This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The full text of the memorandum has been released and confirmed by the White House:
If this is signed as written on Friday, I predict major ructions in the GOP, particularly the Senate, which were already coming to a head before this.
If this deal goes through, it's going to be an absolute disaster. $300 billion USD, all assets unfrozen, and full access to the Strait along with Oman. Are you kidding me? That's far worse than anything Obama or Biden ever did regarding Iran. All that money going straight into the pockets of terrorists. More money, apparently, than the post-World War II Marshall Plan was in 2026 money ($180 billion). I would have said that they're in a better position than they started in, if many of their leaders weren't killed. But I hope this deal falls through, seriously. It successfully coming through would be a bigger loss than Afghanistan was for Biden. The Israelis need to violate the agreement for our own good.
The deal is crafted so they actually don't get any of that until the final agreement; it is also crafted to appear as though they get that beforehand; #11 is particularly deceptive in this manner. What they get immediately is an end to the blockade and permission to sell oil during negotiations.
This is the crux of the text as is. Most concessions in both sides are in three buckets: what the belligerents offer right now regardless of any deal, what the belligerents offer later conditional on a complete deal, and what the belligerents can't offer personally but promise to pursue via other actors later.
For example, number 11 states "The United States of America undertakes to make fully available for use, the frozen or restricted funds and assets of the Islamic Republic of Iran upon the implementation of this MoU. The United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran will mutually agree on the procedures related to the release of these funds during the negotiations."
This states that the US undertakes to make fully available, not immediately makes fully available, with the second sentence stating that the procedure for making available must be mutually agreeable based on later negotiations. Later negotiations, in turn, depending on the prospect of the final deal, until which the US side can claim no mutually agreed procedure has been achieved. While this does not necessarily need to be entirely tied to the 'final deal', the it can be as the US, not Iran, desires, with Iran likely going to push for more early and the US pushing for progress/concessions to get there.
Further, most frozen Iranian funds are not frozen under US jurisdiction. The US agreeing to issue all necessary licenses- which is again contingent on the mutual agreed procedure- does not give the US licensing authority over other actors. This turns into an angle where the holding countries have a veto authority over the return of frozen funds. After all, the US undertakes to make fully available, but anyone who reads this as an obligation to 'strongarm' the countries in question is significantly misreading who is liable to try strongarming countries one on one.
Most frozen Iranian funds outside US jurisdiction are frozen by people who were bullied into it by US secondary sanctions. Both the US and Iran know that they will be unfrozen quickly if the US wants them to be, and are negotiating on that basis.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Hmm I'm not proficient in legalese, what does 11 actually mean?
See Dean's comment. The unfreezing of funds is on the table (as is the downblending or other destruction of the uranium). But it doesn't happen as part of the M.O.U. If Iran and the US are negotiating in good faith we'd expect an agreement to conclude in which the funds were released as the uranium was.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Then I sincerely hope that the final agreement doesn't come to pass. You can't trust these guys as far as you can throw them, and no assets whatsoever should be unfrozen for them under any circumstances as long as they continue to be the #1 source of terrorism in the Middle East. There better be some teeth behind the "no nukes" part of the deal, or this is worse than the JCPOA.
The $300 billion not being taxpayer funded is great, but that's still $300 billion going towards the terrorist capital of the world.
The important thing for the US is the nuclear material. Terrorism in the middle east -- outside of shooting at ships in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf/Strait of Hormuz/Gulf of Oman -- honestly, isn't a huge US problem. It's more of a problem for Israel. I expect the final agreement will say that Iran won't support terrorist groups in Lebanon and Israel won't attack Lebanon, and that part of the agreement will last about 5 minutes before it is violated.
That was my (very rough, uninformed) understanding of the famous Obama Iran deal - good for Iran, good for the United States, bad for Israel. So naturally Israel has leapt at every chance it can get to sabotage it.
I am waiting for the "only Nixon could go to China" moment, translated into the current situation as "only Trump could abandon Israel."
Trump has the unique opportunity to forge a reasonably lasting peace with Iran and getting them to abandon "death to America" and nuclear materials in exchange for completely abandoning Israel. It might get some bipartisan support, and it would be politically impossible for a democratic president and most republican presidents.
In this way, Trump could legitimately claim to have put America first, and I would admit that he secured an excellent deal. He would get a lot of heat for it, but I think it would slide right off him and he would be able to sell it to the public as a win.
I don't put any faith in Trump to take advantage of good opportunities he has, but in the abstract I would say, at least, that a re-ordering of American alliances in the Middle East seems like a good idea.
Part of what's baffling about the current situation is that, in pure geo-strategic terms, there is no particularly compelling reason for Iran and the United States to hate one another. Neither is there a particularly compelling reason for Israel and Iran to hate one another. Neither is there a very good reason for the United States to be ride-or-die with Israel.
In some ways it's quite sad - historically Persia has been relatively friendly to Jews, at least by the standards of the region. The current hatreds in the region are almost entirely post-WWII. The Americans supported the British with the Mossadegh coup back in the 50s, and then bungled responses to the revolution in 1979, and there's lingering hatred from that even though there isn't a very good reason today why America and Iran can't get along. If the Americans can be good friends with the Saudis, well, the Iranians certainly aren't any worse than the Saudis, morally speaking. At times the Iranians have signalled willingness to cooperate as well - didn't they offer to be supportive with regard to America's invasion of Afghanistan, right up until Bush declared them 'Axis of Evil', unnecessarily making enemies?
As regards Israel, it's partly symbolic - Iran has ambitions of being (and tries to present itself as) the de facto leader of the Islamic world, and because there is incredibly strong grassroots sympathy for Palestine in the Islamic world, presenting themselves as champions of the Palestinian cause is good for that. (Meanwhile potential rivals like the Saudis undermine themselves by slowly normalising relations with Israel.) Obviously the hatred is partly sincere as well, but my point is that the conflict between Iran and Israel is largely not over material interests.
And of course for the last leg, it is pretty unclear what America gets out of its alliance with Israel. The Israelis do not seem like very good allies. I cannot blame Israel for prioritising Israeli interests first, or taking the best deal they can get, but there certainly seems to be room for America to ask for more out of the arrangement, or failing that, to scale back their support for Israel.
Iran needs to oppose Israel's existence as a state to harness Islamic street credibility, the survival of Shia theology in a Sunni dominated world may depend on it at this point.
As for America's support for Israel, it's largely due to entrenched jewish capture of US media, cultural, and financial institutions. Not as a deliberate act, but as a consequence of typical jewish high-IQ, educational attainment, and preference for high prestige, high status employment. US jewish elites are uniquely vulnerable to Israeli propaganda to support them at all costs. In turn, the US gets strongly nudged to support Israeli political ambitions.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
According to Reuters:
So it isn't comparable to the government-funded Marshall Plan.
@Catsnakes_ @sarker
Why would private companies do this out of the goodness of their cold, capitalistic hearts? Who's paying them?
I am also very curious what $300B of voluntary private contributions look like. Is this a case where the USA will pressure local governments to demand that private industry contribute to the fund, under threat of negative government treatment if certain benchmarks aren't met? I.e. a convoluted tax that will ultimately be passed on to some split of global consumers and investors?
More options
Context Copy link
It's access to invest in a market that is otherwise illegal to access. It's money lying on the table.
Did investment pour into Iran after the 2015 deal? Serious question.
Iran has a couple of things going for it: large, well educated population with oil. On the other hand it's led by angry Islamists who just fought a war with the US and many of its neighbors. High-risk high-reward, perhaps.
The 2015 deal didn't lift sanctions that prevented US firms from doing business with them afaik, so no. Here the private investment ostensibly is the deal. (assuming it happens as presented, which is doubtful)
The 2015 deal would significantly had allowed European firms to do business with Iran, which many European capitals were gearing up in advance. It was one of the reasons the JCPOA's retraction under Trump was an embarassment point for the European Union- they tried to create a dummy intermediary system to shield European companies from American sanction violations, but the European companies didn't want to risk American market access regardless.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link