The language of the coming battle in Congress , could determine the outcome. Many of the President’a allies are unashamedly pro-Iran from NIAC to Ploughshares. In other words, their interests lie with Iran, not America. The White House negotiating team has behaved in recent months as if were Iran’s lawyers, trying to get other nations in the P5 + 1 who were more skeptical of all the give-aways, in line. Some supporters of the Administration who will now try to defend the indefensible,are simply left wing hacks, like J Street, whose only job is to defend anything this President tells them to defend.
Richard Baehr
| Democrats for the mullahs
The latest word from Vienna is that the July 7 deadline has come and gone, and now the P5+1 and Iran hope to wrap things up by Friday, July 10.
The three-day slippage may not appear to be a big deal, but it is a delay the administration hoped to avoid, since the Corker-Menendez bill provides for 60 days for congressional review of an Iran agreement if the terms are submitted to Congress after July 9, but only 30 days if submitted by that date. Given summer vacations and the general undesirability (heat, humidity) of being in the nation's capital during the summer months, the extra 30 days allows for both houses of Congress, controlled by Republicans in each case, to set up less compressed schedules for reviewing the agreement, calling in witnesses and taking the votes. And of course, it provides more time for skeptical lawmakers and their staffs to read the details of what has been conceded and given away and to try to determine what our side got in exchange for removing most sanctions -- American and international -- almost immediately, and providing about $150 billion to Iran.
The White House under U.S. President Barack Obama, most specifically Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes, has stated that getting this deal done is as big a deal for the administration as passing Obamacare was. In the case of the health care legislation, one of the administration's leading supporters in Congress, then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi, said the bill needed to be passed so we could find out what was in it. With the Iran deal, it appears, the vote will come after examination, an improvement, I think, at least regarding the process.
When the deal is signed, as it almost certainly will be, there will be momentum behind those who have negotiated it. Secretary of State John Kerry, Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman, and other administration officials will of course put the best spin on the catastrophic giveaway that has resulted from their obsessive pursuit of an agreement with Iran, which seems to have removed the word "no" from their vocabulary. The White House will control the narrative in the short term as many sympathetic media organizations -- the major networks, many magazines and newspapers -- will be only too happy to earn brownie points by facilitating the administration's selling of the deal.
Columnist Charles Krauthammer has called the deal the worst agreement in American diplomatic history, which is saying something, even if some think he is still being too generous in his assessment.
Krauthammer lays out how much the P5+1 have given up on inspections, the documentation of prior Iranian nuclear activity, and on both nuclear and non-nuclear sanctions relief.
"Instead of welcoming Congress' attempt to tighten sanctions to increase the pressure on the mullahs, Obama began the negotiations by loosening sanctions, injecting billions into the Iranian economy (which began growing again in 2014) and conceding in advance an Iranian right to enrich uranium," he said.
And what is left?
"A surrender document of the kind offered by defeated nations suing for peace. Consider: The strongest military and economic power on earth, backed by the five other major powers, armed with what had been a crushing sanctions regime, is about to sign the worst international agreement in U.S. diplomatic history."
The pursuit of a deal has been justified by a desire to "bring Iran into the community of nations" while preventing its development of a nuclear weapon. As MK and former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren describes in his new book "Ally," the language the Obama team has used to describe the goal of the outreach to Iran and how it sees the "achievement" with Iran matches almost word for word the language used to describe the nuclear "breakthrough" the Clinton team believed it had secured in nuclear talks with North Korea in the mid-1990s. Some of the same functionaries have been involved in both sets of talks, so it is no great surprise that they could be conned twice by similarly untrustworthy but more focused opponents, who have been both more skillful as negotiators and have successfully played off the intense Western desires for deals. Iran has stuck to its single-minded pursuit of financial gain without pain, with no significant constraints on its ability to break out to becoming a nuclear armed nation.
The latest current estimate for breakout time, provided by Alan Kuperman in an article in, amazingly enough, The New York Times (otherwise known as the Obama administration's house organ), is that the deal being finalized in Vienna will extend the breakout period from two to three months. To be charitable, we could call this a 50% improvement. Maybe there is a secret codicil (a handshake deal) that Iran won't actually break out to get the bomb until Obama has left office. This way, Kerry can obtain his Nobel Peace Prize to replace the Vietnam war medals he tossed away when he smeared his fellow soldiers and sought to first establish himself as a future political player.
An article announcing the brief extension to the negotiations included a summary of what issues remained to be ironed out, as provided by the French foreign minister: "French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters the still unresolved issues in the talks are the freeze of Iranian research and development, the sanctions 'snapback,' and the possible military dimensions of past Iranian nuclear work."
Later in the day, there was a leak that the dimensions of past Iranian nuclear work was now a resolved issue, meaning that like so many other issues once considered important to our side, it had been finessed so that Iran need not do anything.
The near certainty that a deal will be forthcoming, and very soon, is that the administration is already working to stiffen the resolve of Democrats in the House and Senate to back Obama, and resist pressure from skeptics or critics of the deal, a group whose number has grown as American resolve has disappeared. Democratic senators were bused to the White House on the evening of July 7 to get their first heavy sell.
The White House may well lose on the initial vote on the deal in both the House and Senate. Only six Democrats need to join all the Republicans in the Senate (if they stay united) to break a filibuster and then vote down the deal. But it is after a presidential veto of that action that the real tough sledding begins -- an override vote. While the odds look very longagainst opponents lining up enough Democratic members to achieve a two-thirds override vote in either the House or Senate, the White House is almost certainly anxious to avoid the embarrassment of a stinging defeat on the vote in either branch of Congress at any stage of review.
The White House is also going back to a strategy it employed to pass Obamacare, when it needed every single Democrat in the Senate to get to 60 votes and break a Republican filibuster. Representatives of nearly 100 progressive groups held a conference call with White House officials on Monday to discuss strategy on how to pressure wavering Democrats on the Iran vote. Most astonishingly, the details of the Iran deal appeared to be entirely irrelevant to the various groups. This is to be all about party loyalty, and supporting the president and his agenda, because this is very important to him. In time, after the critics make their case, the deal will likely be sold as a choice between war and peace, as administration spokespeople have already regularly argued, as if negotiating a better deal or walking away were never real options. Also to be expected will be an argument that Democrats need to be standing up for America and its leadership rather than standing up for the right-wing Israeli government, which has already shown its "disrespect" for the White House.
Even worse, many of the president's allies appear to be unabashedly pro-Iran at this point. This includes former felon Robert Creamer, the husband of Illinois Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky. The congresswoman seems to revel at this point in sticking it to Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu while joyously telling her constituents she is pro-Israel and working to stop an Iranian nuclear program.
Creamer "urged participants on the call to 'step up' their pro-Iran efforts." The call itself was "organized by the liberal pro-Iran group Ploughshares Fund, which has spent millions of dollars to slant Iran-related coverage and protect the Obama administration's diplomatic efforts."
The administration will send its representatives to Congress to make a case for the deal. But they seem to think that even more important to winning will be the millions of phone calls and emails and petitions to Democrats, telling them to back the president. This, they seem to believe, will simplify the decision process -- sort of along the lines that Democrats are good, and Republicans are bad, which is about the level of depth the progressive advocates can deliver.
This kind of substantive argument may well make the difference in the votes of some members over a treaty that is not being treated like a treaty, but is probably more important than many treaties that have been signed in American history. In this case, given what we know of the agreement, a vote by Democrats to stick with Obama is really a vote for the mullahs.
Iran and the Battle for the Soul of the Democratic Party
Jonathan S. Tobin | @tobincommentary
As the Iran nuclear talks head down the home stretch, it is increasingly obvious that Secretary of State John Kerry’s comments about walking away from the negotiations if a “good agreement” isn’t obtained are not credible. A deal or, as Omri Ceren predicts, a “non-agreement agreement” is inevitable even as the deadline was extended to the end of the week. That means the focus will soon change from the standoff in Vienna to Washington where a Congressional debate on the deal that comes out of this process will soon begin. The result of a vote on the deal is by no means certain but most observers believe that although there will be majorities in both Houses that will vote against it, opponents will fall well short of the two thirds they need to override President Obama’s expected veto. Such an outcome will be made possible by the decision of a critical mass of Democrats in the Senate and especially the House to back the president’s deal even though it will not satisfy the administration’s own stated goal of preventing the Islamist regime from getting a weapon. If so, that will be explained by partisan loyalty and the hold the president still has over much of his party. But there’s no escaping an answer that is just as obvious that was highlighted in a new poll conducted by Frank Luntz that was reported today in the Times of Israel that sees Israel losing Democrats across the board.
It should not be forgotten that the issue of the nuclear threat from Iran transcends that of support for Israel. A nuclear Iran or even one that has attained the status of a threshold nuclear power with Western approval — which the president’s deal will assure — presents a clear and present danger to the Arab world, including U.S. allies like Saudi Arabia as much as it does to Israel. The boost such an outcome would give terrorist groups allied with Iran, such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthi rebels in Yemen as well as the Assad regime in Syria would undermine the regional balance of power and help Tehran in its quest for regional hegemony. Moreover, Iranian nukes are also a threat to the United States and Europe, especially if Iran’s ballistic missile program is not halted; an aspect of the problem that the agreement is as unlikely to address as the regime’s state sponsorship of terror.
But there is no ignoring the fact that it will be the pull of the alliance with Israel that will determine more votes in Congress than general qualms about regional or even U.S. security. The existential threat to Israel from an Iranian weapon is obvious, a point brought home again today by the published comments of former Iranian President Rafsanjani who repeated what many others in power — including the country’s Supreme Leader — have already said: that Israel “will be erased soon.”
If Democrats are going to buck Obama, it will be because their instinctual support for Israel makes it impossible for them to vote to approve a weak nuclear deal that, as this one does, provides Iran with two paths to a bomb: one by cheating on its easily evaded rules and one by patiently waiting for it to expire in ten years.
But if, as Luntz points out, a growing number of Democrats are ready to abandon Israel, it will be that much easier for the White House to rally the president’s party behind a détente with Iran that he considers integral to his foreign policy legacy.
Luntz’s poll, which was sponsored by the Jewish National Fund, is consistent with other surveys that have showed a growing gap between Republicans and Democrats about Israel. But the highlights he provided still ought to shock pro-Israel Democrats:
* 76 percent of Democrats but only 20 percent of Republicans say Israel “has too much influence” on U.S. foreign policy.
* Asked whether Israel was a “racist country,” 47 percent of Democrats agreed, 32 percent disagreed and 21 percent either didn’t know or were neutral. By contrast, 76 percent of Republicans disagreed while only 13 percent agreed and 12 percent didn’t know or were neutral about this canard.
* When queried as to whether Israel wanted peace, only 48 percent of Democrats agreed while 31 disagreed and 21 percent didn’t know or were neutral. By contrast, 88 percent of Republicans agreed while only five percent thought it didn’t and seven percent didn’t know or were neutral.
* 88 percent of Republicans also termed themselves “pro-Israel,” a label that only 46 percent applied that label to themselves.
* Most important for those looking to handicap a vote on a deal with Iran were those questions relating to support for politicians who are perceived as friendly or hostile to Israel. Only 18 percent of Democrats said they would be more likely to vote for a politician who defended Israel’s right to self-defense while 76 percent of Republicans said they would. 32 percent of Democrats and only seven percent of Republicans said they would be less likely to back such a politician. On the other hand, 45 percent of Democrats and only 6 percent of Republicans said they would be more likely to vote for a politician who criticized Israel. 75 percent of Republicans and only 23 percent of Democrats said they would be less likely to vote for such a politician.
* For those looking for a link to anti-Semitism, while a majority of both parties saw anti-Semitism as a problem in the United States, fully 50 percent of Democrats but only 18 percent of Republicans agreed with the proposition that, “Jewish people are too hyper-sensitive and too often label legitimate criticisms of Israel as an anti-Semitic attack.”
This data confirms what has already become obvious. While clear majorities of both parties in Congress are part of a strong pro-Israel coalition, support for that consensus among rank and file Democrats is weak and growing weaker all that time. That means Democrats inclined to choose partisan loyalty to Obama over support for Israel’s survival face fewer critics within their party. Where a Republican inclined to throw Israel under the bus would face a wall of opposition from his party, Democrats may have no such fears.
Though the agreement the president will present to Congress will almost certainly fall short of the same criteria that the administration presented before the negotiations began, the soft support for Israel among Democrats will be Obama’s trump card as he twists arms and hands out favors in search of Democratic votes to sustain a veto of the Iran deal. This means the debate on Iran will not be so much one about policy as a battle for the soul of a Democratic Party that has lost its way on Israel.
Some will blame this state of affairs on the Israeli government or even Republicans for “politicizing” support for the Jewish state. But such arguments are entirely disingenuous. The fault here lies entirely with Obama and the left-wing of the Democrats who have embraced positions attacking Israel and, in the case of Iran, prioritized détente with the Islamist regime over support for America’s only democratic ally in the Middle East.
It is true, as I wrote earlier this year, that both Republicans and Democrats failed when they passed the lamentable Corker-Cardin bill that created an approval procedure for the Iran deal that turned the treaty confirmation process on its head. The president should have been forced to present the agreement as a treaty that requires two thirds of the Senate to vote yes for it to be ratified. Instead, distracted by Obama’s disingenuous designation of the deal and bullied by the president’s rhetoric, they voted for a bill that allows it to become law with only the one-third plus one of one of the two Houses of Congress to sustain a veto.
But any chance to vote on the most important foreign treaty in a generation should have caused both the Republican and Democratic caucuses to stand firm on an issue on which there has always been a clear consensus. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened despite obvious evidence that the president has decided any Iran deal, even an indefensible one, is better than none at all. If Obama succeeds in getting his Iran deal, and the odds favor it, blame Democrats for abandoning their pro-Israel principles, not Republicans or the Israelis.
The catastrophic, genocidal Iran deal is just about upon us. 1. It will make it simple for Iran to get many nuclear bombs. 2. It will facilitate a nuclear arms race throughout Middle east. 3. it will ensure the worst terrorist nation on earth becomes the main regional power in the region. 4. it will vastly exacerbate Iran's already VAST support for terrorism in the world through: a. the threat of the nuks as well as b. billions and billions of economic relief to iran they will use for terrorism c. their already huge network of worldwide terror proxies and Iranians. 5. It directly threatens Israel's existence, as well as the ICBMs aimed at USA, multiple dirty bombs being exploded in US cities 6. Verification of any element of the plan is a joke since a. Iran has never abided by past agreements b. They have said repeatedly they have no intention of allowing inspections 7.Obama saying they will not use nuclear weapons is a LIE and nighmarish joke because that shows a complete denial of the reality of Iran's theology and willingness to sacrifice much of their population for the "honor" of annihilating the Jewish state. 8. obama says ISIS and  |
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