The White House dismisses Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei’s “Death to America” chant rants as “intended for a domestic political audience.”
Can we say the same thing about President Obama’s and Secretary of State John Kerry’s public reassurances about their nuclear treaty with Iran?
Besides, has anyone told the Obama administration that Khamenei doesn’t have to please his “domestic political audience” because Iranian voters don’t get to elect him? Indeed, he and his fellow mullahs decide who Iranian voters get vote on.
While President Obama tries to convince the American people, and especially members of Congress (including lots of Democrats), that he and Kerry are wringing concessions out of the Iranians, almost no one believes him. In fact, the mullahs have boasted on many occasions that they’re strumming Obama like a banjo.
As the Daily Caller reports (along with video), in 2013 Iranian President Hassan Rouhani explained that when the negotiations started, “We could not produce one gram of U4 or U6 [uranium hexafluoride]. …We did not have the heavy-water production. We could not produce yellow cake. Our total production of centrifuges inside the country was 150.”
He went on to say that by stalling for time they got to where they could do all of those things. And he said that Iran not only didn’t stop its nuclear program in 2003 after it agreed to do so, it expanded it.
And in December 2013, Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif implied his side deceived Obama during the nuclear negotiations, asserting it was Iran’s absolute right to continue enriching nuclear fuel and the country could easily reverse any enrichment limitations.
The White House is trying to deflect those occasional instances of Iranian honesty. When CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta pressed White House spokesman Josh Earnest about Khamenei’s “death to America” chants, he asked, “And you feel like you can negotiate in good faith with a supreme leader who is calling for ‘death to America’?” Earnest responded, “Jim, what we have seen is—we have seen the Iranians sit down at the negotiating table and demonstrate a willingness to have constructive conversations.”
As to those negotiations, David Blair, chief foreign correspondent for the London Daily Telegraph, reports, “Under the possible compromise, Iran would accept a limit of 6,000 operational centrifuges and export almost all of its 7.9 tons of low-enriched uranium.” But then he adds, “These two steps would ensure that its scientists would be at least one year away from producing enough weapons-grade uranium for one nuclear bomb.” He might be safer in saying “at most one year away.”
The sticky issues appear to be—since we only learn of these things through leaks—how quickly the economic sanctions against Iran would end and, most importantly, how much access international inspectors will have. Without robust inspections it will be impossible to know if Iran is complying with the agreement or, as in 2003, expanding its efforts.
If Obama gets a deal—and the general consensus seems to be that he will do almost anything to get one—don’t be surprised if the agreement stresses ending the sanctions first and compliance verification second. Like legislation that includes tax increases and spending cuts, you usually get the former but never the later.
But the even bigger political challenge for Obama is a skeptical public that doesn’t believe him anymore. And who can blame them? He and his team have been caught so many times parsing words, warping facts, and misrepresenting reality that he doesn’t deserve the benefit of the doubt.
Like so many other times in his six years in office, we’ll have to get a treaty before we know what’s in it.