The Fanaticism of Lindsey Graham

The implication of his fanatical position is that nothing short of preventive war and regime change will do.

Lindsey Graham reminds us of the sheer fanaticism in the hearts of many Iran hawks:

“There’s no way to avoid evil,” he continued. “You confront it. You can’t accommodate it… I believe the regime is religious Nazis. One day, they will fall — the Soviet Union collapsed. The system in Iran is, over time, unsustainable. One thing I will not do is try to contain them [bold mine-DL]. Once they get a weapon, there is no way to do that. You have to prevent them from getting a weapon… So how long it takes, I don’t know. Whatever it takes, we’ll do.”

Graham has an exceptionally poor foreign policy record. He has not only been reflexively in favor of every U.S. intervention under the sun for as long as he has been in office, but his worldview remains every bit as deranged today as it was decades ago. Despite backing many failed wars, Graham is no less enthusiastic about starting more than he was when he cheered on the invasion of Iraq. On Iran, he has been one of the most extreme senators, and you can see that from his rejection of containment as an option and his “whatever it takes” mantra. The implication of his fanatical position is that nothing short of preventive war and regime change will do. That is the face of the opposition to the nuclear deal. If the current negotiations fail, and they may, Graham and his allies are the ones that will benefit.