Iran Doubletake

John McCain seems to have been caught with his neoconservative rhetoric hanging out. His Iran talk has been reviewed in many quarters like this:

In the race for the White House, John McCain has trumpeted Iran as a paramount threat to the United States (and its close ally Israel), and has asserted that Iran will be the No. 1 foreign policy problem facing the next administration. McCain uses Iran as a prime example of what he depicts as his opponent Barack Obama’s naive and guileless approach to U.S. foreign policy. Just like the president he hopes to succeed, McCain has sought to deploy Iran as a political weapon of mass destruction.

When you spout off with half baked “jokes” like “Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran,” what does he expect?

But finally, at long last, Bush has decided to engage. I had to read
it twice.

The US plans to establish a diplomatic presence in Tehran for the first time in 30 years as part of a remarkable turnaround in policy by President George Bush. The Guardian has learned that an announcement will be made in the next month to establish a US interests section – a halfway house to setting up a full embassy. The move will see US diplomats stationed in the country. The news of the shift by Bush who has pursued a hawkish approach to Iran throughout his tenure comes at a critical time in US-Iranian relations. After weeks that have seen tensions rise with Israel conducting war games and Tehran carrying out long-range missile tests, a thaw appears to be under way. The White House announced yesterday that William Burns, a senior state department official, is to be sent to Switzerland on Saturday to hear Tehran’s response to a European offer aimed at resolving the nuclear standoff. Burns is to sit at the table with Iranian officials despite Bush repeatedly ruling out direct talks on the nuclear issue until Iran suspends its uranium enrichment programme, which is a possible first step on the way to a nuclear weapon capability. … ..

You can drive yourself dizzy taking a rhetorical walkabout trying to describe why this is happening now. Why Undersecretary of State William J. Burns, the No. 3 State Department official, is also going to have a “sit in” this weekend while the Europeans talk with Iran. Really, the United States sending the third highest State Department official to watch talks take place with Iran. Oh, but he can’t speak! Could this get any more junior league? Though you can’t blame Burns.

But why is Bush doing this now? The answer is as simple as it is obvious. The Democrats made them do it.

However, Michael Goldfarb, an official McCain spokesperson, his official blogger and one of his head neoconservatives, took issue with the assessment when asked about it on a McCain media call today (live blogged it in the comments here): Only Ahmadinejad showing up at Crawford would prove Bush is moving towards Obama’s strategy. He’s as bad at jokes as his boss. He went on to hit Obama on not holding a hearing with his subcommittee, no doubt completely oblivious that according to ABC News John McCain has missed nearly all of the hearings of the Senate Armed Services Committee on which he is a ranking member.

I don’t want to get sidetracked on McCain’s media call, which petered out unenthusiastically when what turned out to be the final caller couldn’t be understood. But I simply can’t move on to the subject at hand without mentioning the annoyingly earnest Rep. Martha Blackburn, who was the other person speaking for camp McCain. She had many things to say, including that good old Republican standby on how Obama “ignores the need to fund the troops.” Oh, and if he’s not going to listen the the military in Iraq he should “spare them the photo op.” But one of the more outlandish was this little uninformed belch: “Senator Obama doesn’t understand the regional threat posed by the Islamic extremists.”

Right, that’s why McCain is now giving speeches on Afghanistan, while George W. Bush is engaging with Iran just months before the next general election.

Between Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, James Webb, and now the presumptive
nominee, Barack Obama, the entire top tier of the Democratic Party, plus others
down the line have been screaming that talks are the only way forward. It’s not an accident that these moves by Bush are manifesting. It’s Democratic pressure and a public who can’t stand what our foreign policy has turned into under Bush, with a lot of help from John McCain who has stood beside Bush at every turn on Iraq.

One can also make other guesses why now, which could have something to do with Afghanistan’s unwinding again. Nice job, Bushie. The Iranians were crucial when we struck Afghanistan after 9/11, moving on the Taliban. People forget that
fact. As William Holbrooke said on “Morning Joe” yesterday (video here), the Iranians
made further moves afterwards towards the Bush administration signaling they wanted to
talk but got the silent treatment.

So make no mistake about it, the Democratic foundational national security
strategy of engagement won the day on this one. It’s a foreign policy win in
an area that used to tilt Republican. More proof that since 9/11
and the Iraq war the Democrats are reacting better and have assessed asymmetrical
threats more readily than the Republicans, who see national security as a one crisis at a time event, which was fine for the 20th century, but won’t work with the multiple front challenges we face today.

On Iran, point goes to the Democrats. Extra credit goes to Joe Biden who led
the way from the start. A win to Obama, because all this comes right before his big trip next week, which has the potential to blow John McCain out of the media cycle for a week.