by Bob Barr | Oct 12, 2018 | Front page |
The American Spectator For one thing, the current president isn’t inclined to prop up the mullahs. On three occasions in the past eight decades, Iran has served as a turning point for America’s strategic global interests. Now, as the Trump Administration turns up the pressure on the Islamic Republic, it appears the country may once again become a fulcrum for our country’s strategic interests in the Middle East and beyond. The first time modern Persia found itself in a key global position was in the immediate aftermath of World War Two, when the Soviet Union’s imperialist designs were focused on Iran’s already well-known oil reserves, and access to the country’s ports on the Persian Gulf. The United States and Great Britain teamed up to ensure that they, and not the USSR, held sway in Teheran after the defeat of the Axis powers. For the next three decades Iran served as a key military and economic ally to the United States; providing a steady supply of oil, and invaluable intelligence on Soviet missile technology captured from listening posts in northeastern Iran overlooking the Caspian Sea. That important bilateral modus operandi disintegrated in 1979 with the overthrow of the pro-American Shah, and the installation of what quickly became a regime controlled by a cleric-based Supreme Council headed by the Ayatollah Khomeini. The subsequent rise of militant Islam as a force not only in Iran but throughout the region, from Syria and Iraq to Afghanistan and Pakistan, became a force that has dominated much of America’s global strategy for the past four decades. Since 1979 and over the course of six American presidencies from...
by Bob Barr | Oct 10, 2018 | Front page, Townhall Article |
Townhall.com On October 27, 1964, Ronald Reagan, still two years away from serving in public office himself, delivered one of the greatest speeches in modern American history. Delivered to a nationwide radio audience in support of then-GOP presidential candidate Barry Goldwater, the former movie star declared America at a crossroads. Failure to grasp and aggressively defend against the dangers then faced by our country would, Reagan warned, push us into “a thousand years of darkness.” While the specific dangers about which Reagan then spoke were external, his call to action against existential threats applies with at least equal validity to internal forces tearing at the foundations of our freedom. Looking back at the last month of insanity surrounding the confirmation process of now-Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, it seems we are standing at Reagan’s shoulder, staring directly into that black abyss. The disturbing level of irrational hatred and willingness to use violence demonstrated by those protesting Kavanaugh was outshone only by the level of contempt Democratic Senators Dianne Feinstein, Mazie Hirono, Cory (aka “Spartacus”) Booker, and Chuck Schumer displayed for their constitutional “advice and consent” duty. And, if not for Sen. Lindsey Graham slapping many of his Republican colleagues (notably Sen. Jeff Flake) back to their senses, we might have just taken that last step into darkness. The mobs of seething liberals may have physically receded temporarily from the halls of Congress and the steps of the Supreme Court, but the effects of their psychotic breakdown remain. Already in the Beltway media, liberals are pushing the idea that Democrats were insufficiently “ruthless” in their resistance and political chicanery. Enabled by the lack...
