The truck attack at a Christmas market in Berlin has cast a lurid spotlight on German authorities. The police apparently knew the suspect, had evidence of his ties to jihadists and believed he posed a threat. Yet twelve people are now dead. Last August, we saw a truck used as a weapon of jihad in Nice, France, so why didn't police prevent this one?
Last week, the Claremont Review of Books published Elan Journo’s review of Ilan Berman’s Iran's Deadly Ambition: The Islamic Republic's Quest for Global Power.
When defending the Iran nuclear deal, the Obama administration and its surrogates made claims that seemed, at least to some people, plausible. For a long time, I’ve argued that the deal was predicated on evading Iran’s jihadist character and malignant goals, and that the deal’s selling points were fantastical. Some people felt that “only time will tell”; so let’s consider two of the administration’s claims.
The Iran nuclear deal was the centerpiece of Obama’s multi-year diplomatic campaign to extend a hand of friendship to Tehran. Six months later, where do things stand?
When the Iran nuclear deal was signed last summer, the Obama administration celebrated it as a diplomatic triumph. Many supporters of the accord endorsed it on the grounds that it could delay Iran’s nuclear program. At the time I argued in The Federalist that the case for the deal hinged in large part on willfully disregarding Tehran’s malignant ideological character and goals. A militant theocracy, the Iranian regime actively funds jihadist groups and calls for our destruction.
When Obama swept into office, on a tidal wave of Hope and the promise of Change, he vowed to reset America’s orientation to the world. Frankly, after eight years of George W. Bush’s destructive foreign policy, you can see why many people would heave a sigh of relief and welcome an ABB (Anything But Bush) commander-in-chief. From today’s vantage — and on the week marking 14 years since 9/11 — how should we judge Obama’s record? Can we judge Obama’s policy without weighing the Bush legacy? Is the Iran deal, as many believe, a crowning achievement? How, more broadly, should we evaluate Obama’s Middle East policy? These are some of the questions I’ll cover when I guest host The Yaron Brook Show this Saturday, September 12.
On the heels of the proposed nuclear deal with Iran, Elan Journo asks: “Why are seemingly sensible people cheering the Iran deal, given the regime’s notorious brutality and belligerence?”
A little more than a week ago, the Obama administration reached a historic agreement with the Islamic Republic of Iran over its nuclear program. How should we evaluate this deal? ARI’s Elan Journo argues not only that this is a “bad deal,” but also that it’s irrational to negotiate with Iran. Why?
When Obama announced the Iran nuclear deal, he explained the rationale for taking the diplomatic path. There were, he said, three options: negotiate as good a deal as we can get; pull out of the talks; or else take military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities, igniting another Middle East war. Turns out these boil down to only two options, really, since pulling out of talks, according to Obama, would also end up leading to military action. So, if the options are diplomacy versus going to war, you can see why Obama’s case has swayed some people. But that argument hinges on a tendentious framing of the possibilities.
On today’s episode of The Yaron Brook Show, ARI’s Elan Journo guest hosted. Elan interviewed Rituparna Basu, ARI’s health care policy analyst, about Obamacare.