05/06/15 – Jim Lobe – The Scott Horton Show

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All right, you guys, welcome back to the show.
I'm Scott Horton.
It's my show, The Scott Horton Show.
Our first guest today is the great Jim Loeb, Washington editor of Enterprise Service and keeper of the Loeb Log.
That's spelled like your earlobe there.
LoebLog.com.
So your pal and mine, Ali Gharib, has an article here at your site, LoebLog.com.
And, of course, you're just as good on all this stuff as him.
And he was unavailable, but anyway, this is the subject matter I'd like to cover, at least for starters here.
And that is the politics, particularly in the U.S. Senate, on the Corker bill to give the Congress oversight, an up or down vote, I guess, on the Iran nuclear deal after the deal is struck, presuming that it is struck.
And all the mess going on with the so-called poison pill amendments, if indeed that's what they are and what's behind that.
And the split between the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and some of the more prominent neoconservative writers and all of that.
So dive right in and tell us what you think is important here.
Well, I don't know.
I mean, I think the legislative situation is kind of fluid at the moment.
The majority leader, Mitch McConnell, said that he wanted to wrap up a vote on the Corker bill, the Corker-Cardin bill, by tomorrow.
So I assume now that he's spoken, that's what will happen and there won't be any additional controversial amendments.
So the bill will pass.
Then it has to be taken up by the House.
And I don't know how quickly Boehner wants to take it up.
I'm just not clear about that at all.
I think there has been some talk within the Republican caucus about a couple of alternatives.
One is to indeed force a vote on a final agreement, presuming one is reached by the end of June or shortly thereafter, either in July or September, and to force the Democrats to vote not to disapprove of the deal, which the Republicans think will be a winner for them.
But there's also the possibility that there'll be an effort to put some of the more radical amendments like requiring Iran to recognize Israel onto unrelated legislation like the Pentagon Authorization Act, which is coming up next month.
And so I guess there's quite a lot of debate about what the Republicans are going to do.
But to go back to the original question and what Ali was writing about on the blog, essentially there's been something of a split, at least in tactics, between AIPAC on the one hand and more radical forces led by Bill Kristol at the Weekly Standard, who is also the director of the Emergency Committee for Israel, and within Congress by Tom Cotton, the Arkansas senator, as well as Marco Rubio, it seems that they wanted their so-called poison pill amendments to be voted on.
Whereas AIPAC, the premier Israel lobby, which tries very hard to retain its bipartisan appeal, has taken the position that Corker-Cardin should be passed without any poison pill amendments, because I think they wish to set the stage for a vote of disapproval of any deal.
I think that's their goal.
So there's a serious tactical disagreement between – Well, what is Bill Kristol going for?
I don't understand why they would – I mean, I understand that they claim that the Corker bill, Corker-Cardin, whatever, is not hardcore enough.
It doesn't give them – it doesn't require a two-thirds supermajority ratification and this kind of thing and that kind of deal.
But those aren't the amendments, right?
The poison pill amendments are just, oh, you have to never give another dollar to Hezbollah or you have to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, which even the Israelis don't necessarily do in law, right?
That's still controversial in Israel, but it's not supposed to be for Iran.
And then – but so the only purpose of those amendments could be to force Obama to veto it, right?
And then so they could try again and have harsher terms in the next bill.
Is that the point?
Well, I think there are a number of different considerations.
I mean remember Kristol is not only a kind of Likud activist.
He's also a Republican activist.
And he comes from neoconservative royalty whose roots lie in kind of people who were at least flirting with Trotskyism.
And they retain that kind of Trotsky element of if you can't get what you want, you burn it down.
There's a kind of all or nothing mentality at work.
And I think the idea is okay – I mean Kristol originally supported the Corker bill when it was originally introduced because it had a number of provisions that were very problematic to the administration.
And the administration was strongly opposed to it.
But I think when Cardin moved in and began negotiating a compromise with Corker, which eventually was approved by the Foreign Relations Committee unanimously, those more problematic provisions were either eliminated or substantially watered down.
And Kristol became increasingly unhappy with Corker and eventually came out strongly against it.
And I think he's acting as both a pro-Israel or pro-Likud, more precisely, activist and as a Republican activist because he believes that the Iran deal will not be popular.
And to the extent that Republicans can show that they oppose an Iran deal, that that will benefit them in the 2016 elections.
AIPAC, on the other hand, of course, wants to retain its bipartisan kind of stature.
And so they welcomed the Cardin agreement because – Does he mean popular as in the American public or popular within powerful Republican donors?
Well, he certainly, I think, represents the interests of some of the powerful Republican donors like Sheldon Adelson.
Because, of course, the polls say that even most Republicans – the worst poll I saw on this was that a plurality of Republicans support the bill.
And in other cases, it's the outright majority – or not the bill, but, I mean, the nuclear deal itself.
Well, I mean, I think he thinks that there are enough holes to be poked in the deal that they can bring around Republican voters.
But he – I mean, he does also, as you suggest, kind of represent the interests of some wealthy Republican donors who are going to play a major role in determining who the presidential candidate is going to be for the Republican Party in 2016.
Now, I mean, what's interesting – I think the most interesting thing and what was – what Ali noted in his post was that the Wall Street Journal editorial board, which is about as hardline neoconservative as you can find, implicitly criticized Kristol's position and ultimately backed AIPAC.
All right.
Now, hold it right there, Jim.
We've got to take this break.
But when we get back, we'll talk about that, the splits within the neocons.
And there are various editorial pages here over the tactics that they're employing against the Iran deal, particularly in the Senate, with the great Jim Loeb at loeblog.com.
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All right, you guys.
Welcome back.
I'm Scott Horton.
This is my show, The Scott Horton Show.
I'm talking with the great Jim Loeb from Interpress Service and loeblog.com.
We're talking about politics of the Iran deal here.
Ali Gharib has a new one there, Neocon versus Neocon on Iran.
And that's where we left off was we got Jen Rubin in the Washington Post.
We've got, I guess, just the Wall Street Journal in the Wall Street Journal.
I don't know if it was an unsigned editorial.
And then you've got Bill Kristol, of course, at the Weekly Standard.
And then you've got his protege, as Ali Gharib calls him, Tom Cotton and suck-up Marco Rubio in the Senate following Kristol's lead.
And so where we left off at the break, he said the Wall Street Journal in a kind of understated way, but they pretty much went out after Bill Kristol for pushing these poison pill amendments against the Corker deal.
And as did Jen Rubin of the Washington Post, which was also a surprise because these are very hardline neoconservative – well, in the case of the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal institution.
And then Rubin herself is quite shrill in her own, I think, extremism.
But yeah, they both criticized, at least implicitly, Kristol and Cotton.
But again, I think this is mainly a tactical disagreement.
They're saying, you know, don't let the – to Bill, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
We can still use Corker-Cardin in order to, at the very least, embarrass Democrats and perhaps even derail the deal or sabotage a deal through congressional action.
Although the Wall Street Journal's editorial is particularly interesting because it seemed to be reconciled to a deal being reached, number one.
And number two, Congress really being unable to do anything about it until the successor to Obama takes office in January 2017.
They're looking much further ahead.
They seem to think that a deal at this point is inevitable, and they'd like to be able to derail it whenever it is that Obama leaves office.
Yeah, that's interesting that that's their take on it is that once they get the deal signed under this bill, under the Cardin bill, assuming it passes both houses and is signed by the president, that even though they have the authority to vote it down, they won't be able to.
Do you think that's really right?
Well, I mean, I think barring any unexpected event or any kind of provocation by either hardliners in Iran or Saudi Arabia or Israel that would involve any kind of military action on the part of Iran and in some way then oblige the United States to do something.
Barring that scenario, I don't think the votes are going to be there to reject a deal.
I think the Republican quest for a veto proof majority is at this point considered quixotic, at least by the Wall Street Journal.
And it may even be that they won't be able to get enough votes to prevent a Democratic filibuster against any resolution to disapprove the deal.
I think they're hoping that they can get disapproval of the deal and force a veto, but they may not have enough votes.
Well, it seems like once they announce we got a deal and the entire United Nations permanent membership of the Security Council are behind it and look at all the signatures on it and we're moving forward now, then it's got to be the case that, again, all things being equal, as you said, no jandala attacks inside Iran or anything over the weekend.
Or not the weekend, but you know what I mean, over the time between the end of June, here in the end of June.
Then at that point, then the political winds will have really shifted toward the president and they would really be, it would really be bad politics at that point, probably for them to spoil the deal after it's already signed, right?
I mean, that's what I think.
I think it'll be even very difficult for a Republican president to back out of a deal unless there's some kind of flagrant violation of the agreement that takes place, that a secret enrichment facility is discovered or something along those lines.
But frankly, I mean, even Benjamin Netanyahu has told his security cabinet that his worst fear is that Iran will be scrupulous in abiding by any deal for the life of that deal.
And therefore, there will be no way to overturn it at all or overturn Iran's accumulating expertise on nuclear power and how you use nuclear energy.
Well, you know, one thing that's interesting about all this is, I mean, and I'm generalizing obviously, but there's value in it.
It seems to me like this nuclear deal actually doesn't change anything.
They're going from a safeguarded civilian nuclear program to a very, very safeguarded nuclear program, civilian electricity program here.
And I mean, obviously they've made some major concessions, but they haven't changed the nature of their program at all because it never was really about making weapons in the first place.
Although maybe a little bit of research had been done here or there, but I think even most of that has been debunked by your Gareth Porter, among others.
And so it really doesn't make much difference because all the war party hype about Iran and their nuclear program has basically been just a bunch of hype all along.
So there's no reason for them to change.
Even as this Politico article put it, the GOP is not arguing science on Iran.
They got some slogans, but they don't want to argue about what percent uranium-235 it takes to make a bomb because they'll lose that argument.
Or about the details of the safeguards agreement, they'd lose that argument.
And so all they've got is a bunch of hype and all we've got is a civilian nuclear program.
So I don't see really what's the big deal kind of either way for reality or for their continued narrative that Iran is a threat.
So what's really their problem with this thing anyway?
I mean like – I'm sorry, one more just to try to make myself clear because I'm not very eloquent sometimes.
Like that story you just were referring to where Netanyahu said his fear is that if this deal takes place and the Iranians live up to it, that they'll be able to normalize relations with the world and with the West and that kind of thing.
But I don't see that in the cards at all, right?
Do you?
No, I mean actually I do believe – I mean I think what the – I don't think the Israelis are fearful of a nuclear attack by Iran on Israel.
I think what they're fearful of is a major change in the balance of power in the Middle East.
And I think personally that it's indisputable that if a deal is reached and sanctions are lifted, Iran is going to become a much bigger player than it is now.
I don't think it can achieve hegemony over the region by any means because there are just too many states that are against it and that will oppose hegemony and are able to do that.
But it will become a much bigger factor than it has been.
And to the extent that the West in general and the US in particular can achieve any kind of rapprochement with Iran, people's power calculations in the region will change.
Certainly, Saudi Arabia has quite a lot to lose in terms of its influence, and I think Israel fears that it also will lose.
And at the same time, Iran already has considerable influence through, for example, the Syrian regime and through Hezbollah on Israel's border.
And Israel and Saudi Arabia both would have to adjust quite substantially to this changed situation.
And I think both being essentially status quo powers, they find that a very difficult prospect for them.
And particularly, again, to the extent that Iran defines itself as being opposed to Israel and being opposed to the kind of Sunni supremacy that Saudi Arabia has become increasingly aggressive about, there could be a lot of trouble for those two countries.
I mean, it's not a pleasant prospect if you're used to a certain situation where a very, very, well, a hyper power like the United States is essentially backing you virtually without condition for a period of more than 30 years.
And suddenly you have someone in your neighborhood who the United States is taking much more seriously as a possible partner in various respects at your expense.
I mean, I think it's perceived also by those powers as a zero-sum game.
So any gain by Iran is a loss to them.
And I think that's a lot of what is motivating this.
On the Republican side, since you raised that question, I think – I mean, because you have the importance of political donors like Sheldon Adelson, like Paul Singer, on which Republican presidential candidates will necessarily depend, they feel obliged to take strongly anti-Iranian positions.
And you can see that virtually every day that the candidates are kind of competing with each other for Adelson's help and support.
And that also I think is contributing to the kind of political movements or maneuvers that we're seeing.
And I think that partially explains at least why the Republicans are so eager to be seen as attacking the deal.
Right.
Well, and it seems like it's still a minor rapprochement at best, and scaremongering against Iran will still continue.
It was funny, Gareth had that piece yesterday about how the missile defense lobby has Iran as their entire excuse.
So this is a very powerful lobby.
And there are many other interests, as you mentioned there, for 30 years, not just Israel and Saudi, but all kinds of interests are used to the status quo there.
And then I saw where Obama this morning was saying, oh, no, yeah, no, we definitely still need missile defense in case Iran ever does go nuclear.
So I thought maybe he was reading Gareth and decided he would give a deliberate sop to the missile defense lobby that, don't worry, guys, we'll keep you on the dole if you'll line up behind the nuclear deal here.
Well, yeah, it may not be the U.S. who's consuming the missile defense.
It may be a lucrative market and undoubtedly is a lucrative market for the GCC countries, including Saudi Arabia.
I mean, it's lucrative for the defense contractors who want to sell to these countries.
So they'll keep hyping the Iran threat.
And to a certain extent, even though there may be some rapprochement and some cooperation between the U.S. and Iran on regional issues, I'm sure that whatever administration is in power here in Washington, they'll still keep talking about the potential threat of Iran because they want to keep Saudi Arabia on their side.
And they want – particularly I think the goal of the Obama administration is to achieve some kind of equilibrium between Iran and the Sunni powers and Israel in the region so that the United States can begin to move to a more offshore position as a balancer and at the same time sell a lot of weapons to worried clients.
Yeah, well, I already kept you over time, so I'll go for one more thing.
I had Mark Perry on the show, and it was about Pentagon opposition to the war in Yemen that they're fighting.
And that was one of the things that he was saying was that on the bright side, there are some weapons contractors who are looking forward to selling to Iran itself rather than just selling to the Saudis against.
They can sell to both sides again.
It's been since the 70s since Lockheed got to equip them with fighter jets and that kind of stuff, right?
Yeah, no, I think that's true.
And it was taken here, the Russian announcement that they would indeed go ahead with the sale of these pretty advanced air defense systems to Iran, which they first promised like more than a decade ago, is a bid by Russia to make a claim to the anticipated arms market that Iran will represent.
I mean, we're really going back and kind of in time to perhaps, well, defeating a lot of weapons to the entire region and making a lot of money that way.
All right, well, with that, I will let you go.
Thank you so much for coming back on the show, Jim.
Yeah, not at all.
It was a pleasure.
Great to talk to you.
That's the great Jim Loeb, everybody.
He's at loeblog.com, Washington Bureau Chief for Interpret Service, IPSnews.net.
This one is by Ali Gharib, Neocon versus Neocon on Iran, and Charles Goyette is next.
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