Sanctions you can sanction

[Welcome Glenn Greenwald readers! See also my exchange with Elizabeth Warren re: the sanctions on Iran]

This is why Obama is at the top of the Democratic heap.

He has the taste to suggest that crippling sanctions against Iran are suffered only by its elites:

The regime is more isolated than ever before; its leaders are faced with crippling sanctions

Lesser Dems lack the subtlety that Lee Atwater famously counseled to his team. They ham-handedly admit their goal is to wreak vicious harm upon ordinary Iranians:

Listening to congressional supporters of sanctions, you’d think the sole reason is a sadistic urge to harm innocent Iranians. As one of the top supporters of sanctions, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA), said, “Critics [of the sanctions] argued that these measures will hurt the Iranian people. Quite frankly, we need to do just that.” Or take Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY): “The goal … is to inflict crippling, unendurable economic pain over there. Iran’s banking sector — especially its central bank — needs to become the financial equivalent of Chernobyl: radioactive, dangerous and most of all, empty.”