Foreign Affairs Is an Off-Ramp With Iran Possible? It’s not too late for a diplomatic resolution. (Wikimedia Commons) Militarily speaking, the United States has a lot to be proud of. The war in Iran, now over a week old, has blown up plenty of buildings, killed a whole crop of senior Iranian officials—most notably the Iranian Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei—and destroyed a significant chunk of the Islamic Republic’s military capacity. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Dan Caine have provided several updates at the Pentagon lauding the Trump administration’s brilliance, marveling at the U.S. military’s technological superiority, and bragging about Iran’s inability to control its own airspace. Senior Israeli military officials are just as bombastic; on March 5, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir claimed that 80 percent of Iran’s air defenses were destroyed and 60 percent of its missile launchers were taken out of action. But the Iranians aren’t going down without a fight. Although Iran is unquestionably the weaker party in this war, the country’s leadership is treating it as an existential conflict that requires a total-war strategy. To date, Tehran has calculated that expanding the conflict into other states, chief among them Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar, is not only appropriate as a method of retaliation but also the best way to compel Trump to eventually sue for peace. The idea is to press the Gulf States, all of whom want to get back to business as usual, into lobbying the Trump administration for a ceasefire. Whether or not the gambit works, the Iranians risk ruining the very detente they established with the Gulf over the last several years by sending missiles into hotels, oil fields, gas terminals, and ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz. Right now, it’s difficult to envision an off-ramp to the war. Based strictly on public remarks, the Trump administration doesn’t appear all that interested in sitting down with the Iranians, either directly or indirectly, to find a way out. Trump is talking about a full-blown Iranian capitulation, or, in his words, “unconditional surrender,” which could either be a negotiating ploy on his end or a genuine statement of intent. If it’s the latter, then the war will go on for weeks, if not months, because the Iranian regime is not going to simply throw up its hands and give up, no matter how lopsided the military balance is. Nor has the regime, or what’s left of it, decided to grant Trump his wish to pick its next supreme leader, which made about as much sense as giving the Iranians veto power over who wins the 2028 U.S. presidential election.  Even so, it’s far too early to eliminate diplomacy from the picture. Trump is fickle, unpredictable, and malleable, and he doesn’t like to take any of his options off the table. Although he may be sounding  more like George W. Bush with every passing day, nobody can say with absolute certainty that “dealmaking Don” won’t make an appearance. Depending on the regime’s ability to sustain retaliation across the Gulf, its ability to stay unified internally, and the U.S. military’s capacity to keep its air defense interceptors stocked, diplomacy could switch from unlikely today to at least plausible in the future. Add in fluctuating price increases in world energy markets, and it’s possible that Trump could begin to see an exit ramp in a more favorable light. At the time of writing, Brent crude prices have increased by nearly 25 percent since the war began, cracking over $100 a barrel for the first time in nearly two years. Natural gas futures have nearly doubled in the same timeframe. None of this is particularly great for Trump, whose party could possibly lose one (or both) houses of Congress in the midterm elections this year.   The economic pain is only going to get worse. Kuwait, which produces about 2.5 million barrels of oil a day, is now reducing oil production due to a lack of storage capacity. Meanwhile, Qatar’s energy minister has said that crude prices could rise to an astounding $150 a barrel, which will be felt by Americans when they’re filling up their tanks. For the Iranians, this is precisely what the strategy entails—make Americans feel the economic consequences of their government’s actions, drive a wedge between Washington and its Gulf Arab partners, and send the message that all of these consequences will compound even further as long as the war continues. Trump, who obsesses about gas prices, could very well take the bait.  Of course, all of this is purely hypothetical right now. It could also be a waste of ink if Trump insists on changing the Iranian regime from the inside out. Over the last 48 hours, Trump has given a slew of interviews pontificating about who Khamenei’s replacement might be and demanding that he personally sign off on the next candidate. (In the end, the Iranians did not consult him and installed Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba.) If this feels like the very regime change he lambasted during his previous presidential campaigns, that’s because it is. What Trump seems to be after is not merely degrading Iran’s ballistic missile stockpile, preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, or wiping out Tehran’s ability to project power against its neighbors, but a wholesale transformation of the Iranian government and a complete 180-degree shift in Iranian foreign policy. To think the regime would cater to these demands even as it’s under military pressure is delusional. The first, second, and third priority of the regime is to keep itself in power, and bowing to Trump’s diktats would bring the exact opposite result.  The question, then, becomes what a potential negotiated deal could look like. Some of the Trump administration’s demands—Iran can never have a nuclear weapon—are reasonable and in keeping with longstanding U.S. policy. Others, like Iran being essentially gutted of its defense capabilities, cutting all ties with its proxy networks in the Middle East and agreeing to become the Persian Gulf’s version of post-Maduro Venezuela are obviously desirable but unrealistic given Tehran’s own objectives.  We also need to ask whether Tehran would be responsive to more diplomacy with Trump. Casual observers who see Iranian military bases, government buildings, and mobile missile launchers getting blown up on the news may scoff at this question. But we need to remember that Iran has been burned by Trump at least three times before. The first time was in May 2018, when Trump withdrew Washington from the 2015 nuclear deal. The second was last June, when Trump permitted Israel to begin a 12-day bombing campaign against Iran despite having scheduled the sixth round of nuclear negotiations with Iranian officials days later. The third was last week, when the Trump administration chose to unleash a second, more comprehensive air campaign only days after U.S. and Iranian negotiators met in Oman for talks, which Iran’s Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi, called serious. Given this track record, the regime will view any outreach by the White House as suspect. Last June, Trump essentially made Israel swallow a ceasefire. The U.S. objectives back then were straightforward and easily explained to the American public: destroy, or at least heavily damage, Iran’s three major nuclear facilities. Once that goal was met, Trump declared victory, patted himself on the back for a job well done, and pressured Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop his own airstrikes. Today, the situation is markedly different. U.S. objectives are wishy-washy and change by the hour; rumors of U.S. ground troops deploying into Iran are beginning to percolate; and Trump appears to want to end the Iranian problem once and for all. If this is the case, then there’s no off-ramp to consider. The post Is an Off-Ramp With Iran Possible? appeared first on The American Conservative.

“I think, and this is now with some distance in listening to the records, but on the outside looking in with all earnestness I think Soundgarden made the best records out of that scene,” band vocalist Chris Cornell offered in an ’07 interview. “I think we were the most daring and experimental and genre-pushing… and I’m really proud of it. “We started getting (comparisons to Led Zeppelin) a lot: ‘Zeppelin, Zeppelin, Zeppelin,’ and we were like, OK, let’s check some of this out,” Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil explained “We were all very acquainted with it individually, but collectively we weren’t sitting around the table listening them. So initially we would deny that influence. Ultimately, we started to re-embrace Zeppelin, Beatles, (Black) Sabbath and Pink Floyd. I think they were always there. It’s a weird story, but it may explain why, for a few years, we denied the Zeppelin/Sabbath influence.” #10. Pretty Noose (Down On The Upside, 1996) “Pretty Noose” was written by frontman Chris Cornell. “That song for me was kind of interesting, because we were at the phase where we were just going to demo tunes,” offered drummer Matt Cameron, “I’d walked to the studio (in Seattle) and my legs were really tired. But to make a long story short, I was trying to get a walking feel on the drum part. So it probably has a little weird shuffle to it probably from that walk that I took to the studio that day.” #9. The Day I Tried To Live (Superunknown, 1994) “It’s about trying to step out of being patterned and closed off and reclusive, which I’ve always had a problem with,” explained Cornell. “It’s about attempting to be normal and just go out and be around other people and hang out. I have a tendency to sometimes be pretty closed off and not see people for long periods of time and not call anyone.” #8. Rusty Cage (Badmotorfinger, 1991) “The tuning on that song was pretty nutty. It’s recorded with a wah wah in the low position used as a filter,” stated guitarist Kim Thayil. “That was the first time we did anything like that. It was Chris’s idea; he wanted to get that weird tone that you can’t really dial in on an amp. But if you use the wah wah as a filter, it gets an incredibly weird sound. And if you listen to that riff, especially if you’ve heard the original demos of it, it almost sounds backward.” #7. 4th Of July (Superunknown, 1994) “One time I was on acid, and there were voices ten feet behind my head,” Cornell told RIP magazine. “The whole time I’d be walking, they’d be talking behind me. It actually made me feel good, because I felt like I was with some people. At one point I was looking back, and I saw that one person was wearing a black shirt and jeans, and the other person was wearing a red shirt. They were always there. It was kinda like a dream, though, where I’d wake up and look and focus once in a while and realize there was no one there.” #6. Spoonman (Superunknown, 1994) The song was originally written for the “Singles” soundtrack with the title inspired by Artis The Spoonman, a street performer from Santa Cruz, CA, and later Seattle, who played a set of spoons. “It’s more about the paradox of who (Artis) is and what people perceive him as,” Corbell commented. “He’s a street musician, but when he’s playing on the street, he is given a value and judged completely wrong by someone else. They think he’s a street person, or he’s doing this because he can’t hold down a regular job. They put him a few pegs down on the social ladder because of how they perceive someone who dresses differently.” #5. Blow Up The Outside World (Down On The Upside, 1996) “”People said there was a Beatles-ish element,” said Thayil. “I suppose there is a bit of Paul McCartney and a little bit of (John) Lennon in the flavor of the song. Everyone in the band grew up with the Beatles and we had a certain degree of respect and admiration for them that’s not uncommon.” #4. Jesus Christ Pose (Badmotorfinger, 1991) “(It) was definitely a jam at rehearsal,” noted Thayil explaining the song’s origin. “I think Ben (Shepherd) was just jamming up this loud and blurry, detuned bass line flopping around there. And Matt (Cameron) starts making it precise and coherent; Matt’s drum part is insane – it’s so fast and coordinated. And I picked up my guitar, thinking, “What the hell are they doing?” It took me a while to figure out what’s going on rhythmically and where to punctuate the one, so what I start hearing is that swirling, kamikaze bat (guitar) sound at the beginning. And that was a groove.” #3. Outshined (Badmotorfinger, 1991) “I don’t know how everyone else feels … but I definitely go through periods of extreme self-confidence, feeling like I can do anything,” offered Cornell. “But then someone will say something, however insignificant, or I’ll get something in my head and, all of a sudden, I’m plummeting in the opposite direction. That’s where “Outshined” comes from. #2. Fell On Black Days (Superunknown, 1994) “Fell on Black Days” was like this ongoing fear I’ve had for years,” noted Cornell. “It’s a feeling that everyone gets. You’re happy with your life, everything’s going well, things are exciting—when all of a sudden you realize you’re unhappy in the extreme, to the point of being really, really scared.” #1. Black Hole Sun (Superunknown, 1994) “I wrote the song thinking the band wouldn’t like it—then it became the biggest hit of the summer,” remembered Cornell. The song topped the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart and cracked the Top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. “No one seems to get this, but ‘Black Hole Sun’ is sad,” added Cornell. “But because the melody is really pretty, everyone thinks it’s almost chipper, which is ridiculous.” ### Soundgarden: Chris Cornell: Lead Vocals/Rhythm Guitar/Drums Kim Thayil: Lead Guitar Ben Shepherd: Bass Matt Cameron: Drums Former Members: Hiro Yamamoto: Bass/Backing Vocals (1984 – 1989) Scott Sunquist: Drums (1985 – 1986) Jason Everman: Bass (1989 – 1990 ### The post Soundgarden’s Top 10 appeared first on RockinTown.

Throughout history, certain events have occurred that were so unexpected and impactful that they halted the world in its tracks. These pivotal moments not only captured global attention but also disrupted daily life and significantly influenced the course of humanity. From unforeseen disasters to groundbreaking discoveries, these events have the power to unite or divide, ... The post 15 Shocking Moments in History That Literally Made The Whole World Stop appeared first on History Collection.

from Your News: Federal investigators have obtained large volumes of election data from Arizona’s largest county as part of a widening probe into potential voting irregularities connected to the 2020 and 2024 elections. By yourNEWS Media Newsroom The FBI has expanded its investigation into potential election irregularities by secretly obtaining a large collection of voting […]

God’s purpose is not a hidden code to crack.

Unforgiveness feels justified, but it quietly chains your heart. Discover how choosing to forgive can release you into the freedom Christ died to give you.

The day started like every other one. Sun illuminates the curtains, letting in the soft glow of morning light. The sound of the house creaking as the rest of the family awakened and started the day. But something was different. As I pulled back the covers, I felt a fluttering in my chest. Panic gripped me, and I dreaded starting yet another cycle of endless tasks that demanded my attention. Tears welled up at the thought of facing the light of another day.  Sometimes the joy of a new morning is apparent; we made it through a challenging night, or the gentle forgetfulness of sleep blessed us with a fresh perspective. Other times, we need a reminder of the joy that can be found in Christ, regardless of our circumstances or feelings. As Psalm 30:5 tells us, “For his anger lasts only a moment, but his favor lasts a lifetime; weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” NIVThe comforting aspect of this Psalm is that David was writing from a difficult experience. He had faced death and felt the fear of being surrounded by his enemies. Yet, the Lord had rescued him and healed him. David did not rejoice because events had turned to his favor or because he was assured of a trouble-free life. He found a reason to rejoice because of the Lord’s kindness. As the final verses of this song of praise say, “You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever.” - Psalm 30:11-12 NIV  We, too, can experience this transformative joy in the Lord, whether life is filled with good things right now or we are struggling to get out of bed. The following eight peaceful morning prayers offer practical yet thoughtful ways to turn our attention back to the Lord whose kindness is ever new. To lean against our Savior, as the Apostle John did, and rest in the greatest friendship we can know. Then, we can face the new day, not from a posture of dread, but from a place of gentle refreshment and reassurance that we are not alone.      Photo Credit: Getty Images/DigitalVision/Klaus Vedfelt

Discover how to reclaim your energy and avoid burnout by embracing the ancient practice of Sabbath, a divine invitation designed for your restoration and spiritual well-being. Learn practical ways to integrate intentional rest into your modern life, transforming it from a burden into a powerful tool for connection and rejuvenation.