Happy Birthday Greg Maddux!

I thought I was flying American Shuttle but I was actually flying Shuttle America and whoever heard of that? Down the hatch, up into the dark clouds and across the Lake and we landed with five kids yelling and me mouthing Hail Marys. It was a bumpy ride and I don't fly well.

Earlier I'd run around Brooklyn trying to make sure I had everything for the trip home but all the grand plans turned into a bunch of dirty laundry but I found this amazing sandwich place and the sun was warm and the leaves spring-small more radiated their color than were their color along the streets. A lot of people were off work today and were walking around looking at everything without any rushed sense of winter.

By the evening I was back in Andersonville with Corms talking about how much I hate Eric Milton and there was this cool thunderstorm, so Midwest and sudden, the wind blowing through the Edgewater and the lamps swaying, the specials cards flipping over and as suddenly it was over. The bark on the trees slick and the lights blurring the wet streets the only reminders of the storm. Late now, the air was still and you could feel the time. Driving home along Peterson it seemed like nothing had changed, the same hamburger joints and long rows of businesses with timelines that seem to have stopped around 1978, the same $4.99 Video sign, the same stupid light sequencing around Lincoln, it was mildly depressing and comforting.

Anyway. a lot of Neocons are comparing Iran's non-weapons grade enrichment of uranium to Hitler's occupation of the Rhineland in 1936, for instance William Kristol in the Weekly Standard, however this is a tenuous analogy at best. I think there are very legitimate questions about Iran's motives, however, to call this moment one akin to 1936 presumes several dangerous assumptions. First, Hitler's action of occupying the Rhineland was actively infringing on France's nationhood, Iran's actions so far are not affecting borders or sovereignty (unless you can argue that they are asserting their own sovereignty). Second, Hitler's war machine was much closer to readiness in 1936 than Iran's nuclear energy policies are to producing a bomb they keep saying they don't want (but how much is their word worth?). The most dire predictions are three to five years (which would be about where Hitler was...), but most experts say that if the Iranians actually are looking to create a bomb, they're more likely at least 15 years away. Third, that Iran is actually another fascist Germany but all evidence about Iran points to Iran as being far more divided about what its government should look like than the Germans were in 1936. How consistent is Iran's policy actually going to be over the three to fifteen years? Germany's resolve was steady and fanatical, whereas Iran's actually is more difficult to read (though it is delicious to see the National Review arguing for support of labor unions, be they Iranian or otherwise in their shrill call to action).

Then there are the reasons to suppose this is a potential 1936. First, one can suppose that Iran, by announcing it has enriched uraniam to the point that it could be used for nuclear power, is testing the waters of Western response to its gently turning up the ratchet on its nuclear program. If we do nothing now, will the Iranians then be emboldened to act more forcefully to create nuclear weapons? Second, their government has been quite comfortable in supporting enemies of the United States and expresses often its wishes to destroy Israel. With nuclear weapons, they could exert a lot of force in the Mideast and we could see our first nuclear exchange between Israel and Iran. Third, just as the Germans capitalized on the tumultous political environment in the France of 1936, which was bitterly divided and politically self-destructive, so too are Iran's announcements and actions coming just as the United States is bitterly divided and politically self-destructive with the opposition party lost and without ideology and the ruling party with an ideology so inconsistant and illogical that it is quickly becoming a model of incompetence as well as being simply mean and contemptible.

Quickly, the actions of the Iranians are going to create a response by the United States which will further define Bush's presidency. Having shown absolutely no subtlety or diplomatic abilities so far, it is scary to contemplate the coming months and the Iranian situation. The idea of a nuclear Iran is terrifying, yet while America has been content to let European countries make attempts at diplomacy with Iran while staying in the background mumbling threats and then saying, like a true bully, "I never said that..." but now, as it considers taking more drastic steps, it is imperative that there be direct diplomatic contact between the two countries.

Iran's defiance is odd and its stated goal of nuclear energy seems ridiculous in a country that swims in oil, but how long oil? And what of the image of itself standing up to the United States and Israel for the average Iranian to have? On the other hand, offering Iran something dangerous to lose, might make them less callous and less aggressive in pursuing nuclear goals.

I should sleep now, I keep nodding off...the wind has picked up again and it is late, late night.