A subliminal reason that the White House has been freaking out about this is that the American people will once again see a strong, academically accomplished, articulate warrior and leader, and contrast him with Barack Obama.
[Update after the speech]
“Netanyahu is better in his second language than Obama is in his first.”
Yup.
Well, I’m listening to the speech right now, and he just blew a reference to Frost’s poem about the road less traveled. Frost was using irony, and Bibi missed it. Is it significant? Of course not, but I’m not sure why “academically accomplished” is significant either, given recent comments about Scott Walker,etc.
What is ironic about Frost’s poem? He took the less traveled path. It is harder to take.
The easy path is to grab your ankles to the will of Iran.
The traveler concedes that the paths were ” really about the same” but the traveler imagines that in the future he (or she) will claim that it made all the difference to take the road less traveled, and that he or she will inevitably feel regret at not taking the other choice. Have a new look at the poem. Wikipedia has an adequate elaboration of what I’m saying, as well as the text of the poem itself.
Frost himself said “”You have to be careful of that one; it’s a tricky poem – very tricky.” And he said “No matter which road you take, you’ll always sigh, and wish you’d taken another.”
Appropriately, Frost was considering the road to war, and his friend was killed, while not understanding Frost’s poem.
See Edward Thomas, Robert Frost and the road to war
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/jul/29/robert-frost-edward-thomas-poetry
I learned all this in school, but it would be quite easy to learn it on your own, particularly now that the internet is at our fingertips.
Many good points there.
Don’t mean to argue w wikipedia, but the clear impression given by the poem is that the author was _right_ to take the road less travelled by, even though it can cause regret. I would venture to say that any other interpretation, no matter what the author thinks he intended, ruins the poem. Nor do I see that Frost’s words contradict this.
Well, the traveller is projecting – he is looking into the future and thinking wryly about what he will later think. And the paths were really about the same — the traveller wasn’t faced with the stark choice that both the traveller in the future and Netanyahu imagine it to be.
That said, generations have gotten something good out of Frost’s words that Frost never intended, and that’s not horrible, just goofy. Kind of like Ronald Reagan using Born In the USA as his rousing campaign theme song….
“And the paths were really about the same”. No –
“Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,”
They weren’t the same beforehand, it was definitely “less traveled by”. Frost’s taking it kind of evened things out.
I’m just not seeing how else to read the poem. He intentionally chose the one less traveled. He doesn’t know how it will turn out; he is speculating now about how he will feel later, “Somewhere ages and ages hence”. Obviously he thinks this is the best decision now, that’s why he made it. And his “sigh”, I thought, was because he is somewhat sad that he will probably never get to take the other road; he’d like to take both.
In short, I don’t think Netanyahu “blew the reference”. Maybe Frost somehow goofily misunderstood the implications of what he wrote, as Thomas apparently did. This is the meaning of the poem that the world has accepted and I think it’s right.
What you have here is more fundamental. You have the result of a parliamentary system vs a presidential system as well. Like the Roman Empire of long ago, a presidential system that yields much power to one individual has pluses and minuses.
Best paraphrase take away from BiBi’s speech:
“Obama’s approach to Iran is one of Hope and Change. Hope that Iran will change….”
Dave
His speech was far more gracious than what one would expect from Obama, Reid or Pelosi. Sorry for being anti-Mormon, sexist and racist.
Democrats are just upset at the possibility of Americans finding out that Obama is in talks with Iran and then the details of those talks. Democrats want Iran to get nukes but they don’t want the useful idiots knowing about it.
Why would they want Iran to get nukes?
Ask Jim.
To me, they want Iran to have nukes because it will take the US down a few notches. They despise “American Imperialism”.
I don’t want Iran to get nukes, and I think that making a deal with them is our best shot at keeping them from getting nukes.
But making a deal would lead to warmer relations between Iran and the West, and Netanyahu doesn’t want that. So he argues against a deal, but doesn’t have any better option to offer.
It is utterly insane to think that there can be (or for that matter, even to desire) “warm relations between Iran and the West,” with anything resembling the current totalitarian regime.
Well, I’m sure Netanyahu, like all Israeli leaders, wants warmer relations between the West and Iran, if that warmth includes Iran not supporting terrorism, reigning in Hezbollah, and so forth. Beyond that, Israel would love to see a Western-oriented democratic Iran – it would make them much safer and provide them with a good market.
“But making a deal would lead to warmer relations between Iran and the West, and Netanyahu doesn’t want that. ”
Neither does Iran so your statement is, as usual, empty.
There’s a big difference between “warm” and “warmer”. The latter is certainly possible.
Recall that we sent millions of men to Vietnam to keep South Vietnam from being ruled by a totalitarian Communist regime. The regime that posed such a threat to us is still in power, but today Americans companies outsource manufacturing there, and American tourists go there on vacation. China is a similar story, and Cuba will be before long.
Regime change is not, fortunately, a prerequisite for improved relations with Iran, any more than it was with Vietnam or China.
As long as the mullahs are in charge, their goals will not change.
These negotiations are BS. We all know that. Just delay tactics by Iran. After all:
This barbaric, wolflike & infanticidal regime of #Israel which spares no crime has no cure but to be annihilated. 7/23/14
#HandsOffAlAqsa
And you expect warmer relations? Are you serious? Yes you are. Deep down you want Iran to have nukes.
Vietnam doesn’t want to destroy us. False comparison.
–Jon
March 3, 2015 at 2:59 PM
Vietnam doesn’t want to destroy us. False comparison.–
And not only does Vietnam not want to destroy us, it never did, nor did every imagine that this was the the problem.
The problem was Communism and what the left does to countries.
Really no different than french left that cause “The terror”. But for the lefties, The terror was the best of times.
Though the left was less happy about the killing fields of Cambodia. Which regret could summed up as killed the wrong people- otherwise something worthy of praise by the Left. Or said in more real terms, it’s hard to cheer lead genocides. Or Left may be fans of .genocides in general, but it’s not something they can sell. Lacks market appeal.
Millions dying to reduce world population- is something left can support, but slaughter children [not safely hidden in the womb] is not good optics.
Vietnam doesn’t want to destroy us. False comparison.
We certainly thought that Communists were out to destroy us. That’s why we sent our military to Korea and then Vietnam. But today we happily trade with the same Communist-run countries that we considered so threatening then.
Rand and Netanyahu’s argument is we can’t have better relations without Iran without regime change. Of course that was the argument that anti-Communists made with regard to China and Vietnam in the 50s and 60s (and with Cuba even now). We couldn’t imagine that the hardened Communists who ran those countries would ever allow normal diplomatic relations, trade, cooperate with us in international bodies, etc. And yet they have. It may be hard to imagine today an Iranian Islamic Republic lead by mullahs will ever be anything but an an enemy, but historically it wouldn’t be all that surprising. After all, the mullahs have many interests other than opposing the U.S., and we even share some of them (e.g. fighting ISIS).
It’s also worth contrasting our relationship with Iran with our relationship with Saudi Arabia. The new king of Saudi Arabia just gave a $200,000 prize to a Muslim Indian televangelist who praises attacks on Americans, believes that the U.S. was responsible for 9/11, that the U.S. is the greatest terrorist in the world, etc. There is plenty of anti-U.S. sentiment coming from the kingdom’s leadership, just as there is coming from Iran’s mullahs. But we don’t treat Saudi Arabia as an enemy with a regime that must be toppled, we treat them as a country that shares some of our interests and can be worked with.
In his speech Netanyahu described ISIS and Iran as similar threats. That’s exactly what some anti-Communists used to do with the U.S.S.R and China. The biggest breakthrough in the Cold War was Nixon’s realization that by making overtures to China he could split that supposedly monolithic threat in two and exploit the rivalry between the two to advance our global interests. Instead of one enormous problem we faced two smaller ones, each of which we could play against the other. The Middle East is crying out for that sort of insight: that all our enemies there are also each other’s enemies, and indeed care more about fighting each other than they do about fighting us. Iran’s mullahs will never love us, but they hate us less than they hate ISIS. Saudi princes will never love us but they hate us less than they hate Iran and Assad. Iraq’s Sunnis will never love us but they hate and fear us less than they hate and fear Iranian militias. And so on. Treating every anti-U.S. Muslim state or group as united against us just makes it exponentially harder for us to pursue our interests.
Jim
–March 4, 2015 at 8:22 AM
Vietnam doesn’t want to destroy us. False comparison.
We certainly thought that Communists were out to destroy us. —
So we thought correctly.
And Communists have done enormous damage to the world, and continue to do so.
What good has Cuba ever done?
Why do lefties think is a good idea to imprison the people of Cuba?
Why do Lefties think it’s good for leaders to terrorize their population.
In what realm of morality is justified to have a fawa on an author of fiction?
–That’s why we sent our military to Korea and then Vietnam. But today we happily trade with the same Communist-run countries that we considered so threatening then.–
What purpose does N Korea service? Do need millions of people oppressed to feel good about yourself?
It seems that unless one given some elevated station in N Korea, you would not want to live in N Korea. So why do imagine anyone [who did not know better] would want to live in N Korea.
What needed for one to imagine we need more of N Korea
is sheer insanity. The situation of N Korea is not question of whether we could trade with N Korea. The US trades mostly with countries near the US- such a Canada. And US did trade with USSR but mostly because communist could not manage to farm very well- rather than lack of arable land.
But trade even with largest trading country, Canada, is not particularly important as compared to other issues- such as oppression of people in the world by governments.
Anyways, for your education, read these articles about Vietnam:
http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/michael-j-totten/last-days-communist-party
http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/michael-j-totten/havana-hanoi
We certainly thought that Communists were out to destroy us.
And look at the bloodbath in South Vietnam after the Democrat Party pulled out. Will you take responsibility for the mass slaughter of the South Vietnamese?
Vietnam, as you know, was a part of the Communist empire. After the Soviet Union fell, it wasn’t much of a threat anymore. That is why we trade with them NOW.
You conflate two periods of history.
And, by the way, Vietnam isn’t after nukes. Why do you make these false comparisons?
Heh, not everyone agrees with you:
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2014/06/10/Why-Vietnam-Will-Be-Next-Nuclear-State
(I don’t buy it, but what do I know? The author is described as “A combat veteran and former U.S. Army Intelligence officer, Andrew L. Peek is a doctoral candidate at The Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, where he teaches political theory and strategic studies. He served as strategic advisor to the top U.S. and NATO commander.”
Clearly Iran blew it. It should have Vietnam-ized itself first, and then went after nukes:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/243652/americas-nuclear-vietnam-henry-sokolski
This seems apropos:
http://www.the-american-interest.com/2015/03/03/israel-speaks-for-the-sunnis/