It is worse than a crime -- it is asinine

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry would have happily missed the Senate hearing over the nuclear deal with Iran on Thursday. Kerry, in all innocence, thought he had returned home from Vienna last week a hero. Congress, however, prepared a welcome more befitting a loser.

The American administration wants a legacy. In the meantime, it is getting a slap in the face from the Senate. If one were to judge based on the scene on Capitol Hill yesterday, it seems that receiving Congressional approval of the bill will be no easy task.

Every new detail of the deal revealed only proves how foolish and dangerous it is. It was clear the Iranians would cheat throughout the entire process, but the West ... it appears everyone is a partner to the crime. Alas, nothing is new in the West, either.

"It is worse than a crime, it is a blunder," is a famous quote attributed to Napoleon-era French diplomat Charles Maurice De Talleyrand, in reference to the wrongful hanging of the Duke of Enghien, Louis Antoine de Bourbon, in 1804. John Bolton, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, has also evoked the Napoleonic era. He believes the deal is the Battle of Waterloo of American foreign policy -- nothing less.

The Republican senator from Idaho, Jim Risch, revealed, for example, on Thursday that as part of the secret deal, the one we haven't seen, Iran will be responsible for transferring soil samples, for inspection, from the Parchin installation to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Parchin, we know, is the site where Iran is suspected of conducting military nuclear tests.

You read that correctly: Iran, not the IAEA's inspectors, will transfer the soil samples. And just to complete the picture, as part of the secret agreement, the one even Kerry is not completely familiar with (as Kerry has said, B.B.), Iran will be able to develop as many ballistic missiles as it wants.

In other words, Iran will enrich uranium, won't dismantle the facilities it built secretly, will receive protection for its nuclear sites from the West and will advance its military projects unhindered. May Talleyrand forgive me for skewing his words, but this "is worse than a crime -- it is asinine."

Bob Corker, the senator from Tennessee who is also the chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, went on the attack against Kerry on Thursday. From his perspective, America has been "fleeced" and "bamboozled" by Tehran.

My heart truly goes out to Kerry. After taking his lumps from the Iranians, he is now taking a beating from Congress.

What heart-wrenching sacrifice by the secretary of state, who is willing to do anything -- but really, anything -- for his boss to have a legacy.

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