The False Premise Of The Iran Debate [1]
November 23, 2011 1:19 pm ET — Walid Zafar
Being a hawk means never having to say you’re sorry.
The Iraq war did not discredit the idea of war, but it certainly should discredit the people who strongly promoted it. In fact, it has in most circles. But among conservatives, such people still have the standing to be taken seriously when they promote another war based on false premises, exaggeration and lies. Although most of the Iraq deceivers are out of government today, they still populate think tanks, op-ed pages and, most troubling, the campaigns of most of the GOP candidates for president.
Case in point: At last night’s GOP presidential debate, Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute, one of the loudest cheerleaders for the Iraq war, addressed the candidates:
Good evening. I’m Danielle Pletka. I’m the Vice President for Foreign and Defense Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute. Yesterday the United States and the U.K. slapped new sanctions on Iran. But we haven’t bought oil directly from Iran in over 30 years. We’ve had targeted sanctions on Iran for more than half that time. Nonetheless, Iran is probably less than a year away from getting a nuclear weapon. Do you believe that there is any set of sanctions that could be put in place that would stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon?
The question about sanctions is a good one. She acknowledges that the sanctions she’s advocated have failed and she wants to know if the candidates will consider further sanctions to deter Iran’s nuclear ambitions and slow down its program. But the premise of the question is not just false, it’s completely fabricated.
Either Pletka has seen intelligence that literally no one else in the world has access to or, despite being a scholar at one of the most renowned conservative think tanks, she’s just lying through her teeth. Read More [1]