Multiple lobbying groups in the US are expected to spend $100 million to force Congress to vote down the nuclear deal with Iran. Polls show that most Americans -- even most American Jews -- are in favor of the deal. Will Congress cave?
Multiple lobbying groups in the US are expected to spend $100 million to force Congress to vote down the nuclear deal with Iran. Polls show that most Americans -- even most American Jews -- are in favor of the deal. Will Congress cave?
Multiple lobbying groups in the US are expected to spend $100 million to force Congress to vote down the nuclear deal with Iran. Polls show that most Americans -- even most American Jews -- are in favor of the deal. Will Congress cave?
Hello everybody and welcome to the Liberty Report.
With me today is Daniel McAdams.
Daniel, good to see you today.
Good morning, sir.
Good.
One of the big items in the news right now, of course, continues to be, and that is the effort to have better relationships with Iran.
It turns out that the people who despise the notion that we should even talk to the Iranians are willing to spend $100 million.
Wonder what's going on here, why it is of this interest.
Are they saints and are doing this for the cause of peace?
Or just what it is, but $100 million to lobby the American people to support this and to twist the arms of Congress to try to dampen this effort which the president has been pursuing.
Yeah, you know, when Congress gets back in September, they're expected to vote on the deal, the Vienna deal.
And this money is being spent to influence Congress.
It's also, as you point out, being spent to propagandize Americans against it, because the big problem that the deep pockets have on this is that the majority of Americans are in favor of this deal.
And as we've discussed before the show, there was a recent survey that showed the majority of American Jews are in favor of this deal.
So they've got a task ahead of them, but they've got a lot of money.
That's right.
And they're pretty good at it.
You know, most of the time, the American people, when they're polled about starting a new war, they're all against it.
But then after the war propagandists get out, they change their mind.
So the cards are stacked in the wrong direction because there's a lot of money and they'll have some time here.
They'll be under the gun.
But this Los Angeles Jewish Journal did a national poll.
And I was really surprised with it, and I think a lot of other people would be because the assumptions are made that AIPAC speaks for the Jewish people.
But it turns out that 49% support the effort and 31% are opposed to it.
So it's a pretty good majority of people who are in support of this effort in the Jewish community.
And that is also true of all Americans.
They would like to see this effort made.
So it remains to be seen whether the lobbyists are going to win out on this.
It's interesting, as you say, APAC purports to speak for these people, but it's not the case.
You were saying before the show about you had another, in your profession, another situation.
Yeah, you know, I think this is not unusual.
Certain professional organizations, they get co-opted by certain groups, and then all of a sudden they speak for the group.
But, you know, a very small percentage of doctors belong to the AMA.
I bet it's less than 20%.
It's probably 15%.
And yet the AMA is always speaking for the doctors, but they speak for organized medicine, for the insurance companies, and this sort of thing.
And this has happened in some gun groups the same way they get the organizers to speak for it.
So the big question is, does APAC really speak for the Jewish people in this country?
Do they speak for the people in Israel?
But, you know, this same survey said that there's a discrepancy between what is perceived that the Jews in Israel, there's a larger number that want to support this effort than they want to deny it, but we don't hear anything about that.
Yeah, and well, you know, the people that support the deal say that it will ensure that Israel is the only country in the region that has a bomb, so you could actually be a hawk and say this is a good deal.
Well, you should, but that's the way it's existed.
They should be satisfied with their strength, but they are always worrying about a bomb that doesn't exist.
How many times were we warned 15, 20 years ago that they've been always warning they're on the verge of this, even though our security agencies have never said that.
Others have just tried to provoke things that way.
But there were also some former U.S. diplomats, significant diplomats that have been around for a while.
They came out and wrote a letter to support, to support this effort.
And these are individuals who worked in the regions, have been ambassadors over there, and they think it's worthwhile.
Someone like Thomas Pickering, who signed it, he's been an ambassador over numerous presidencies, a very long, distinguished diplomatic career.
So I think you're seeing a dividing line between people who do diplomacy for a living or did it, and they understand how these things work, and the people who are just trying to light fires and destroy the EU.
You know, the saying is, follow the money.
Dividing Lines Between Diplomats and Neocons00:09:06
Where is the money coming from and where is it going?
So there's money involved.
So is it just this issue of those bad Iranians maybe getting a nuclear weapon someday?
Or could there be some finances involved?
I happen to think there's always finances involved and always economics.
This is the anti-war people, many, when we were getting ready to go into Iraq, it's all about oil, all about oil.
It wasn't all about oil, but oil was significant.
Right now, you know, there's reasons, some people have postulated that the Iranians are, you know, on the verge of some big explosion if they get a little bit of a settlement here because they're a very wealthy country.
They have a lot of oil and they have natural resources and the geography is good.
It's not like Afghanistan or some of these other places.
And so they're spending a lot of money.
But the other thing that people should think about is, let's say the neocons are successful and they stop this.
That isn't the agreement.
The agreement wasn't between us and Iran.
It was an accord with six countries.
Do you think there's a probability that those five other countries are going to immediately withdraw and say, okay, America, we're going to bow down?
Or might they take the advantage of the economics that are coming about and could we then be pushed into a corner and lose some credibility, which I think is very risky because it may make our dollar even more vulnerable.
Yeah, I think that's a great point.
And people notice this is not a U.S.-Iran agreement.
These are six major powers who've signed on to it.
You know, the U.S. has spent a lot of years cajoling them and prodding them into putting on the sanctions.
But as you point out, when there are so many shovel-ready projects, so many business deals that are just waiting to go, if the other countries that signed this and approved it start reaping the benefits of trade with Iran, and the U.S. is left in the back, you know, holding a flag and yelling, hold on, we've got to put the sanctions back on, you know, the NACONs like to talk about American global leadership.
But if that happens, it's America by itself.
And I think, you know, of course, the foundation of our system is rather rocky.
But one argument that they're using that they throw out there, I think your so-called friend Bill Kristol threw this number out that, oh, you can't do this.
This will allow the Iranians to have $150 billion.
Well, is this going to come from the American taxpayers?
No.
This is money.
The precise number I don't think anybody knows because a lot of people have confiscated this wealth from the Iranians for many reasons unjustly.
So, but $150 they're dealing with, and they're saying, well, they're going to get this.
But these are stolen goods.
These are monies we took from them.
And we're giving back these assets.
And they're using this as a tool.
Well, you can't allow them to have what was once theirs.
It was very disingenuous of Crystal when he wrote his piece last week.
I think it was against the deal, because the implication certainly in his article was that we're going to send them a check for $150 billion in aid.
and he said, we're giving it to a regime with American blood on its hands.
And so by saying that, what he meant is that every bullet or any piece of equipment that had been manufactured in Iran, anywhere in Afghanistan or everywhere else, was directly Iran's responsibility if it killed an American, which is a pretty dangerous thing to think about when you think about the U.S. selling weapons around the world.
You know, the leadership there is, sometimes I question it.
You know, this seemed to be moving along, and it seemed to dampen the enthusiasm when you hear the Ayatollah come out with a statement, and one of their leaders come out, and it sounds just antagonistic.
And then, of course, the neocons jump on this.
But, you know, putting it in perspective, I think one could understand it because wouldn't it be true that if we were living in Iran and doing this and listening to the taunts and the yelling and screaming by our Congress and what they should do and the neocons, I mean, they're not exactly offering an olive branch.
And then you have an Ayatollah and leadership there who probably have to pacify, just like every country has the different factions.
They might have to say this to pacify them.
But anyway, it doesn't help things, but I think it's better we understand that they're listening to every bit as strong rhetoric as we're listening to from them.
Can you imagine sitting down to dinner, you're an Iranian family, you turn on the news, and hears Senator Cotton going on about, you know, or a Huckabee or someone like this, about how we've got to crush Iran, crush Iran.
Of course that's going to make you irritated.
And they're not going to know whether they have a lot of power or not.
You know, it'll be the American government once again.
It's the Congress.
And of course this would really be accentuated once this vote comes up.
And there's going to be a lot of split feelings on this too because the majority vote will be to stop it, but they won't have enough to override a veto by the president.
So there will be a lot.
And I think as we've just said, this is risky business.
I mean, we could, let's say the Hawks win, but they'll lose in the long run.
And there's a lot to be said about we should be thinking about maybe some of the advice of the founders, you know, trying to stay out of some of this mess.
You know, the one thing that struck me, and you said this a lot, it's the other side who are the isolationists.
In this sense, it certainly is the neocons who are the isolationists because they want to pull America out of the deal that the rest of the world is ready to go to.
Yeah, they're putting on sanctions and boycotts and everything else, and yet they call us, the free traders, the isolationists.
But they get away with it.
I've heard that term so often, you know, thrown at me.
That's why I like people to think about non-intervention because the last thing we are is want to be isolationists.
We're supposed to be talking to people, and that's, of course, the reason that we've talked favorably about the excitement going on with Cuba.
And now that we hear good reports, you know, this looks good.
One thing that I saw in this process, which isn't shown very often, it was the young Iranians.
And they weren't in religious garb or anything.
They looked like American college kids.
I don't know.
They were like they had Western clothes on and everything else.
And they were excited about this.
Of course, the neocons turn this and say, oh, yeah, they're going to get $150 billion back and they're going to get a bomb.
Those kids, these kids aren't even thinking about it.
Just thinking about freedom.
They have internet access.
They know what's going on and they want a better life.
And there were a few pictures of that that I thought were fantastic.
Yeah, I saw them as well.
So, anyway, I want to thank everybody for tuning in today to the Liberty Report.
And I'm sure this subject about the Iranian peace effort is going to be around for a while, although there will be a vote in Congress soon.
It looks like right now the majority will oppose these negotiations, but the president will be able to veto this.
But once again, I argue for the side that we at least ought to talk to people.
If we talked to the Soviets when they had 30,000 of these, both Reagan talked to the Soviets as well as Kennedy did, and it all was for good.
But now we're talking about a country that is not on the verge of invading another country, nor do they have the facilities to do it.
And I really believe that high on their agenda is not building a nuclear bomb.
And they also do not practice suicide.
And this would be suicidal for them.
If they tried anything like that, all of the country of Iran would be wiped off the map if they did it.
And they know that.
And I think most of these neocon warmongers know that too.
And they have other things in mind.
But right now, we ought to just slow down.
And when there's an opportunity to talk and maybe move toward more peaceful relationships and trade relationships, that's what we ought to do.
Nixon did it with China.
And he had to do it in secret because he knew that the demagogues would demagogue that and say it was terrible.
Yet, in spite of the continued shortcomings on our side and their side, we're doing much better.
At least we're not shooting and killing each other.
So I'm always going to vote for the trade and the relationships, friendly relationships with any country that's willing to participate.