Netanyahu’s speech was designed to depict Obama and others working on the current deal as utterly naive and, with Israeli elections two weeks off, to burnish Netanyahu’s credentials as a hawk who can school Obama and other American squishes on their own turf. And House Speaker John Boehner, who had invited Netanyahu to use Congress as a prop, had succeeded in firing a torpedo at the president’s Iran talks. As unseemly as all this was—Netanyahu could have delivered his Obama-subverting message in meetings with US lawmakers, media interviews, and public speeches elsewhere—the hard truth remains: Obama and Netanyahu have a fundamental difference of opinion. The president believes a realistic deal with Iran will contain Tehran’s nuclear program and reduce the odds of another war in the region. Netanyahu insists on an all-or-nothing approach that, whether he says it or not, seems likely to lead to war. This is indeed an important debate, one that should be free of all the theatrics and chest-thumping that Netanyahu, Boehner, and their political consultants engineered today.

– Read more: Netanyahu’s Speech: Mansplaining Iran to Obama – David Corn, MotherJones.com