The Iran deal sounds like war no matter what

The president, once again, pushed hard for the nuclear deal with Iran and said there are only two ways we can go.

“Let’s not mince words. The choice we face is ultimately between diplomacy or some form of war,” President Barack Obama said Wednesday.

I am told by friends in Jerusalem, who I would consider reasonable people, that Israelis across the political spectrum are tired of hearing the president say it’s either this deal or war.

But that is clearly what critics in Congress are thinking. Republican Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas told a group of Israeli journalists on Wednesday that the U.S. military is capable of setting Iran’s nuclear facilities back to day zero. That sounds like war to me.

As for how Iran would react? Maybe they would do nothing. But I can tell you I’ve also met people in Iran who are reasonable people, and who are no fans of the Ayatollahs, but who say that if we bomb their homeland, they will defend it.

So if you listen to both sides of the debate, what you end up with is that we face a choice between war and war.

Fortunately, there’s an election coming up and with all this war talk, I’m starting to think I don’t much care where the candidates stand on the issues, since all that stuff has to go through Congress first anyway. What I want is a presidential candidate who can stand up and say, “I have a son in the military.”

Because starting a war is the one thing. But the only way to know if another Middle East war is really, truly, worth the price, is to have a president with some skin in the game.