Obama's theater of the absurd

The relationship between the Obama administration and the Islamic Republic of Iran continues to live in the theater of the absurd. If William Shakespeare had not died 400 years ago, he could have penned new successful plays with titles such as "Obama and Khamenei" (a modern version of "Romeo and Juliet") and "The Merchant of Tehran" (a remake of "The Merchant of Venice," with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani playing the role of Shylock).

Over the weekend, The Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. would buy 32 tons of heavy water from Iran for $8.6 million. The main problem here is not the amount of money. Rather, it is the fact that the U.S. is rewarding Iran for the sale of a key component in the production of nuclear weapons.

The U.S. is not boycotting Iran, it is not destroying Iran's nuclear program and it is not worried about third-party deals with Iran that will have negative consequences for the Middle East. The U.S. is showing that it has turned a new page in its relationship with Iran. And the turning of that page began in November 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president.

A play about this absurdly comical saga could begin with the mishandling of the talks in Turkey, Switzerland, Iraq and Kazakhstan. Or perhaps it could start with the final nuclear deal itself, which in effect legitimized Iran as a future nuclear power. We could also focus on the fact that international trade with Iran is returning to normal, as if we have gone back in time to the era when the shah was in power. Money is flowing into Iran, despite the fact that the Iranian regime is a certified pimp of terrorism. And we could further enrich the absurdness of the play by mentioning that the nuclear deal includes a clause that world powers, including the U.S., must defend Iran's nuclear sites from attack (maybe even from Israeli planes).

In other words, there is no lack of comedic material here. But why hurry to write the play now? It is very likely that the peak of the absurdity is still ahead of us. Imagine that in a few years the U.S. buys a nuclear weapon from Iran. Sounds crazy? Maybe not.

A decade ago, we would have read this script and thought it was written by a science fiction author like Bruce Sterling or Stephen Baxter. But when it comes to the Obama administration and Iran, it is like Pablo Picasso once said: "Everything you can imagine is real."

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