You Walker Right Into This One

GOP Gov. Scott Walker is showing the country once again exactly why he'll never be President as he's too macho for diplomacy, y'all.  Greg Sargent:

Today negotiators from Iran, the U.S., and other major powers announced the framework for a deal to curb Iran’s nuclear program, laying the groundwork to draft a final agreement by the end of June. The preliminary deal would limit continued operation of centrifuges to one site, while converting a second one — which had been the subject of controversy — to a research facility. The Arak nuclear reactor could no longer be used to produce weapons-grade plutonium.

In exchange, sanctions against Iran will be lifted by the U.S. and European countries, after the International Atomic Energy Agency verifies Iran has taken those steps. It’s anyone’s guess whether a final deal will be reached, and in the interim, plenty of hard questions will be asked about it.

The 2016 GOP presidential hopefuls are all but certain to oppose the emerging framework, and Congressional Republicans (with the help of some Democrats) will probably try to scuttle any deal before it is signed. But staking out a position against the deal — and trying to sink it — could prove a bit more complicated than it appears.

This is driven home by a new interview that Scott Walker gave to a Wisconsin radio personality, in which he said that not only would he undo any deal with Iran on his first day as president; he would do so even if our European allies wanted the deal to continue.

Well, that certainly shows respect for diplomacy and our allies, especially after conservatives were screaming that President Obama showed no respect for our "ally" Israel by daring to negotiate with Iran in the first place.

I asked Peter Juul, a Mideast analyst for the Center for American Progress, to explain what the consequences of that might be. He told me:

“The big questions would be, How would Europeans and Iranians react? It’s hard to believe that the Iranians would stick to their end of the deal. That would leave Iran open to take their nuclear program as far as they want.

“The Europeans would probably try to keep their portion of the deal in place and try to salvage it. This would place the burden of having blown up the deal on us. This would be particularly ironic, considering that a major Republican and conservative talking point is that the Obama administration is breaking faith with our allies. We would be alienating and breaking faith with our European allies right out of the gate. You’d be irreparably damaging our transatlantic relationships for however long Scott Walker were in office.

“Putin is not going to leave power anytime soon, unless he keels over. For all the talk about the Russian threat, it would be odd to throw our European allies under the bus on Iran at the same time they are facing down a Russia that is not particularly friendly.

“There would be a lot of ripple effects around wherever the U.S. and Europe have security cooperation. This is a reckless, irresponsible, shoot first, don’t-ask-questions-ever approach. It’s just not a viable strategy if your goal is to keep Iran from getting a nuclear bomb.”

Remember, we're still in the primary phase of the 2016 GOP clown car game, which means there's no governance, only idiotic macho bluster.  Walker will fit right in, and he'll lose just like Republicans have for the last two presidential contests.

Course, we could just sell weapons to Iran like Reagan did, right?