(photo by Hamed Saber)

It’s the 30th anniversary of the Tehran embassy seizure. The Iranian dissidents are out in the streets. But they’re not condemning U.S. imperialism. They’re condemning the brutality and avarice of the Iranian regime, and reclaiming their revolution. And they’re risking life and limb to do it.

At one point, one crowd of protesters turned its message toward the American President Barack Obama, chanting, “Obama, Obama, You are either with us or with them.”

Now, luckily for us in the U.S., there are Iranian organizations that support the dissidents and raise awareness about them, like Trita Parsi’s National Iranian-American Council or Hadi Ghaemi’s International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. Yet over the last several days, journalists like the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg have shrugged at the differences between Parsi and the Iranian regime. The Washington Post’s Jackson Diehl has called the opposition “unlovely” because it’s made up of Iranians, who possess an Iranian agenda, not an American neoconservative one. Great timing, gentlemen. You couldn’t be doing Ahmedinejad’s work for him any more thoroughly if he paid you. Not that I’m accusing him of paying you, of course. I have no evidence of that.

(photo by corey olson)

A potential victory for diplomacy is brewing in Vienna. After initial reports about Iranian nuclear talks were termed “slow,” today negotiators have reached a draft deal on shipping Iran’s nuclear enrichment to Russia for processing.

Under the draft deal, most of Iran’s stockpile of low enriched uranium would be shipped out of the country for processing into fuel to make medical isotopes in a research reactor in Tehran.

Negotiators were unable to clinch a final agreement after more than two days of talks in the Austrian capital, apparently because the Iranian delegation, led by the ambassador to Vienna, did not have the authority to sign a far-reaching deal about which there was no consensus in Tehran.

Announcing the draft deal, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director, Mohamed ElBaradei, said it represented a balanced approach, offering to provide Iran with fuel for making medical isotopes, while building international confidence in Iran’s intentions by shipping much of its enriched uranium out of the country.

He said the document would now be sent to the capitals of the negotiating parties – Iran, the US, Russia and France – “for final approval” by Friday.

If the Vienna talks actually produce a deal this week, it would represent a major step forward for the Obama theory of diplomacy and negotiation over belligerence and militarism. It would lengthen considerably the timeline for Iran to potentially gather enough fuel for a nuclear device, though they have insisted (and official US intelligence still agrees) that they are not looking to build a weapon. By any measure, this would be a concrete victory, and hopefully would stall out the sanctions packages which even the Iranian opposition has warned against.

Elliott Abrams — those “brows”
are made for bombin’

Many of us have now seen or heard the cheers of various right-wingers over the United States losing out on the Olympics to Brazil. They reserve their patriotism for when it can lead to bombing things.

As always, what Digby says:

Just as a successful universal health care system would doom the Republicans, a successful negotiation on nonproliferation would doom the neocon vision that you cannot talk to adversaries and only force is advisable and just.

So, naturally after the U.S. and our european allies obtain a diplomatic breakthrough with Iran comes the lying and the pleading for war. The more ridiculous the claim the better. Take it away Elliott Abrams.

People used to say that — that if there’s an attack on Iran, you know the population is going to get patriotic. But that’s what Americans would do. I don’t know that it’s what Iranians are going to do, considering the way that regime is hated in Iran.

Yeah, what’s an unpopular regime compared to the thrill of being bombed?

Stern rhetoric at the joint Pittsburgh announcement from Obama, Brown and Sarkozy on Iran’s undisclosed nuclear facility. Obama said the "size and configuration of this facility is inconsistent" with peaceful nuclear energy. The three leaders demand full disclosure next week at the P5+1 meeting with Iran on the nuclear portfolio in Geneva. Obama said the U.S. "remains committed" to the prospect of a productive dialogue with the Iranians — pending disclosure. "Iran must comply with U.N. security council resolutions… We have offered Iran a clear path to greater international [cooperation]… or be held accountable to international standards and international law."

The three leaders are talking about sanctions, to be clear, not war. Sarkozy said there must be full Iranian nuclear disclosure to the IAEA "by December" or "sanctions will have to be taken." He said he expected an "exhaustive, strict and rigorous investigation" by the IAEA to confront what Brown called Iran’s "serial deception."

picture by Michael Heilemann

Haaretz published a long piece by Aluf Benn today arguing that the nuclear proliferation is "the basis for understanding the diplomatic processes in today’s Middle East." I think that’s a nice way to frame regional peace primarily around the Iranian nuclear issue. But the article unintentionally raises an excellent question: What the hell does ‘nuclear ambiguity‘ even mean?

From what I can gather, all it means is that Israel and the United State won’t officially discuss Israel’s nukes, especially when it comes to international policy. As in, the only context where it matters. Really? We can publish endless newspaper articles and talk off record until our shit stops stinking, but no, that stuff is completely irrelevant whenever anyone might want to dish arms control for real? My brain is literally stroking out right now trying to figure out why policymaking is considered the proper place to play fucking pretend. Cause that’s all it is, since something can’t be ambiguous if everyone knows all about it.

How can there even be a debate whether Israel should "declare" its nuclear weapons? Yeah, that’d be a real god damn game changer. Everyone gonna want their own now that it’s out in the open (like it was already)! I bet Ayatollah Khameini would piss his long, flowing pants once he finds out Israel now knows that Iran knows that Israel has the nukes Iran already knows about! Maybe this line of thought help explain Iran’s, as well as the entire Arab world’s, apparent comfort with a policy of "ambiguity" when it comes to Israel’s right to exist. Sure, they know Israel knows they know Israel is there, but hey they just don’t want to talk about it on record.

Which leads us to a larger discussion: how can we possibly negotiate in good faith with the Iranians as long as we continue to play dumb about Israel? Aren’t we accusing Iran of following the precedent first set by Israel, well before India, Pakistan or even North Korea, where having nuclear weapons is okay as long as you’re reaaaallly quiet about making them. Does Israel get to grandfather their nukes as acceptable just because they got to the finish line before anyone caught on? Might that be why Iran would possibly want to become a de facto nuclear weapons state in the first place, as alleged by the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate?

Just because we don’t like them doesn’t mean Iran isn’t allowed to have legitimate security concerns. Remember that mind blowing Goldberg op-ed? I wonder how that played in the Farsi press? The snarky lede practically writes itself:

The leader of a country repeatedly invokes apocalyptic religious language and threatens to attack his country’s declared bête noire. Meanwhile, his own country is subject to longstanding international concern regarding its secret nuclear program. Of course, we’re discussing Benjamin Netanyahu and Iran.

Like what I did there? Why shouldn’t Iran feel threatened by that kind of rhetoric, as Israel does by Ahmadinejad? Does Israel get the sort of pass the United States liked to believe it had during the Cold War, when Reagan could saber rattle all he wanted about the Evil Empire because the Soviets, like, know for sure we would never strike first. Because we’re America, a free democracy, and thus the good guys. After the infamous 1983 NATO training exercise Able Archer, Reagan apparently changed his mind:

"Three years had taught me something surprising about the Russians: Many people at the top of the Soviet hierarchy were genuinely afraid of America and Americans. Perhaps this shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did … During my first years in Washington, I think many of us in the administration took it for granted that the Russians, like ourselves, considered it unthinkable that the United States would launch a first strike against them. But the more experience I had with Soviet leaders and other heads of state who knew them, the more I began to realize that many Soviet officials feared us not only as adversaries but as potential aggressors who might hurl nuclear weapons at them in a first strike … Well, if that was the case, I was even more anxious to get a top Soviet leader in a room alone and try to convince him we had no designs on the Soviet Union and Russians had nothing to fear from us."

Robert Gates agreed with that assessment in his own memoir:

Information about the peculiar and remarkably skewed frame of mind of the Soviet leaders during those times that has emerged since the collapse of the Soviet Union makes me think there is a good chance—with all of the other events in 1983—that they really felt a NATO attack was at least possible and that they took a number of measures to enhance their military readiness short of mobilization. After going through the experience at the time, then through the postmortems, and now through the documents, I don’t think the Soviets were crying wolf. They may not have believed a NATO attack was imminent in November 1983, but they did seem to believe that the situation was very dangerous. And US intelligence [SNIE 11-9-84 and SNIE 11-10-84] had failed to grasp the true extent of their anxiety.

Think the Iranian leadership might also be classified as a bit paranoid? They’re surrounded by other nuclear weapons states -Pakistan, Israel, the United States, Russia and India – and only maintain tension free relations with the last two. They’ve watched two American invasions seeking regime changes right on their border. I’m sure the Iranian leadership thought jokes about turning ‘left to Damascus or right to Tehran" after the fall of Baghdad were fucking hilarious. Finally, it’s nothing but stupid to pretend they’ve forgotten how practically the entire rest of the world either openly or covertly supported Iraq in their decade long war (That is, everyone except North Korea, the US in Iran-Contra, and, improbably, Israel). Especially the global silence on repeated Iraqi use of chemical weapons against Iranian soldiers and civilians, leaving Iran only second to Japan as the country most afflicted by weapons of mass destruction. Most of those weapons were developed, by the way, with European assistance.

That’s even ignoring the obvious economic incentives Iran has for nuclear power; namely, a desire not to lose valuable potential oil and gas exports because of their rapidly growing domestic energy consumption, which is already straining their current grid. Now I know lots of people might nod their heads at that, but still say Iranian duplicity regarding its nuclear program means they’ve lost the right for domestic nuclear enrichment. Haaretz reports that the US is even considering refined petroleum sanctions, since Iran has limited refining capacity of its own. Maybe that’s the kind of threat to which the Iranians would respond. But I’ll go out on a limb and suggest that because that sort of threat (ie; an energy embargo) is even possible is precisely why Iran doesn’t trust "legally guaranteed" enriched uranium imports in return for ending its domestic program.

There is one obvious solution to this, and forgive my jargon, "diplomatic shitstorm." If the United States is really worried about Iran upsetting the established order because they might obtain nuclear weapons, I suggest a policy of "nuclear ambiguity". In return for Iran not openly discussing or brandishing nuclear weapons, the United States will not oppose an Iranian nuclear energy program. The rest of the world, Israel included, should continue on as if the status quo is maintained, and stop asking questions since the answers will only upset them more. Israel can even continue to pretend Iran knows about the nukes that Israel pretends not to have while pretending Iran has no nukes at all! Makes perfect sense, right?

Oh fuck Haaretz predicted that one two years ago.

By His Own Rules: The Ambitions, Successes and Ultimate Failures of Donald Rumsfeld

In the spring and summer of 2001, then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld busied himself putting together a detailed briefing for Congressional leaders and national security officials that would outline where he saw threats in the post Cold War world. In many respects, he was on the money, focusing his presentation on terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, cyberwarfare, and rogue nations. The plan was to alarm Congress enough to give Rumsfeld the political backing he needed to undertake a massive overhaul of how the Pentagon did business, and to drag the American military out of its Cold War mindset and into the realm of complex 21^st century threats.  

It was to be Rumsfeld’s blueprint for his tenure as Secretary of Defense, the “next Mr. X article” as one of his aides said, comparing it to the famous 1947 Foreign Affairs article by George F. Keenan that laid out the policy of containment that the United States would largely follow until the collapse of the Soviet Union.  

But the briefings were never presented as Rumsfeld had planned. The first one was scheduled for September 17, 2001, but by that point the case that Rumsfeld wanted to present had already been made in the form of jetliners used as missiles aimed at American civilian and military targets. While the 9/11 attacks in one sense interrupted Rumsfeld’s plans for the transformation of the American military from a heavy force structured to fight two near peer competitors simultaneously into a lighter, networked force that uses the latest technologies to move quickly across several theaters; in another sense the technological revolution spurred by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan helped to bring the Rumsfeld dream into reality—though he never seemed able to fully grasp how to manage this change.  

Rumsfeld is a study in infuriating contradictions. An intelligent, driven, energetic man who was successful both in a previous stint in government—he was a Congressman, then Chief of Staff and Secretary of Defense in the Ford administration—as well as in the private sector, he seemed to fall apart as Bush’s SecDef. During the critical years from 2001-2006, Rumsfeld is revealed in Bradley Graham’s book to be a bullying micromanager who complains about the number of water glasses on the table for Pentagon lunch meetings and sends so many needling memos—some of them about how to write memos—that underlings in the Pentagon referred to them as “snowflakes.” He becomes involved in so many of the mundane staffing decisions at the Pentagon, and forces his way into so many beuracratic turf battles with other members of the Bush administration and Congress, that you wonder where he found the time to plan two wars. To take on all these tasks while continuing to push for transformation of the Pentagon’s culture, hardware, strategic concepts and daily operations is a nearly impossible task, and Rumsfeld’s ultimate failure is that while pushing in so many directions, he rarely seemed interested in answers, instead confining himself to keep pushing for more ideas, and asking more questions. He was a micromanager who also was fond of asking the big questions, but never actually got around to doing the heavy lifting of answering them. Robert Soule, the Pentagon’s chief program analyst at the time, told Graham that “Rumsfeld had the reputation coming in as a really decisive guy, but he wasn’t at all.”  

He also undermined his own plans by insisting on insulting the Joint Chiefs of Staff in surprisingly large and pathetically small ways. He refused to meet with them in “the Tank,” the meeting room where the Chiefs hold their meetings; would call the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Richard Myers, away during his own meetings with the Chiefs; cut them out of the loop in his dealings with the Pentagon’s regional commanders; shut them out of the planning of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; and continually inserted himself in decisions over which officers to promote, which has traditionally been the responsibility of the service chiefs. If all that sounds like a lot of energy to expend on proving a point, he also would also do small things like seat the Chiefs in the back row at some meetings, just to prove a point. 

The tragedy of all of this is that Rumsfeld’s head was in the right place when he took the helm in 2001. The Pentagon was mired in its own groupthink, with expensive and obsolete weapons systems designed to defeat a Soviet enemy that no longer existed being pushed by a system that didn’t know any other way. His forward-looking reform agenda actually resembles, in some respects, the one current Secretary of Defense Bob Gates is successfully pushing through Congress and the Pentagon. But Rumsfeld’s problem was that he never tired of asking questions, always putting off answers until he had more information—and when more information was provided, finding more questions to ask. Overall, Graham paints a picture of a Pentagon staff that was forced into constant battle against a bullying and obtuse boss who spent more energy on issuing blunt dismissals of their briefings and producing a constant hail of snowflakes, than actually doing the work of leading.

Michael Calderone is way out of line with his article bitching that Nico Pitney got called on at Obama’s press conference today.

In what appeared to be a coordinated exchange, President Obama called on the Huffington Post’s Nico Pitney near the start of his press conference and requested a question directly about Iran.

“Nico, I know you and all across the Internet, we’ve been seeing a lot of reports coming out of Iran,” Obama said, addressing Pitney. “I know there may actually be questions from people in Iran who are communicating through the Internet. Do you have a question?”

Pitney, as if ignoring what Obama had just said, said: “I wanted to use this opportunity to ask you a question directly from an Iranian.”

[snip]

According to POLITICO’s Carol Lee, The Huffington Post reporter was brought out of lower press by deputy press secretary Josh Earnest and placed just inside the barricade for reporters a few minutes before the start of the press conference.

When I heard, before the presser, that Nico was hoping to pose a question from an Iranian, I knew some beltway idiot would bitch if the HuffPo got a question. I just thought the bitching would come from someone with a more consistent record of being a complete idiot than Calderone.

As to Calderone’s bitching, it’s out of line for several reasons. First, if I knew that Nico was hoping to ask a question from an Iranian, then chances are the people paid to know these things at the White House knew. What better tribute to democracy and free speech could the White House make than to allow this question to be posed to the President?

And, after all, one primary focus of the presser was Iran. There are few who would argue but that Nico’s reporting–his tireless compilation of news coming in from both traditional and citizen media–has been far and away the best minute-to-minute news on the Iranian crisis (to take nothing away from the people offering superb commentary and expertise, which I consider something different). Maybe the Politico’s media reporter has missed it, but Nico’s doing something pretty historic with his reporting on Iran. So even assuming the White House isn’t as up-to-speed as I am, how hard do you think it would have been for them to guess that Nico, who has been living and breathing the Iranian crisis since it started, would ask a question about Iran?

I mean, c’mon. To try to turn this into a scandal is to assume that both the White House and Politico itself are a lot stupider than I think they are.

Update: Calderone has updated his post–and, in fact, the folks paid to know this stuff at the White House did know this stuff!!

Deputy press secretary Bill Burton responds: "We did reach out to him prior to press conference to tell him that we had been paying attention to what he had been doing on Iran and there was a chance that he’d be called on. And, he ended up asking the toughest question that the President took on Iran. In the absence of an Iranian press corps in Washington, it was an innovative way to get a question directly from an Iranian."

Which means Calderone’s pout-rage amounts to a journalist complaining about free speech and those in power getting asked tough questions.

The United States and the international community have been appalled and outraged by the threats, beatings, and imprisonments of the last few days. I strongly condemn these unjust actions, and I join with the American people in mourning each and every innocent life that is lost.

I have made it clear that the United States respects the sovereignty of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and is not at all interfering in Iran’s affairs. But we must also bear witness to the courage and dignity of the Iranian people, and to a remarkable opening within Iranian society. And we deplore violence against innocent civilians anywhere that it takes place.

…

This is what we have witnessed. We have seen the timeless dignity of tens of thousands Iranians marching in silence. We have seen people of all ages risk everything to insist that their votes are counted and their voices heard. Above all, we have seen courageous women stand up to brutality and threats, and we have experienced the searing image of a woman bleeding to death on the streets. While this loss is raw and painful, we also know this: those who stand up for justice are always on the right side of history. 

Certainly seems to be taking a harder line, but undoubtedly, won’t be hard enough for the tough-talking neocon anklebiters.

Still, if McCain, Graham and others have a valid complaint, it is not with Obama’s words but with his music. The President of Cool seems emotionally disconnected from events in Tehran — not unconcerned but not particularly upset, either. This is a quality that will cost Obama plenty in coming years. He can acknowledge your pain, but he cannot feel it.

Richard Cohen has "crossed the streams" for once again, without realizing it naturally, tossing a GOP talking point down the drain — after all, "empathy" is supposedly a bad thing*. Next up, Andy McCarthy goes after Obama for not stepping in to save Jon & Kate — blames his foreign birth.

*Note: Obama Administration policy of "empathy" may not be readily available for Afghan/Pakistani civilians or Gay Americans.

[Welcome Cyrus Nowrasteh, Director / Writer, and Mozhan Marno,  Actor (Soraya M)]

Based on a true story, The Stoning of Soraya M. paints with horrifying clarity how women are disposable chattel in certain societies. Soraya’s husband wishes to divorce her, she refuses, so he and the local mullah hatch a plot to accuse her of adultery. In the aftermath of the accusation, Soraya’s brutal murder by stoning, and the conspiracy surrounding it, the truth is revealed.

It is painfully coincidental to be discussing this moving feature within days of the shooting of Neda in Tehran, a young woman who was watching demonstrations next her father when a Basiji militiaman shot her through the heart. Neda’s sister had been blogging about the elections the day before, so it is unclear if Neda–whose name means “voice” or “proclamation”–was mistaken for her sister, targeted in retaliation, or was shot simply because she was there. Neda has become a face of the protests, a symbol, much like the real Soraya M, whose story–originally a best selling book by French-Iranian journalist Freidoune Sahebjam–prompted outrage at the treatment of women.
 
Under Iranian law, to be stoned to death for adultery, there must be two collaborating witnesses, and Soraya’s abusive, manipulative husband Ali finds the second, the widower Hashem, who is pushed into testifying out of fear that his mentally disabled son will be taken from him.  The story of the villagers’ lies, blackmail and murderous deed is told to a stranded journalist (Sahebjam, played by James Caviezel) by Soraya’s aunt Zahra (Shohreh Aghdashloo) who tries her best to save Soraya, but is helpless against the mob rule and misogyny.

Soraya, poignantly portrayed by Mozhan Marno, ignores Zahra’s warnings; she believes that despite her husband’s beating and cruelties, he and the village could never commit such an act and her innocence is palpable as she is led to her death wearing a spotless white dress.

The film indicts those who pervert religion for their own ends–something that can seen in any faith. In The Stoning of Soraya M., the corrupt mullah agrees to help Soraya’s husband in order to protect his own position and to keep Ali from revealing his past as a supporter of the Shah. Yet, throughout the film Zahra positively evokes Islam, at one point telling Ali that "God is watching" his lies. And as she helps Sahebjam escape after he has recorded her story, Zahra repeatedly exclaims, “God is Great!” to a crowd of villagers.

The Stoning of Soraya M. is a tense drama, dark and suspenseful, anguished yet finally hopeful in that with the telling of this story, crimes like this will end. It is a beautiful film, disturbing and hard to watch, yet one that needs to be seen and taked about so that Soraya’s death and the deaths of thousands of women around the world for “crimes” like this do not go unanswered.

The Stoning of Soraya M. opens in the theatres June 26. Last year Amnesty International released their Campaign to End Stoning in Iran report as part of their  Stop Violence Against Women program.