Richard Land in hot pursuit of the unworkable

Richard Land of the unapology apology is back to foreign policy arm-waving. Yes. Recall that in September, Land and his Religious Right friends sent a hyperventilating open letter which left them looking foolish when Iran quickly gave ground to “weak” President Barak Obama by offering to have its nuclear experts meet with U.S. scientists.

Never mind either that or the fruits of subsequent diplomacy, now says Southern Baptist Convention Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission chief Land.

Because Iran can't be trusted.

Trusted in this case to live up to a U.N.-drafted proposal -- already endorsed by the United States, Russia and France -- to to ship much of its uranium abroad for enrichment and cut back their drive for domestic reprocessing capacity. A proposal to which Iran is to respond officially on Thursday to the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Land apparently prefers the trade embargo he and his Religious Right friends recommended in the aforementioned letter -- an approach that would bring pain to the Iranian people in general and is unlikely to work .

Which, taken together with his approach to apologies, seems to put Land in the running for master of the unworkable.

Sanctions 'are inevitable' [maybe]

Our attention-eager friends on the Religious Right surely did not anticipate seeing Iran quickly give ground in the face of "weak" President Barak Obama by offering to have its nuclear experts meet with U.S. scientists.

Although they must have known of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's statement last week, echoed today, that "Sanctions are seldom productive but they are sometimes inevitable." If they knew, you see, our friends were demanding what they had good reason to suspect was in fact inevitable. That's, well, an easy victory.

As real events proceed apace, however, their hyperventilating open letter begins to look a bit, er, undignified.