Donald Trump is in enough trouble, legally and politically, to need a war – or so one would think. Sanctions just don’t cut it.
He has a serviceable enemy at hand too, Iran.
American elites have long had it in for the Islamic Republic. They have many reasons, but high on the list is a point of honor: years after it happened, they still want payback for “the hostage crisis,” the government supported humiliation that revolutionary Iranian students inflicted upon the American Empire in the final 444 days of the Carter administration. Nearly everything disappears down the memory hole in “the United States of Amnesia” – except affronts to American authority, which are never forgotten.
The broader American public doesn’t care much for Iran either; the idea that the country is full of terrorists and led by demonic Ayatollahs is deeply entrenched.
There is an Iranian-American lobby, led by people too articulate and thoughtful to make much difference in a political culture dominated by mind-numbing cable networks and Twitter. If it had more rich backers, it might nevertheless have some influence. As it is, its cultural and political impact is slight, and its effect on elections is nil.
Therefore, were Trump to start a war against Iran, or to let Israel go at their “existential threat” du jour, there would be plenty of voters covering his back and many egging him on.
The question therefore arises: with the majority of Americans despising him, with the law…