Populist Ted Cruz

This may be a little late to the point but watching Ted Cruz’s faux filibuster last week was one of the most frustrating and obnoxious rants I have seen from either party in congress in a while. Im not too impressed with the fact that he was able to keep talking for approximately 21 hours as it sounds like members of both the Republicans and Democrats know he is more than capable of that. However, his ability to hijack the Senate and use it for his own narcissistic self promoting purposes under the guise of “sticking up for the American people” is truly astounding.

Senator Cruz wants to come across as a populist fighting for regular Americans but there is only one thing this guy is truly interested in: Ted Cruz.

Cruz is truly a “Washington insider” or an establishment guy. If you need proof of that you need not look any further than back to the early 00’s when he worked for the Bush/Cheney campaign and helped file their pleadings following the election errors in Florida. He was rewarded well with a position in the U.S. Justice Department as associate deputy attorney general. Not a demanding position by any means but one well connected with higher ups in the administration and would help a younger Cruz with the contacts he would need to obtain a higher profile office as well as giving him plenty of time to survey changing political climates across the country.

Enter the Tea Party. Cruz jumped on-board and posed as an outsider challenging the system. He knew the only way he was going to become a senator was to tack violently to the right, so he mastered the Tea Party lingo and rode the train all the way to D.C., where his fakery has reached epic proportions.

There is definitely no shortage of narcissists in DC but Senator Cruz seems to take the cake. One of the largest decorations in his office would be the oil painting of him. In fact its not just of himself. Its an oil painting of himself arguing a case before the supreme court while other people make paintings of him.

As of now Senator Cruz is focused on shutting down the government and dismantling Obama-care. However, its pretty obvious that between his latest stunt in the Senate for media attention and his carefully coordinated past working up to the office he holds now that he has presidential aspirations. The real question should be whether or not the Republican party can survive his political ambitions with most Americans poised to blame the GOP (according to a recent CNN survey) in the event of a government shutdown, or is a worse case scenario, a default on US debt.

Could this be real?

It’s not often that I find myself remotely optimistic about politics or foreign affairs. But the recent Iranian overtures to the US and international community, I am cautiously optimistic that real progress could actually happen. While skeptics point out that potential nuclear talks could be a stalling tactic, there are two key factors that lead me to believe there could be an opportunity for progress on the nuclear issue.

1) The current economic climate forces political pragmatism

Iran’s economy deteriorated under Ahmadinejad. Inflation and unemployment soared. The return from oil prices doubling was wasted on cheap imports and easy credit. As a result, Rohani’s presidential success will be measured by how he addresses the ailing economy.

To that end, Rohani has moved quickly to take practical steps to confront the economic challenges. He brought in a cabinet of technocrats that are likely to advocate for freer market economic policy while broadening the tax base and seeking credit.  Rohani is reopening the Management and Planning Organization, which acts as Iran’s budget auditor and was closed by Ahmadinejad in 2007.

Nevertheless, Rohani’s actions to push economic progress on the domestic front will lose momentum if he cannot convince the US and Europe to lift their sanctions against Iran’s banks and oil. Realistically, the new president has a vested interest in a constructive nuclear negotiation with the west.

2) Syria’s instability directly threatens Iran’s power in the region
 Iran has been an ally to Syria’s president Bashar Assad, so his declining credibility is a liability for Iran’s regional influence. If the conflict in Syria spreads to Lebanon, it threatens to weaken Hizbullah, the Shia militia connected to Iran.  This would ultimately weaken Iran as a regional power.

It is in Iran’s best interest to leverage its relationship with Assad to support the current chemical weapons deal. This allows Iran to play a role valuable to the West as a regional power capable of influencing Syria to stay on track with the agreement. The end result of this approach ideally would be a more stable Syria, which would stabilize the balance of power on which Iran’s regional leadership lies.

Together, Iran’s pragmatic political climate and its regional power interests are strong incentives to seek a nuclear compromise with the US and Europe. While mutual mistrust in US-Iranian relations and the supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s decades-long commitment to anti-American policy cast skepticism over the potential for compromise, Iran’s current situation provides an opportunity to test the waters and talk. And considering the past eight years, that is cause for optimism, even if it is cautious.