Iran, in Today's News 09.24.09

Iran. Today's Wall Street Journal headline: "Obama Gains Russian Support on Iran". The reality is actually quite a bit different.

The Obama administration announced a week or so ago that the US would unilaterally abandon its effort to build missile interceptors and radar in Poland and the Czech Republic. The goal was to make a concession to the Russians in the hope that Russia would modify its support of Iran. Russian support to Iran is a major obstacle to US and Israel efforts to confront Iran. It would be a help to the US if the Russians did nothing when the US and Israel attack Iran.

This diplomatic maneuver was to bring results this week when Obama and Russian President Medvedev met at the G-20 meeting.

So, what happened? The Russians agreed....to a proposal that they had already supported!!!! "The US and its allies [read Israel] have decided to present Iran once more with a version of an offer they have made previously: They would halt efforts to enact new economic sanctions against Tehran in exchange for it freezing it production of nuclear fuel..." This stance is know as the 'freeze for freeze' proposal.

So, in other words, what the US achieved with its overture to the Russians was absolutely nothing!!! Even worse Obama managed to give away a key bargaining chip in exchange for zilch. Experienced negotiators must be stunned by the incompetence of Obama and his team.

The WSJ and others in the media are portraying this development as a great victory for Obama. "President Obama scored a potential victory in his diplomatic engagement with Iran by gaining what appeared to be a commitment from...Medvedev..."

Note that the puff language to build up Obama is qualified by 'potential victory' and 'appeared to be'. The heavy thinkers on the cryptocracy team know what happened (or didn't happen), but they must nonetheless build up their spokesman Obama.

The truth is this little diplomatic adventure was debacle. The cryptocracy for one and the Israelis for two are not going to be pleased. Their desired war on Iran remains stalled.

H1N1 (Swine) Flu Update No 46, in Today's News 09.23.09

H1N1 (Swine) Flu. It is beginning to look like the cryptocracy decided that it had had enough problems with health care, financial regulatory reform, Afghanistan, and Iraq to also take on a full-fledged mandatory vaccination program.

Schools have been in session for at least a couple of weeks. One would expect, based on the scare-campaign propaganda, that the hospitals would now be bulging with swine-flu victims. But news of the virus has virtually disappeared from the media.

What happened? In addition to the significant public opposition to the cryptocracy/Obama 'reforms', the coordinators of the swine flu scare campaign have a temporary logistical problem. They won't have enough vaccine until mid-October. And so there is no sense in going all-out on their campaign when there is no vaccine to stampede people toward.

Things will get interesting again in October.

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Russia has not gone along with the cryptocracy's swine flu campaign. In fact they have been downright uncooperative.

The cryptocracy certainly cannot tolerate such insolence. Moreover, the Russian have the capability to spill the beans on the phoniness of the scare campaign. So, the cryptocrats found a respectable member of the Russian medical world to issue a statement attacking the government's swine-flu stance. 

The Wall Street Journal reports on this development today under the headline,"Doctor Says Russia Understating Swine-Flu Cases."

Iran, in Today's News 09.17.09

Iran. The preparations for a United States confrontation with Iran are growing more serious. The US is now trying to clear some of the obstacles to the US-Israel plan to bring Iran to its knees. One of the principle obstacles is Russia's support to Iran.

On September 16 the Wall Street Journal ran a story covered by all the media. The headline: "Medvedev Blasts Russian System." If one reads the article one learns that Medvedev did no such thing. His criticisms of Russian corruption, etc., were the same as Putin's, with whom Medvedev says he talks regularly. The article implies a break between Putin and Medvedev which exists only in the imagination of the author.

What's going on here? Believe it or not, but the cryptocracy's employees actually think that they can drive a wedge between Medvedev and Putin, by indicating to Medvedev that if he plays ball they will be helpful to him. Somehow the foreign policy experts think they have a better chance of neutralizing Russia on the Iran issue with Medvedev. Fat chance.

Then today, the White House leaked that the "US to Shelve Nuclear-Missile Shield" (page one headline in the Wall Street Journal). The US is now abandoning the Bush Administration plans to build a missile-defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic. The idea is to please Russia, but the 'allies' will be infuriated. That the US is willing to make such a dramatic move indicates how seriously the US wants the confrontation with Iran and wants it with no opposition from Russia.

The message to Medvedev is pretty clear: the US is willing to make big efforts to show that Russia is better off under him than Putin. The US may have some intelligence to show that these maneuvers may actually work, but success is highly doubtful. The US actions seem to be a fairly desperate attempt to get Russia out of the way.

Israel keeps pushing the US to end Iran's nuclear efforts and to secure Israel's position of dominance in the middle east. The pressure keeps mounting and Obama's time to make some sort of decision grows short. 

The decision to confront Iran is a 'lose-lose' proposition, but Obama has little choice than to go ahead. 

These American maneuvers are part of the build up to a meeting between Medvedev and Obama at the G-20 meeting next week.