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  "path": "/articles/we-have-achieved-our-goal-of-making-everything-worse-than-it-was-before",
  "publishedAt": "2026-04-13T11:29:00.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.mcsweeneys.net",
  "tags": [
    "New York Times"
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  "textContent": "_“Vice President JD Vance’s failure to win the concessions the United States sought from Iran in a single, marathon negotiating session over its nuclear program was no surprise… The failure leaves the Trump administration facing several unpalatable options.”_ — New York Times\n\n- - -\n\nWhen we willingly chose to start this war against our will, we had one sole objective: to make everything slightly worse than it was before. And now, through a combination of military might and hard-nosed diplomacy, we have achieved our aim.\n\nGo ahead, step outside. Breathe. Admittedly, you won’t notice much of a difference because the world today is pretty much the same as it was a few weeks ago, only more unstable. Which, again—and we cannot stress this enough—was the whole point.\n\nSure, it was touch-and-go for a while there. Entirely predictable things happened that we could never have foreseen, jeopardizing our chances of success in this completely unnecessary war of necessity. The world teetered on the brink of chaos: financial collapse, geopolitical meltdown, the potential death of millions. But at the last minute, when all hope seemed lost, we managed to avert disaster and walk away with precisely what we set out to accomplish: a net loss.\n\nNow, some people might argue that negotiating yourself out of a situation of your own making only to walk away with less than nothing is no cause for celebration. Au contraire. It actually takes a lot of courage to do something that nobody asked for at great personal expense, and that sort of selflessness should be applauded, not mocked or questioned or denounced by the UN.\n\nOthers will say that this was a war of choice. Wrong. This was “do or die.” Or as we like to think of it, “do or do nothing and leave everything basically fine.” Sure, we could have just sat back and twiddled our thumbs. And sure, had we done that, everything would be largely the same as it was two months ago, i.e., better than it is today. But instead, we chose to act. We chose to do something. And isn’t it better to make things a little worse than to do nothing at all?\n\nNot since Winston Churchill stood on that balcony and held up that famous “V for Victory” has a military success been so complete and total. Sure, winning WWII may have resulted in the defeat of fascism in Europe, but this war has achieved something even more extraordinary, something that many thought impossible: it’s made Marjorie Taylor Greene seem almost reasonable.\n\nLook, what’s the point in even having elected leaders if they’re not going to start costly wars that nobody voted for? How else were we going to spend those billions of dollars we had lying around? Invest in public schools and healthcare? Launch ambitious civil infrastructure projects? That’s ridiculous. Anyone with half a brain can see that the astronomical cost of this conflict was worth it to guarantee our children a future that is less bright and safe than it was before.",
  "title": "We Have Achieved Our Goal of Making Everything Worse Than It Was Before"
}