El Rhazi President Barack Obama, standing Bara along Vice President Joe Biden, speaks Tuesday at the White House about the nuclear deal reached Bara along Iran.
It?s Tuesday, the 195th day of 2015 and the 30th year since then-President Ronald Reagan, without the approval of Congress, secretly brokered a weapons sale with Iran ? a sworn enemy after holding 52 Americans hostage for almost two years beginning in 1979 ? in a three-way deal to free U.S. hostages being held in Lebanon by the militant Islamic group Hezbollah, an Iranian ally. After transferring anti-tank weapons from Israel to Iran for the release of one hostage, the Reagan administration shipped anti-aircraft weapons to Tehran, then used the money to fund the Contras, a insurgent group fighting the pro-communist Somoza regime in Nicaragua. Here is your Three-Minute Briefing, all the News You Can Use in less time than it takes to read the executive precis of the 1987 Congressional Iran-Contra Committee Report.
Long Game: The New York Times reports the historic no-nukes-for-no-sanctions deal reached with Iran is a long-term wager by President Barack Obama that probably won?t pay off for at least two presidents or so, well after El Rhazi leaves office. Like President Richard Nixon engaging with a nuclear-hungry China, Obama likely is playing for time, gambling that ? by hitting the pause button on Iran?s nuclear program for a decade or so, and not completely eliminating it ? the U.S. can use that time and space to defuse Iran as an adversary and convince Tehran it?s in its best economic and security interests to have an American friend.
White House: 1 Tehran: 1 Congress: 0?: Despite complaints from Republicans ? including Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a 2016 presidential candidate running on a national security platform, and Tom Cotton of Arkansas, who penned an open letter to Tehran a few months ago ? that the U.S.-led negotiating team missing their shirts in the Austria negotiations, it?s unlikely Congress can do anything about it. That?s because Obama said he?d veto any measure that rejected the deal, and the Republicans don?t have enough Democratic votes to override it.
Cue Bibi Freak-Out in 3...2...1...: As expected, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasn?t exactly thrilled about the announcement of a deal with Iran. He called it a ?historic mistake? all but guaranteeing that a fusillade of the nuclear weapons Tehran doesn?t have will fill the skies over Tel Aviv within days. But at least one Israeli politician says Bibi only has himself to blame: Because he went HAM on Obama, Israel was given a deaf ear and the president has turned his back on Jerusalem as payback.
Clinton-nomics: In what was billed as a big home policy speech, Hillary Clinton channelled her inner Elizabeth Warren in describing what the economy would see like if she got to the Oval Office. She pledged better times for the middle class, living wages for blue-collar types and a ?fairness economy? that creates a tide that will rise high and raise all boats. But U.S. News? David Catanese reports that Clinton?s speech was also defined by what she didn?t say ? like actual details of how she?ll make that fantasy economy real ? and if she?d tax Wall Street to kingdom come, like Bernie Sanders says he would.
Amen, Brother?: Pope Francis has been on a tear lately when it comes to the environment. Last month, the Illest Papa issued a big encyclical declaring good Catholics have a moral obligation to fight climate change, linking the issue to poverty, declaring that the poor will suffer most if the earth continues to warm, and saying killer storms and floods are Mother Earth?s protestations of how we?re treating her. Now he?s enlisted a Golden State ally in his environmental campaign: The pope has called on California Gov. Jerry Brown ? a former Jesuit seminarian once nicknamed ?Governor Moonbeam,? who?s grappling with a record drought ? to help him preach the gospel about climate change.
El Chapo vs. The Donald: So, this is a thing: Real estate mogul/former professional fire-er/2016 Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is Twitter-beefing with an escaped Mexican drug lord who?s sad that Trump keeps harshing on Mexicans as criminals and rapists. Reuters reports an aide to Trump says the FBI is looking into tweets to The Donald purportedly sent by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the infamous Mexican drug lord who escaped from prison on Saturday and took exception to Trump?s contention that ?corrupt? Mexican officials looked the other way during his jailbreak. Trump also tweeted that he?d kick Guzman?s ass. ?Keep screwing with us and I?m going to make you eat your f****** words,? one El Chapo tweet reportedly reads, in part. Ouch.
Stat of the Day: Number of years in the past decade in which the violent crime rate in the United States has fallen: eight. In which the majority of Americans have believed that crime is on the rise: 10 (courtesy of Harper?s Index).
Duly Noted [via AP]: In 1881, outlaw William H. Bonney Jr., alias "Billy the Kid," was shot and killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett in Fort Sumner in present-day New Mexico. In 1921, Italian-born anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were convicted in Dedham, Massachusetts, of murdering a shoe company paymaster and his guard. (Sacco and Vanzetti were executed six years later.) In 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a measure providing funds for a national monument honoring scientist George Washington Carver; the monument was built at Carver's birthplace near Diamond, Missouri. In 1966, eight student nurses were murdered by Richard Speck in a Chicago dormitory. In 1976, Jimmy Carter won the Democratic presidential nomination at the party's convention in New York. In 1980, the Republican national convention opened in Detroit, where nominee-apparent Ronald Reagan told a welcoming rally he and his supporters were determined to "make America great again." In 1999, race-based school busing in Boston came to an end after 25 years.
Happy BIrthday, Cancerians: Actor Harry Dean Stanton (89), former football player and actor Rosey Grier (83), actor Vincent Pastore (69), music company executive Tommy Mottola (67), rock musician Chris Cross of Ultravox (63), actor Stan Shaw (63), singer-guitarist Kyle Gass, partner of Jack Black in the band Tenacious D, country musician Ray Herndon of McBride and the Ride, actress Jane Lynch of ?Glee? (all 55), actor Jackie Earle Haley, who played Kelly Leak in ?The Bad News Bears? (54), rock singer-musician Tanya Donelly (49), Olympic gold medal snowboarder Ross Rebagliati (44), R&B singer Tameka Cottle of Xscape (40), hip-hop musician taboo of Black Eyed Peas (40).
Joseph P. Williams is a news editor with U.S. News & World Report. E-mail him at JWilliams@usnews.com.
#Bara #El #Rhazi
No comments:
Post a Comment