced" the enlightened and benighted leaders of the West to come to its rescue by staving off the rapey schwarztes intent on sullying its democratic and Jewish virtues.

Had a good chat with an Iranian cabbie here in NY the other day, and he made your very point exactly, MJS: "They don't care about our nukes, they don't like that we're independent and that they can't take our oil and tell us what to do." Not to get all talking-with-man-on-the-street patronizing, but in a 15 minute chat, this guy clarified what hours and hours and hours of NPR and NYT "analysis" and thousands of pages of think tank white papers obfuscate.

Two questions I invariably ask a cabbie: "Where you from?" And: "Whaddya think about ___?" The replies are invariably illuminating deployment deeply encouraging.

He also noted: "Look how far we've come since independence." And: "The Israelis aren't crazy, they're smart. They're too smart to do something stupid like attack us."

Yeah, CZ, but Tom Friedman's cabbie told him that the middle class Iranians—who are liberal, like Tom—want nothing more than a chance to play on the level economic playing field of the global flat earth. Then he gave Tom a balsa wood replica of the Peacock Throne, which he'd carved while solving calculus problems on his voice-controlled iPad.

Al, I know, I thought of Mustache Man when I posted that comment, fearful of evoking him. I suspect the difference is, my cabbies are actual people, not the imaginary ones rattling around in Tom's head. Also, he probably gets furnished with company car service, and maybe the drivers have learned to spout the company line or to tell the likes of Mustache Man what he wants to hear. Flat-earth chatter no doubt yields a decent tip.

Of course, cabbies, like all of us, say all sorts of things. Happens that I've encountered some astute ones of late.

I couldn't resist and there's no doubt you're right about Tom's make-believe interlocutors. Somehow he always manages to find the one who fits his column's needs.

There's some serious juice to your encounters. People who have been spared an elite education are usually much more perspicacious about the doings of Uncle. They're not invested in the cruise missile mindset. I think it's likely that a random sample, drawn from the streets, and drafted as legislators, would form a far more humane and clear-headed government than our elected one. They could hardly do worse!

Al, the fact that the vast majority of the world knew that the I-raq "liberation" was an oil grab, and either doesn't care that Iran might want nukes, or thinks they have every right to have 'em, are two pieces of evidence --- off the top of my head ---- that support your theory.