Although the details of the new “agreement” with Iran have not been fully released, enough of them have become public to make it clear this is one of the all-time great sellouts in American history, going beyond even the Yalta Conference at the end of WWII when the store was given away to the Soviets.
Nearly every Republican lawmaker and presidential candidate have already come out against it. The comparisons to former British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who infamously sold out Czechoslovakia to Hitler at the Munich Conference in 1938 have begun to proliferate—and rightly so.
What do we already know about this agreement? Only that the negotiators on the American side, led by Secretary of State John Kerry, backed down on every point that they had told us they would not compromise.
Despite Obama’s rhetoric yesterday in his announcement, the agreement gives the green light to Iran to develop nuclear weapons. Oh, they are supposed to put it on hold for now, but in about a decade, all constraints are lifted.
What else was dropped from the discussions? They don’t have to be held to immediate inspections to be sure they are keeping their word. Any request to carry out an inspection must first come to a committee—on which Iran is a member—for a decision. And that committee has up to 24 days to make the decision. So much for “snap” inspections.
But that doesn’t bother our president or secretary of state. They have Iran’s word, and that is sufficient for them.
All economic sanctions against Iran are now dropped, and the result will be billions of dollars that this terrorist nation can now devote to more terrorism. They can even obtain ballistic missiles.
What a great deal—for Iran.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, clear-headed as always, immediately denounced this deal, knowing full well that Israel is now more threatened than ever, given that Iran has never walked back its promise to wipe that nation off the map. Netanyahu put the world on notice that the deal will not be recognized as legitimate by Israel; they will defend themselves as necessary.
This comes down to the biggest problem of all: Obama’s naïve and foolish belief that once Iran is welcomed into the so-called community of nations, it will magically become civilized and change its very nature. He continues to see the U.S. as the problem in the world; if we are just “nice” enough, all evil will drain out of terrorists.
The academic word for that is “baloney.” Even while these negotiations were ongoing, Iran’s leaders were publicly giving voice to their true intentions:
Then there’s the constitutional issue. Article II, section 2, of the Constitution states, rather clearly, “He [the president] shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur.” Notice the 2/3 requirement. Any treaty negotiated with foreign nations must come before the Senate and get the approval of 2/3 of that body.
That’s not happening in this instance.
Verbal slight of hand is being used to say this is not a treaty, but merely an “executive agreement,” an entity that doesn’t exist in the Constitution. So the administration argues that it can go into effect without the 2/3 concurrence of the Senate.
Instead, it will go to the Senate for a vote, and if 3/5 of the senators (60 of them) disapprove, it will be rejected but subject to the president’s veto. Should that occur, the Senate will then have to come up with a 2/3 vote to override the veto.
Notice that the entire approval process has been reversed. Rather than a 2/3 approval up front (67 senators in favor), this agreement could go into effect provided only 51 approve of it. The burden will be on those who disapprove to get to 60 votes. And then they will have to round up 67 to override a veto.
This is blatantly unconstitutional. But what else is new in a Barack Obama presidency?
This deal is worse than Munich or Yalta because neither of them allowed the development of nuclear weapons in a terrorist state. Republicans need to stand firm. Democrats who say they are opposed to terrorism and are in favor of remaining a strong ally of Israel need to find a backbone somewhere. That’s the only way this abomination will be defeated.