Fantasy World in DC

[41chevy]

Obama: Critics of Iran nuclear deal 'selling a fantasy'

AP

By JULIE PACE

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama assailed critics of his Iran nuclear deal Wednesday as "selling a fantasy" to the American people, warning Congress that blocking the accord would damage the nation's credibility and increase the likelihood of more war in the Middle East.

Besides challenging opponents at home, Obama cast Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as the isolated international opponent of the historic accord, saying, "I do not doubt his sincerity, but I believe he is wrong.

The agreement would require Iran to curtail most of its nuclear program for at least a decade in exchange for 600 billion of dollars in relief from the U.S. and other international sources. But Netanyahu and a few critics in the U.S. argue that it would not stop Iran from building a bomb.

The president's blunt remarks, in an hour-long address at American University, were part of an intense lobbying campaign by the White House ahead of Congress' vote next month to either approve or disapprove the international agreement. Opponents of the agreement have streamed to Capitol Hill, too, to make their case, and they have spent tens of millions of dollars on advertisements. The White House considers them a radical fringe group using scare tactics.

The stakes are high, Obama said, contending that it isn't Iran's ability to build a bomb that is on the line but "America's credibility as the anchor and leader of international policy system."

"The choice we face is ultimately between diplomacy and a nuclear war," Obama said. "Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not three months from now, but very, very soon."

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President Barack Obama speaks about the nuclear deal with Iran, Wednesday, Aug. 5, 2015, at American …

Obama's diplomatic overtures to Iran, a centerpiece of his foreign policy agenda, have put him at odds with Republicans and some Democrats, as well as with Netanyahu, who has campaigned vigorously against the deal.

Netanyahu and U.S. critics of the Iran deal say Obama is presenting a false choice between accepting the deal at hand and going to war to stop Iran from building a bomb.

Obama told Jewish leaders in a private meeting Tuesday that he understood their concerns about them being cast as warmongers. But he made his case even more aggressively Wednesday by linking critics of the deal to those who pushed for the invasion of Iraq in 2003, a conflict President Obama considered a mistake.

"I have repeatedly challenged anyone opposed to this deal to put forward a better, plausible alternative," he said. "I have yet to hear one. What I've heard instead are the same types of arguments that we heard in the run-up to the Iraq war."

Drawing on more distant history, Obama said the Iran deal was in line with America's long tradition of "strong, principled diplomacy and successful negotiations with Iran" He spoke at the same university where John F. Kennedy called for Cold War diplomacy and nuclear disarmament, and he referred to Presidents Kennedy and Ronald Reagan a number of times.

View gallery

President Barack Obama speaks about the nuclear deal with Iran, Wednesday, Aug. 5, 2015, at American …

The Iran accord was finalized last month after more than a year of tense negotiations between Iran, the U.S., Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia. The president argues that if Congress blocks the accord, the European Union and the United Nations will lift their sanctions anyway, collapsing the best leverage the international community has to stop Iran from building a bomb.

Opponents say the deal leaves 90% of Iran's nuclear infrastructure in place and allows Tehran to rebuild its program quickly. Critics also contend Iran will use an influx of funds now frozen under the sanctions to boost terrorist activity around the Middle East.

The White House is preparing for the likelihood that lawmakers will vote against the deal next month and is focusing its lobbying efforts on getting enough Democrats to sustain a presidential veto. Only one chamber of Congress is needed to sustain a veto and keep the deal in place.

Obama needs 146 Democrats in the House or 34 in the Senate to sustain a veto. The White House has said it will sustain a veto in the House.

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Associated Press writers Josh Lederman, Donna Cassata and Deb Riechmann contributed to this report.

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[kscarbel2]

How could deciding not to go through with the deal damage our credibility abroad?

As anyone here that travels abroad knows, our reputation abroad is in the gutter. We are a laughing stock.

Our state department from back in the Bush era has all but destroyed the very high levels of credibility that our country once enjoyed.

Obama recently said the U.S. is “the key factor in ensuring stability and security in the world". We certainly were, but not at this point in time.

[david wild]

What is funny to me is that Bush attacked Iraq on bad intel, and Clinton is the one that destroyed the CIA, so who is to blame for the bad intel (Clinton) but Bush takes the heat and goes on. sign of a true man not a sex pervert. Obama is a f--k off and should sent to prison for what he has done and the lies he has told to the taxpayer.