Negotiating 101
I don’t play poker (or do international diplomacy), but my day job — selling residential real estate — does involve a fair amount of negotiating.
So, I think I can say with some confidence that good negotiators don’t usually announce, “I don’t bluff,” as President Obama reportedly just said about dealing with Iran’s nuclear threat.
They don’t have to.
And if you heard someone say, “I don’t bluff,” your first instinct would be, “they’re bluffing!”
A bank (or country) that has to protest its solvency, isn’t (solvent).
Similarly, when one party to a negotiation has to convince the other side that it’s really serious . . . it’s already lost control of the negotiation.
Maybe the state department needs a couple good Washington D.C. Realtors to advise it.
