On the recordApril 22, 2010
I was one of those 11, and I would like to explain why I think the sanction bill against the Iranians is very, very dangerous and not well thought out. Sanctions are very serious. Sanctions are literally an act of war. When you prevent certain goods and services going into a country, it's like a blockade. There is no advantage to us to do this. The sanction bill literally says that any country that trades or sends oil into Iran, we will no longer trade with them. So if Russia sends in oil or gasoline or refined products or China does, we are theoretically, under this bill, not to trade with them. Can you think of anything more chaotic than having a trade war with China at this particular time? So often well-intentioned foreign policy procedures backfire. They have unintended consequences and there is too often blowback. Today, unbelievably, we are engaged in so many places in the world and we can't afford it. Our foreign policy costs us a trillion dollars a year to operate. We're in 135 countries. We have over 700 bases throughout the world. We are engaged in military confrontation in Iraq, Afghanistan, in Pakistan. We're bombing in Yemen, as well as having surrogates fighting in Somalia. We're flat-out broke. The policy is driving our enemies into the hands of the Chinese, and here we are looking for another war.
