Bonus Blog: Yesterday, April 2, 2015

Yesterday was positively amazing to watch. I ran a couple of errands and picked up our mail around 11:30; on my way back home I found myself in a positive snow flurry. By the time I got home, it had gone. A little while alter, while having lunch, I saw it begin to snow again – huge flakes worthy of full-on winter. For half an hour they attacked the ground like GI’s on Omaha Beach, and began to blanket our just greening lawn and our porches. Then the sun came out and the snow retreated. A while later the snow returned, but this time its strategy had changed: this time it attacked only the front half of the house. One porch was turning white while the back porch was bathed in sunlight. And, again, the snow gave way in the end. But it was not done. There was one more assault in store. As the afternoon deepened the snow attacked the whole region of our home, and fell so hard and thick and fast that the air turned white. But the ground was still warm and even that last onslaught gave way as a beautiful nearly full moon began its slow arc across the sky even before the sun began to set. The other thing that happened yesterday was that Iran and the so-called P-5+1 reached an agreement on the framework for a more formal agreement to limit Iran’s nuclear production, dismantle their main plutonium plant and reconfigure it, and open itself up for full on inspections. It was a monumental achievement partly between two countries highly suspicious of each other – but only partly. Five other permanent members of the United Nations Security Council participated in the negotiations, including Russia and China. To think this was a US-Iranian deal is ridiculous; to think that, in any way, shape or form, the chance to monitor Iran is more dangerous to the world than things as they are, or another war in the region, is insane; to think that the deal relies on trust and not precise and careful methods of accountability, is insulting.. Nothing yet has been signed. There are three months to hammer out the fine details and to understand the full implications of the deal. What we don’t need is obstruction, especially when so many other crucial nations are moving forward. We do not need 47 senators clamoring for a course that might lead to conflict, unless those 47 legislators are going to be the ones putting their asses on the line – literally. We need responsible thinking to scrutinize and perfect the plan. We need to bring Iran back into the world of nations. We need to protect our allies in the region by stripping Iran of its capability to create nuclear weapons overtly or covertly, and this treaty, once signed, will do just that. If the United States fails in this, the term Rogue may be applied to us. And that would be as likely as snowfall in April in Montana.