Knee Jerks


Knee prepared to jerk

Knee prepared to jerk

Reading time – 42 seconds  .  .  . 

New York, July 14, 2015 – These exchanges took place on the Morning Joe program on MSNBC just moments after a deal between 6 countries and Iran to prevent nuclear proliferation had been announced and before anyone other than the negotiating parties knew its terms.

Mika Brzezinski: “Senator Lindsey Graham, have you seen the deal?”

S. Graham (R SC): “Ah, no.”

Seconds later he continued:

S. Graham: “We’ve ensured that [Iran will] become a nuclear nation, ensured that there will be a nuclear arms race  .  .  . You have created a possible death sentence for Israel  .  .  .  This is a virtual declaration of war against Sunni Arabs.”

Later on the same TV program  .  .  .

Joe Scarborough: “Senator [Tom Cotton, R-AR]*, you obviously heard the president’s speech. What’s your initial reaction?”

S. Cotton: “Joe, this proposed deal is a terrible, dangerous mistake that’s going to pave the path for Iran to get a nuclear weapon, while also giving them tens of billions of dollars of sanctions relief, even lifting the arms embargo at a time when they’re destabilizing the entire middle-east  .  .  .”

JS: “Does [the aggressive inspection regime] satisfy your concerns about inspections?”

S. Cotton: “No, Joe .  .  .  They will have weeks to delay, they’ll be able to decide which sites that we inspect .  .  .”

It’s most impressive that these men along with so many other Republicans seem to be clairvoyant, in that somehow they see all the danger embedded into an arms limitation agreement that they haven’t read and about which they are totally ignorant.

Actually, it is far more than sad that they have a knee-jerk rejection to anything President Obama supports and that they justify their rejections with fabricated facts. The reason it is more than sad is that they are willing – even eager – to counter the president even if their self-serving behavior leads to another avoidable war. They prefer dead soldiers and a plundered American treasury over resolving differences through diplomacy if diplomacy might give the president a “win.”

These knee jerks could reasonably be accused of treason.

* Senator Tom Cotton is the author of the letter signed by 47 Republican senators sent to the leaders of Iran. It indirectly instructed the Iranian leaders not to trust the President of the United States. That could reasonably be called treasonous, too.

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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we are on a path to continually fail to make things better. It is my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That is the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.

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2 Responses to Knee Jerks
  1. Jim Altschuler Reply

    There are no bounds to ignorance or stupidity. The Republican party members of the House and Senate have spent Mr. Obama’s entire presidency doing everything possible to keep him from accomplishing anything and to discredit any and every accomplishment that the President, his staff and the House and Senate Democrats have made.

    Despite their interference and foolishness, the president has put through legislation and programs that past presidents have tried to put through repeatedly without success. Now, in spite of the 47 who signed that stupid, treasonous letter and a bevy of naysayers including many representatives of other nations around the world, with the efforts of Secretary of State John Kerry spearheading the negotiations, the President has accomplished what was believed by many to be impossible.

    Yet these ignorant _____s (fill in your own term) in the legislature who know nothing about the content and terms of the agreement are trying again to tear down what the President and his people have built.

    Isn’t it time to vote these ignorant, self-serving, big business serving fools out of office by electing other people of either party who really want to represent the people of their states and the best interests if the United States of America?

  2. dominick Reply

    I wonder if our American mass media press is even more disturbing than our lying and self-serving politicians. Don’t expect them to challenge any foolish or unsubstantiated comments from politicians for fear of not getting another interview with them to feature on their tabloid news programs.

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