[amalcon]

If you get into the details, the two biggest "points of past contention" (nuclear enrichment and sanctions) are in the ten point proposal. I only see four ways to resolve that conflict:

1) The US agrees to the resolution of those that Iran publicly claims in the proposal (aka we lost)

2) Iran is lying publicly, and actually agrees to keep sanctions in place and/or give up uranium enrichment (maybe, but the plausible version of this is just reversion to the diplomatic status quo ante - a de facto defeat for everyone).

3) Trump is lying publicly, and there is no agreement on any of this (plausible, but it's unlikely to end better than #1 or #2)

4) This is just a rhetorical trick in service of a stall tactic ("almost all" does not include the ones that actually matter - plausible, but it's unlikely to end better than #1 or #2)

#2 is best case for the US, and represents a defeat in that costs were paid but nothing achieved. It's also a defeat for Iran, but I don't think many of us care about that?

Edit - I guess it is also plausible that Iran's current leadership is sufficiently fragmented that "what Iran agrees to" is not a coherent concept right now. That is just the practical effect of #3 by another route, though.

[zahlman]

Just to make sure: you understand that "workable basis on which to negotiate" does not mean anything remotely resembling "thing to which we have agreed", yes?

[amalcon]

Yes? "Workable basis on which to negotiate" generally does not include things that directly contradict existing agreements, though. I am pointing to "Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to" to establish that he's claiming some agreement on the past points of contention that matter.

If the "workable basis for future negotiation" contradicts that agreement, then someone is lying about something.

[zahlman]

> "Workable basis on which to negotiate" generally does not include things that directly contradict existing agreements, though.

I disagree, and don't understand why you see it that way. Of course each side's negotiating position includes things they couldn't get before. The point of negotiating is to get things they didn't have before.

[amalcon]

I'm just not sure how to respond to this, because this criticism doesn't seem to actually address the point. I suppose I could have communicated poorly, but I'm not sure how I could have been more clear.

"Almost all of the past points of contention have been agreed to" is pretty specific language, that indicates a new negotiation. What does "have already been agreed to" mean?

Do you think Trump was referring to an agreement that was in place prior to the war? If so, why did the war happen at all?

Do you think he was referring to future negotiations? "Have been agreed to" would be an odd way to phrase that.

Do you think he was referring to an agreement that lifts sanctions and permits uranium enrichment? That's #1, US lost.

Do you think he was referring to an agreement that contradicts the public 10-point proposal? That's #2, everyone lost.

Do you think that was just something he said, that doesn't have any truth behind it? That's #3, he's lying.

Do you think he was referring to negotiations that did not include uranium enrichment or sanctions? That's #4, he's using an obvious bad-faith rhetorical trick to stall.

Do you think he was referring to something not in one of those categories? Then what?

[zahlman]

> Do you think Trump was referring to an agreement that was in place prior to the war?

Either this, or else: "agreeing to a point of contention" simply means agreeing that it is a point of contention, not agreeing about how it should be resolved.

> If so, why did the war happen at all?

Because of some combination of:

* there were new points of contention;

* some few unresolved old points of contention became more salient.