First, the Russians are in need of some loving:
Romania and the United States have been negotiating for more than a year about the deployment of ballistic missile interceptors, which should be operational by 2015.
"We have decided that the anti-missile shield will be deployed at the former airbase at Deveselu," Romanian President Traian Basescu said in a televised address.
Moscow, which fears the shield could be turned against Russia, swiftly demanded assurances from Washington.
"In this situation, US legal guarantees on their intention not to deploy a missile defence system aimed at the strategic nuclear forces of Russia is becoming even more relevant," Russian Foreign ministry said quoted by news agencies.
Silly Russians. I say we provide our highest assurances that if Russia tries to nuke one of our Eastern European NATO allies, we will shoot down as many Russian nuclear-tipped missiles as we can. Although I must say that I'm a tad disturbed that maintaining the ability to nuke NATO countries is so important to Russia. I'm sure that is but a minor glitch in our whole reset program.
Pakistan, too, is a bit miffed with us over the recent unpleasantness:
Pakistan criticized the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden as an "unauthorized unilateral action" and warned Washington on Tuesday not to launch similar operations in the future.
Fine. In the spirit of our new hopey age, I say we reassure Pakistan that we will not conduct another raid to kill Osama bin Laden should we find that Pakistan is harboring the man who attacked us on 9/11. We're sorry we did it once. Really. It won't happen again.
Gosh, I feel so nuanced!
Do we have time for one more? Oh, let's!
Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said the U.S. can no longer keep troops to the region under the pretext of fighting terrorism now that Osama bin Laden is dead. The al-Qaida leader was killed in a raid by elite U.S. forces in Pakistan.
Who knew the Iranians were so understanding all these years? Sadly, Mehmanparast seems to have gotten ahead of American progressives who are edging toward the same conclusion. The endorsement by the Iranians of this new talking point might be a tad inconvenient, to say the least.
Still, despite the nuance just oozing from my pores these days, I can't quite work up any outreach for this request. I say we remind the Iranians that SEAL Team 6 (as it is being called) suddenly has time on its hands and that Iran's rulers shouldn't stand near open windows, just in case we want to reach out to them.
Hey, don't expect too much from me. I can only reset so much.
