Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Over at The Opinionator they round up some blog reaction to Barack Obama’s increasingly tough talk on Iran and then say this:

At Mother Jones, Kevin Drum remarked on the shift in tone on Iran without being so fazed by it.

Reading this reminded me of one of the dangers of blogging: it’s such a conversational medium that you sometimes forget which parts you’ve said aloud and which parts you haven’t.  I’ve been emailing and chatting (and just thinking) about Iran the same as everyone else, and one of the things I’ve been emailing and chatting and thinking about is the strong likelihood that the Iranian regime is going to crack down ever harder as the protests continue, producing ever greater brutality and ever greater bloodshed.  So far, for good and sound reasons, Obama has taken a restrained tone toward this, but if it continues he’s obviously going to react ever more strongly and more concretely.  And he’ll have to do it without either overpromising or actively making things worse for the protesters.  It’s already a tough tightrope to walk, and it’s going to get tougher.

So the reason I wasn’t fazed by Obama’s statement today is because I’ve been expecting it all along.  And unless the opposition has already fizzled, I expect Obama’s position to get even more difficult.  I haven’t actually said any of that on the blog, however, which might make my reaction today seem a little jaded.  Really, though, it wasn’t: it was just the natural endpoint of a conversation I’ve been having for the past week outside the blog.  Now, with this post, I’m letting the blog catch up to my brain.  Finally.

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate