Joe Klein waited till the very end of 2011, but has managed to make a strong bid for Most Asinine Assertion of the Year.
Appearing on Morning Joe today, Klein claimed that Iran's interest in getting nukes would "just be to deter Israel" and Pakistan. Certainly when it comes to Israel, this has to be among the most hideous instances of blaming the victim in recent memory. Video after the jump.
Klein made his despicable claim in the course of defending Ron Paul's indifference to Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons.
JOE KLEIN: By the way, you know, the reality is that we're probably not going to be able to stop Iran from getting a bomb, the way, if that's what they choose to do. And the way we're going to react to it is the same way we reacted to the Soviet Union. It's going to be containment and deterrence. That is not an unreasonable policy. The Iranians took a million casualties in the war with Iraq in the 1980s. I mean, I spent time there. And that is one of the most, the foremost facts of life in Iran. Those guys don't want to go to war again. If they got a bomb it would just be to deter Israel and Pakistan.
Iran infamously proclaimed its desire to "wipe Israel off the map." If Israel were to attack Iran, it would only be for the purpose of disrupting its nuclear weapons program that would permit Iran to fulfill that goal. But by Klein's twisted logic, Iran needs nuclear weapons to prevent Israel from attacking it . . . to prevent it from getting nuclear weapons.
