Congress takes a stand on a nuclear Iran? Not really, but…..

Congress takes a stand on a nuclear Iran? Not really, but…..

to look on the bright side, this might be a hopeful first step.

The stakes are high.

The stakes are high.

Just as during WW II we started with a hard slog through the swamps and jungle of Guadalcanal on the long road to Tokyo and the end of a horrific World War, this might someday be seen as a signal event that eventually leads to Congress and “We the People” standing up to a President who seeks to be King.

We now know that there will (most likely) be some sort of a written-down Obama nuclear deal relating to Iran and nuclear weapons on the public record the year. An agreement that Obama sees as part of his legacy. The one Congress gets to see and approve is, at present, not even the same as the Farsi version that Iran may (or may not) sign.

Whatever happens between now and 2016, with this knowledge and something (however weak and non-binding) about Iranian nukes on the public record, I can craft a plausible backstory and proceed with my novel Raven’s Redemption. This feels like the ancient Chinese curse, “May you live in interesting times.”

We now face the sort of threats that Americans used to only see in novels. This has not been the case since the Cold War. We have NEVER seen an American President actively committed to giving Nuclear Weapons and delivery systems  to terrorists who swear “Death to America.” He is actively working to suppress criticism of radical Islam.

Can Congress stop him? Will it act aggressively to do so? Apparently not.

Republicans who support Obama’s illegal Iran deal:

Senators Lamar Alexander of Tennessee
Dan Coats of Indiana
Bob Corker of Tennessee
Jeff Flake and John McCain of Arizona
Lindsey Graham of South Carolina
Orrin Hatch of Utah
David Perdue of Georgia

all voted with the Democrats on the Iran deal.

***

Iraq is essentially gone, well on the way to being overrun by ISIS and/or IRAN. In May 2015, facing bipartisan criticism for his failed policy to destroy ISIS, Obama made it crystal clear that he has NO plans to destroy jihad. He is leaving that to the next President.

Obama understands that an element of his legacy will be the hand-off to the next president of the U.S.- and Iraqi-led operation to defeat ISIS, also known as ISIL, his spokesman said, noting how firmly Obama believes Iraqis must fight for their own country.

“The president has indicated that … essentially, this is a 36-month military operation that will be in the degrade phase,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. “He has been candid about the fact that this will be a challenge that the next president will have to confront.”


Obama’s One-Man Nuclear Deal

Is this treason?

Is this treason?

Congress will get a vote but the President still has a free hand.

 Wall Street Journal, April 14, 2015 7:29 p.m. ET

President Obama says he wants Congress to play a role in approving a nuclear deal with Iran, but his every action suggests the opposite. After months of resistance, the White House said Tuesday the President would finally sign a bill requiring a Senate vote on any deal—and why not since it still gives him nearly a free hand.

He's NOT on our side

He’s NOT on our side

Modern Presidents have typically sought a Congressional majority vote, and usually a two-thirds majority, to ratify a major nuclear agreement. Mr. Obama has maneuvered to make Congress irrelevant, though bipartisan majorities passed the economic sanctions that even he now concedes drove Iran to the negotiating table.

The Republican Congress has been trying to reclaim a modest role in foreign affairs over Mr. Obama’s furious resistance. And on Tuesday afternoon the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously passed a measure that authorizes Congress to vote on an Iran deal within 30 days of Mr. Obama submitting it for review.

Opinion Journal Video. Link.

As late as Tuesday morning, Secretary of State John Kerry was still railing in private against the bill. But the White House finally conceded when passage with a veto-proof majority seemed inevitable. The bill will now pass easily on the floor, and if Mr. Obama’s follows his form, he will soon talk about the bill as if it was his idea.

Mr. Obama can still do whatever he wants on Iran as long as he maintains Democratic support. A majority could offer a resolution of disapproval, but that could be filibustered by Democrats and vetoed by the President. As few as 41 Senate Democrats could thus vote to prevent it from ever getting to President Obama’s desk—and 34 could sustain a veto. Mr. Obama could then declare that Congress had its say and “approved” the Iran deal even if a majority in the House and Senate voted to oppose it.

Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker deserves credit for trying, but in the end he had to agree to Democratic changes watering down the measure if he wanted 67 votes to override an Obama veto. Twice the Tennessee Republican delayed a vote in deference to Democrats, though his bill merely requires a vote after the negotiations are over.

His latest concessions shorten the review period to 30 days, which Mr. Obama wanted, perhaps to mollify the mullahs in Tehran who want sanctions lifted immediately. After 52 days Mr. Obama could unilaterally ease sanctions without Congressional approval. Mr. Obama has said that under the “framework” accord sanctions relief is intended to be gradual. But don’t be surprised if his final concession to Ayatollah Khamenei is to lift sanctions after 52 days.

Mr. Corker also removed a requirement that the Administration certify to Congress that Iran is no longer supporting terrorism. This sends an especially bad signal to Iran that Congress agrees with Mr. Obama that the nuclear deal is divorced from its behavior as a rogue state. One of Mr. Obama’s least plausible justifications for the nuclear deal is that it would help to make Iran a “normal” nation. But if Tehran is still sponsoring terrorism around the world, how can it be trusted as a nuclear partner?

Our own view of all this is closer to that of Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson, who spoke for (but didn’t offer) an amendment in committee Tuesday to require that Mr. Obama submit the Iran nuclear deal as a treaty. Under the Constitution, ratification would require an affirmative vote by two-thirds of the Senate.

Committing the U.S. to a deal of this magnitude—concerning proliferation of the world’s most destructive weapons—should require treaty ratification. Previous Presidents from JFK to Nixon to Reagan and George H.W. Bush submitted nuclear pacts as treaties. Even Mr. Obama submitted the U.S.-Russian New Start accord as a treaty.

The Founders required two-thirds approval on treaties because they wanted major national commitments overseas to have a national political consensus. Mr. Obama should want the same kind of consensus on Iran.

But instead he is giving more authority over American commitments to the United Nations than to the U.S. Congress. By making the accord an executive agreement as opposed to a treaty, and perhaps relying on a filibuster or veto to overcome Congressional opposition, he’s turning the deal into a one-man presidential compact with Iran. This will make it vulnerable to being rejected by the next President, as some of the GOP candidates are already promising.

The case for the Corker bill is that at least it guarantees some debate and a vote in Congress on an Iran deal. Mr. Obama can probably do what he wants anyway, but the Iranians are on notice that the United States isn’t run by a single Supreme Leader.


The CIA Needs an Iran ‘Team B’

John Brennan [reportedly a Muslim himself] has put the spy agency in an impossible position regarding analysis of Iran’s nuclear program.

Wall Street Journal, by Michael B. Mukasey and Kevin Carroll, April 14, 2015

Many of CIA Director John Brennan’s gaffes over the years have raised eyebrows, but none has suggested the need for a legislative remedy—until the one he launched at Harvard last week.

His past indiscretions have included, in 2010 when he was a counterterrorism adviser at the White House, referring to Jerusalem by its Arabic name, “al Quds”; referring to the “moderate” elements in Hezbollah, the Iran surrogate in Lebanon and a group the U.S. designates a terrorist organization; and insisting that our enemies should not be called “jihadists” because jihad is “a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam.”

There was also the time in 2010 when he derided the notion of a war on terrorism or terror because “terrorism is but a tactic” and “terror is a state of mind.” Given that evidence, one might have had a general concern about his competence to lead a U.S. intelligence organization, but not a focused concern about the damage any one statement could cause.

But then, in an interview last week at Harvard’s Institute for Politics, Mr. Brennan said that anyone who both knew the facts surrounding the Obama administration’s “framework” agreement regarding the Iranian nuclear program, and said that it “provides a pathway for Iran to a bomb,” was being “wholly disingenuous.” That was foolish, insofar as it applied to many serious-minded people in and out of government, but it was also dangerous.

Picture CIA analysts and other officers charged with weighing and interpreting Iran’s nuclear program in relation to the recently concluded negotiations in Lausanne, Switzerland; that is, CIA analysts who have families and mortgages. Their solemn charge is to report and analyze facts straight-on—the good, the bad and the ugly.

Evidence of cheating by Iran necessarily would be fragmentary—dual-use technology paid for through opaque transactions; unexplained flight patterns and port calls by aircraft and vessels of dubious registration; intercepted conversations using possibly coded terms; a smattering of human intelligence from sources with questionable access and their own mixed motivations and vulnerabilities.

But the boss has already said that purported concerns about Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon are dishonest. Human nature being what it is at Langley as elsewhere, how likely is it that an evaluation suggesting that Iran is up to something would make it beyond operational channels, through reports officers, analysts and CIA managers, up to policy makers?

Not very, unless Congress acts promptly to put in place an alternative team of analysts, much as George H.W. Bush did when he was CIA director in 1976 under President Ford. That was an election year, and détente with the Soviet Union was the overriding administration policy.

During the campaign, the question of whether our military power was falling behind Moscow’s was a charged issue. Mr. Bush commissioned a team of independent experts known as “Team B” to provide analysis of the Soviets’ capabilities and intentions that competed with the CIA’s own internal evaluation. Team B highlighted dangers posed by the U.S.S.R.’s growing strategic nuclear forces, informing President Reagan’s later determination to counteract those capabilities.

Why is a Team B needed today? Even standing alone, the taint of Mr. Brennan’s statement at Harvard would infect all future CIA evaluations of the Iranian nuclear program. But it doesn’t stand alone. It stands alongside the remainder of the Obama administration’s record in intelligence matters, including false statements about the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi; misleading the public about the military record of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl; concealment of documents seized from Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan that reportedly portray al Qaeda’s durable relationships with Iran and Pakistan; minimizing terrorist threats that were inconsistent with the 2012 presidential-campaign theme of terrorism defeated; and mistaken portrayals of the rise of Islamic State and al Qaeda affiliates in Yemen and Africa.

Mr. Brennan’s statement also stands alongside President Obama’s and Secretary of State John Kerry’s eagerness for a deal with Iran that Ben Rhodes, one of the president’s closest foreign-policy advisers, lauded as “the Obamacare of our second term.”

All this is in addition to the president’s own apparent inability to admit the motivation of Islamist terrorists. Recall his memorable description of the murder in Paris of Jews shopping for kosher food earlier this year as the “random” shooting of “a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris.”

Given these facts, House and Senate leaders of both parties should ask former senior national-security officials to study raw intelligence-reporting on Iran, and direct the administration legislatively if necessary to give them the data needed to make an informed judgment.

This “Team B” should then report its findings periodically not only to the administration, but also to congressional leaders and the presidential nominees of both parties once they are chosen. That way, Americans can be assured that all agencies of government are fully informed—and that the vital issues facing the country are being weighed in the forthright way essential to the nation’s security.

Mr. Mukasey served as U.S. attorney general (2007-09) and as a judge for the Southern District of New York (1988-2006). Mr. Carroll served as senior counsel to the House Homeland Security Committee (2011-13) and before that as a CIA case officer.


Republicans’ descent from principle on Iran, treaties, and budget control

By Rick Manning Wall Street Journal, 4/15/2015

The continued descent of the Congressional Republicans away from the party’s fiscal responsibility and strong national security principles were on full display this week in two legislative “wins.”Republicans were riding high after Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) led forty-six of his colleagues to sign a letter to the government of Iran explaining the role the Senate plays in ratifying treaties.  Momentum was building toward a veto-proof majority in favor of strengthening sanctions against the Iranian regime that seeks to develop a nuclear weapon, promises to use it against Israel, and is fomenting successful rebellions in places like Yemen that have thrown the entire Middle East into turmoil.

President Obama’s weak treaty that fundamentally provided Iran a pathway to get a nuke was being pilloried, and hopes ran high that Senate Republicans had finally seized the high ground from the President.  However, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) came to the Democrats’ rescue just in time, as he negotiated a deal on sanctions legislation that reportedly allows 41 Democrats to block any attempt to stop implementation of Obama’s deal. Given the hammer turned to apparent rubber stamp by the desperate-for-consensus Corker, it’s a good thing that he wasn’t negotiating with the Iranians.

Further proof that Senate prerogatives were annihilated under the “sanctions” bill came when President Obama promised to sign it.

While national security advocates have seen their wings clipped by Corker, the Senate also put a tombstone over the notion that Republicans represent fiscal sanity and balanced budgets as the Senate rejected an amendment by Sen. Jeff Sessions that would have upheld federal spending limits on the Medicare doc fix — a common action that Republicans took when in the minority.  However, 71 Senators voted to opt out of the budget law and eliminate the hard-fought spending limits that were established in the 2011 Budget Control Act.  The result is that Medicare spending will be increased an additional $200 billion in one decade alone and an estimated $500 billion in the next twenty years.

At a time when Republicans could rightfully have reclaimed their leadership on smaller government, lower taxes, deficits, and national security issues, the Senate chose to punt on these fundamental differentiators between the two political parties, with only 29 Republican Senators voting to protect the budget law.

By rejecting the tough choices this week, Senate Republicans have guaranteed a future President will face much more difficult budget choices, as they try to explain how their actions support smaller, more responsive government, a claim that those who pay attention will find harder and harder to believe.  They have also effectively neutered their treaty ratification powers by affirming that President Obama does not have to submit his Iranian agreement to Congress for ratification.

Consensus has been reached; Republicans surrendered; and the nation is worse off and less safe, both fiscally and militarily, than it was the day before.

The author is president of Americans for Limited Government.

***

Obama: Witting or Witless? By Mona Charen

A question has hung in the air since Barack Obama first moved into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and began his “fundamental transformation” of this country: Did he intend harm, or was he merely so blinded by ideology that he could not see the damage his policies were creating? The Iran deal provides an answer. Read more now.

Obama is desperate to have a deal, apparently willing to offer anything.  http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/01/21/us-to-award-iran-11-billion-through-end-nuke-talks/

Read more at NetRightDaily.com: http://netrightdaily.com/2015/04/republicans-descent-from-principle-on-iran-treaties-and-budget-control/#ixzz3XP0C139X

200 Retired Generals and Admirals say, “Terrible Deal.” Link.

LATE BREAKING NEWS — Congress sells out: Not just the Clintons, Kerry, and Obama.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/259895/traitor-senators-took-money-iran-lobby-back-iran-daniel-greenfield

Frontpage Magazine has published a bombshell report that has been met with total silence by the media. 

 “Our politicians bought by Iran include not just a list of senators and congressmen about to vote on the Iran deal.  Recipients of Iran’s largess for their campaigns include President Obama, Joe Biden, John Kerry, and Hillary Clinton.

Both of Obama’s secretaries of state were involved in Iran Lobby cash controversies, as was his vice president and his former secretary of defense. Obama was also the beneficiary of sizable donations from the Iran Lobby….”

***

For more information on the lead up and background of this dirty deal, and how the topic of terrorism, jihad and a nuclear Iran has overlaps my novel Raven’s Run (and its 2016 sequel Raven’s Redemption) see:

https://blog.johntrudel.com/?p=1736

https://blog.johntrudel.com/?p=1890

https://blog.johntrudel.com/?p=334

https://blog.johntrudel.com/?p=1523

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12 Responses to Congress takes a stand on a nuclear Iran? Not really, but…..

  1. john1994hero says:

    Is there any GOOD news? Not much, but consider this: The Democrats now OWN the Iran nuclear issue, and political responsibility for the horrors that come from Mad Mullahs and terrorists with Nukes. That was sealed when the Obama DOJ decided to Nuke one of their own — Senator Bob Menendez from NJ — to remove him from being a key player in blocking Iran from getting nuclear weapons.

    Obama and Hillary also own the rise of bloody, radical Islam — the so-called Arab Spring (aka, Islamic Winter), in which Benghazi played a key part. Which Gowdy can prove, but only if the Rs (especially Boehner and McConnell) support seizing Hillary’s server and ALL her records.

    Obama: “ISIS is not Islamic.” “IRAN does not want nuclear weapons.” Obama is so desperate to sign a treaty with Iran — ANY TREATY — that he is offering them a huge bribe, a “sign on” bonus — Billion$ of dollars.

    ABSURD!!!

    And then there is ObamaCare….. The Republicans now need to banish their RINOs and take the gloves off. But will they have the courage to do so?

  2. John Trudel says:

    Obama often lies but has now gone full Orwellian — or full delusional. He argues [falsely] that America is “more respected” and has made the world safer by enabling jihad, giving nukes to Iran, etc. He is giving speeches about this to foreign groups.

    OMG.

    The truth is that our enemies no longer fear us and our friends no longer trust us thanks to his policies and actions.

    ***
    President Obama: Under My Leadership, US Once Again Most Respected Country on Earth

    By Larry O’Connor (1 day ago) | Nation, World

    Speaking with Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative Fellows at the White House, President Barack Obama said that under his leadership, the United States has become the most respected country in the world.

    The Daily Caller details President Obama’s remarks, in which he emphasized his pending nuclear deal with Iran as one of the deciding factors:

    “People don’t remember, but when I came into office, the United States in world opinion ranked below China and just barely above Russia, and today once again, the United States is the most respected country on earth, and part of that I think is because of the work we did to reengage the world and say that we want to work with you as partners with mutual interests and mutual respect.

    It was on that basis we were able to end two wars while still focusing on the very real threat of terrorism and to try to work with our partners in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s the reason why we are moving in the direction of normalize relations with Cuba. The nuclear deal that we are trying to negotiate with Iran.”

    The President didn’t cite specific research to support his claim. According to a 2014 survey conducted by the Reputation Institute and covered by Forbes, the top nod goes to Switzerland, with the U.S. falling to 22nd place.

    http://www.ijreview.com/2015/06/335114-obama-leadership-us-respected-country-earth/

  3. John Trudel says:

    The Obama Administration has reportedly dusted off this old Cold War era proposal for a WORLD POLICE FORCE made by John F. Kennedy to the UN and may be discussing it as part of the nuclear “treaty” discussions with Iran. Is this part of what Obama and Kerry have been negotiating? I do not know, but it seems consistent with Obama’s actions in reducing our military, failing to confront radical Islam, and lack of concern about a nuclear Iran.

    United States Announces World Police Force

    INTRODUCTION

    The revolutionary development of modern weapons within a world divided by serious ideological differences has produced a crisis in human history. In order to overcome the danger of nuclear war now confronting mankind, the United States has introduced at the Sixteenth General Assembly of the United Nations a Program for General and Complete Disarmament in a Peaceful World.

    This new program provides for the progressive reduction of the war-making capabilities of nations and the simultaneous strengthening of international institutions to settle disputes and maintain the peace. It sets forth a series of comprehensive measures which can and should be taken in order to bring about a world in which there will be freedom from war and security for all states. It is based on three principles deemed essential to the achievement of practical progress in the disarmament field:

    First, there must be immediate disarmament action:

    A strenuous and uninterrupted effort must be made toward the goal of general and complete disarmament; at the same time, it is important that specific measures be put into effect as soon as possible.

    Second, all disarmament obligations must be subject to effective international controls:

    The control organization must have the manpower, facilities, and effectiveness to assure that limitations or reductions take place as agreed. It must also be able to certify to all states that retained forces and armaments do not exceed those permitted at any stage of the disarmament process.

    Third, adequate peace-keeping machinery must be established:

    There is an inseparable relationship between the scaling down of national armaments on the one hand and the building up of international peace-keeping machinery and institutions on the other. Nations are unlikely to shed their means of self-protection in the absence of alternative ways to safeguard their legitimate interests. This can only be achieved through the progressive strengthening of international institutions under the United Nations and by creating a United Nations Peace Force to enforce the peace as the disarmament process proceeds.

    There follows a summary of the principal provisions of the United States Program for General and Complete Disarmament in a Peaceful World. The full text of the program is contained in an appendix to this pamphlet.

    SUMMARY

    DISARMAMENT GOAL AND OBJECTIVES

    The over-all goal of the United States is a free, secure, and peaceful world of independent states adhering to common standards of justice and international conduct and subjecting the use of force to the rule of law; a world which has achieved general and complete disarmament under effective international control; and a world in which adjustment to change takes place in accordance with the principles of the United Nations.

    In order to make possible the achievement of that goal, the program sets forth the following specific objectives toward which nations should direct their efforts:

    ◾The disbanding of all national armed forces and the prohibition of their reestablishment in any form whatsoever other than those required to preserve internal order and for contributions to a United Nations Peace Force;
    ◾The elimination from national arsenals of all armaments, including all weapons of mass destruction and the means for their delivery, other than those required for a United Nations Peace Force and for maintaining internal order;
    ◾The institution of effective means for the enforcement of international agreements, for the settlement of disputes, and for the maintenance of peace in accordance with the principles of the United Nations;
    ◾The establishment and effective operation of an International Disarmament Organization within the framework of the United Nations to ensure compliance at all times with all disarmament obligations.

    Read more at http://freedomoutpost.com/2015/06/united-states-announces-world-police-force/#bjLS5WKJB7VvQskG.99

  4. John Trudel says:

    http://freedomsback.com/charles-krauthammer/the-worst-agreement-in-u-s-diplomatic-history/

    The Worst Agreement In U.S. Diplomatic History

    By Charles Krauthammer

    July 3, 2015, 7:07 am

    WASHINGTON — The devil is not in the details. It’s in the entire conception of the Iran deal, animated by President Obama’s fantastical belief that he, uniquely, could achieve detente with a fanatical Islamist regime whose foundational purpose is to cleanse the Middle East of the poisonous corruption of American power and influence.

    In pursuit of his desire to make the Islamic Republic into an accepted, normalized “successful regional power,” Obama decided to take over the nuclear negotiations. At the time, Tehran was reeling — the rial plunging, inflation skyrocketing, the economy contracting — under a regime of international sanctions painstakingly constructed over a decade.

    Then, 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.

    It’s been downhill ever since. Desperate for a legacy deal, Obama has played the supplicant, abandoning every red line his administration had declared essential to any acceptable deal.

    Inspections

    They were to be anywhere, anytime, unimpeded. Now? Total cave. Unfettered access has become “managed access.” Nuclear inspectors will have to negotiate and receive Iranian approval for inspections. Which allows them denial and/or crucial delay for concealing any clandestine activities.

    To give a flavor of the degree of our capitulation, the administration played Iran’s lawyer on this one, explaining that, after all, “the United States of America wouldn’t allow anybody to get into every military site, so that’s not appropriate.” Apart from the absurdity of morally equating America with the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism, if we were going to parrot the Iranian position, why wait 19 months to do so — after repeatedly insisting on free access as essential to any inspection regime?

    Coming clean on past nuclear activity

    The current interim agreement that governed the last 19 months of negotiation required Iran to do exactly that. Tehran has offered nothing. The administration had insisted that this accounting was essential because how can you verify future illegal advances in Iran’s nuclear program if you have no baseline?

    After continually demanding access to their scientists, plans and weaponization facilities, Secretary of State John Kerry two weeks ago airily dismissed the need, saying he is focused on the future, “not fixated” on the past. And that we have “absolute knowledge” of the Iranian program anyway — a whopper that his staffers had to spend days walking back.

    Not to worry, we are told. The accounting will be done after the final deal is signed. Which is ridiculous. If the Iranians haven’t budged on disclosing previous work under the current sanctions regime, by what logic will they comply after sanctions are lifted?

    Sanctions relief

    These were to be gradual and staged as the International Atomic Energy Agency certified Iranian compliance over time. Now we’re going to be releasing up to $150 billion as an upfront signing bonus. That’s 25 times the annual budget of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Enough to fuel a generation of intensified Iranian aggression from Yemen to Lebanon to Bahrain.

    Yet three months ago, Obama expressed nonchalance about immediate sanctions relief. It’s not the issue, he said. The real issue is “snap-back” sanctions to be reimposed if Iran is found in violation.

    Good grief. Iran won’t be found in violation. The inspection regime is laughable and the bureaucratic procedures endless. Moreover, does anyone imagine that Russia and China will reimpose sanctions? Or that the myriad European businesses preparing to join the Iranian gold rush the day the deal is signed will simply turn around and go home?

    Non-nuclear-related sanctions

    The administration insisted that the nuclear talks would not affect separate sanctions imposed because of Iranian aggression and terrorism. That was then. The administration is now leaking that everything will be lifted.

    Taken together, the catalog of capitulations is breathtaking: spot inspections, disclosure of previous nuclear activity, gradual sanctions relief, retention of non-nuclear sanctions.

    What’s 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 American diplomatic history.

    How did it come to this? With every concession, Obama and Kerry made clear they were desperate for a deal.

    And they will get it. Obama will get his “legacy.” Kerry will get his Nobel. And Iran will get the bomb.

  5. John Trudel says:

    SO NOW WE SEE WHAT — IF ANYTHING — CONGRESS WILL DO.

    Reaction to ‪#‎Iran‬ deal:
    I believe Obama announced it at Oh-Dark-30 to get his reaction out there before Iran’s articulation of deal and open mockery of US idiocy.

    Assured Iran WILL get nuke.

    Unfreezes $100 billion which represents 40% of their GDP which can and will be used to bankroll Hezbollah, Assad, Hamas. It’s like cutting Hitler a check and then telling him to do good things with it –and being so gullible you believe him.

    Arms embargo is taken off. Why? The President says this agreement won’t allow them to get nuke and then gives entree to others. Do you think they might use the assets to buy weapons?

    Leaving our political prisoners in their prisons.

    Giving money to Monsters who killed our soldiers in Iraq and let the bomb making maestro out of the deal.

    Just further destabilized the Middle East.

    No anytime anywhere inspections. Rubes.

    Here are some other reactions from the inter webs:

    Senator Tom Cotton, Veteran
    http://m.weeklystandard.com/…/cotton-iran-deal-terrible-dan…

    Bill Kristol:
    @BillKristol: Plus $140b for Soleimani, revolutionary guards & Quds Force. Deal doesn’t just accomodate Iran. Empowers it. https://t.co/UQMOCdS7Eu

    And:
    @BillKristol: “This deal cannot stand.”
    Special @weeklystandard editorial: A Very Good Deal—for Iran.
    http://t.co/9DmXcCW4Hm

    General Dempsey:

    @BillKristol: Gen. Dempsey: “Under no circumstances should we relieve pressure on Iran relative to ballistic missile capabilities and arms trafficking.”

    IED builder responsible for killing US troops explicitly gets off:
    @DavidKenner: Look whose name appears in the (very long) list of individuals and entities for whom sanctions will be lifted. http://t.co/DnA7tvJy3B
    https://twitter.com/davidkenner/status/620893797078007808

    Rouhani:

    @HassanRouhani: If ‪#‎IranDeal‬, victory of diplomacy and mutual respect over outdated paradigm of exclusion and coercion. And this will be good beginning.

    More to come.

  6. John Trudel says:

    FB post of the day:

    Did you read about the Ayatollah publishing a book on how to trick Obama and John Kerry? Well, he’s already coming out with a sequel….”How to bamboozle a three year old.” It’s even more advanced!

  7. John Trudel says:

    This is, I think, the first time I’ve ever quoted Rush. But I think he’s on to something.

    The Iran treaty is an Obama scam which HAS ALWAYS BEEN INTENDED TO GET NUKES FOR IRAN. The Cat Is Out Of The Bag. This So-Called Deal Was Nothing More Than A Ruse To Give Iran Nuclear Weapons.

    Even Barack Obama knew he could not get away with simply declaring, from the get-go, that he was going to give Iran a free-and-clear path to obtain nukes. It was far better to devise a phony-baloney negotiation that he could sell to a willfully ignorant public as a means to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

    Of course, this so-called deal stops nothing. It accelerates Iran’s path to obtaining nukes by giving Iran a pathway to obtain them in the next 10-15 years (that’s assuming that Iran actually complies with the terms of the deal… and they won’t), but why be bothered with such pesky details.

    But aside from this obvious deception, it is now known, based on a report that was released from MEMRI on August 10, 2015, that Barack Obama and John Kerry already secretly recognized Iran’s right to enrich uranium as far back as 2011.

    Here’s Limbaugh referring to the report from MEMRI: “Now, the second thing we were lied about, even before the negotiations began, is John Kerry, who was a senator at the time, acting on Obama’s orders, had already recognized Iran’s right to enrich uranium on their own soil.”

    http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=68099
    https://fs6.formsite.com/westerncenterjournalism/form213/index.html

  8. John Trudel says:

    VIENNA (AP) — Iran will be allowed to use its own inspectors to investigate a site it has been accused of using to develop nuclear arms, operating under a secret agreement with the U.N. agency that normally carries out such work, according to a document seen by The Associated Press.

    The revelation on Wednesday newly riled Republican lawmakers in the U.S. who have been severely critical of a broader agreement to limit Iran’s future nuclear programs, signed by the Obama administration, Iran and five world powers in July. Those critics have complained that the wider deal is unwisely built on trust of the Iranians, while the administration has insisted it depends on reliable inspections.

    A skeptical House Speaker John Boehner said, “President Obama boasts his deal includes `unprecedented verification.’ He claims it’s not built on trust. But the administration’s briefings on these side deals have been totally insufficient – and it still isn’t clear whether anyone at the White House has seen the final documents.”

    Said House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce: “International inspections should be done by international inspectors. Period.”

    But House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi shrugged off the revelation, saying, “I truly believe in this agreement.”

    The newly disclosed side agreement, for an investigation of the Parchin nuclear site by the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency, is linked to persistent allegations that Iran has worked on atomic weapons. That investigation is part of the overarching nuclear-limits deal.

    Evidence of the inspections concession is sure to increase pressure from U.S. congressional opponents before a Senate vote of disapproval on the overall agreement in early September. If the resolution passes and President Barack Obama vetoes it, opponents would need a two-thirds majority to override it. Even Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, has suggested opponents will likely lose a veto fight, though that was before Wednesday’s disclosure.

    John Cornyn of Texas, the second-ranking Republican senator, said, “Trusting Iran to inspect its own nuclear site and report to the U.N. in an open and transparent way is remarkably naive and incredibly reckless. This revelation only reinforces the deep-seated concerns the American people have about the agreement.”

    The Parchin agreement was worked out between the IAEA and Iran. The United States and the five other world powers were not party to it but were briefed by the IAEA and endorsed it as part of the larger package.

    On Wednesday, White House National Security Council spokesman Ned Price said the Obama administration was “confident in the agency’s technical plans for investigating the possible military dimensions of Iran’s former program. … The IAEA has separately developed the most robust inspection regime ever peacefully negotiated.”

    All IAEA member countries must give the agency some insight into their nuclear programs. Some are required to do no more than give a yearly accounting of the nuclear material they possess. But nations- like Iran – suspected of possible proliferation are under greater scrutiny that can include stringent inspections.

    The agreement in question diverges from normal procedures by allowing Tehran to employ its own experts and equipment in the search for evidence of activities it has consistently denied – trying to develop nuclear weapons.

    Olli Heinonen, who was in charge of the Iran probe as deputy IAEA director general from 2005 to 2010, said he could think of no similar concession with any other country.

    The White House has repeatedly denied claims of a secret side deal favorable to Tehran. IAEA chief Yukiya Amano told Republican senators last week that he was obligated to keep the document confidential.

    Iran has refused access to Parchin for years and has denied any interest in – or work on – nuclear weapons. Based on U.S., Israeli and other intelligence and its own research, the IAEA suspects that the Islamic Republic may have experimented with high-explosive detonators for nuclear arms.

    The IAEA has cited evidence, based on satellite images, of possible attempts to sanitize the site since the alleged work stopped more than a decade ago.

    The document seen by the AP is a draft that one official familiar with its contents said doesn’t differ substantially from the final version. He demanded anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss the issue in public.

    The document is labeled “separate arrangement II,” indicating there is another confidential agreement between Iran and the IAEA governing the agency’s probe of the nuclear weapons allegations.

    Iran is to provide agency experts with photos and videos of locations the IAEA says are linked to the alleged weapons work, “taking into account military concerns.”

    That wording suggests that – beyond being barred from physically visiting the site – the agency won’t get photo or video information from areas Iran says are off-limits because they have military significance.

    While the document says the IAEA “will ensure the technical authenticity” of Iran’s inspection, it does not say how.

    The draft is unsigned but the proposed signatory for Iran is listed as Ali Hoseini Tash, deputy secretary of the Supreme National Security Council for Strategic Affairs. That reflects the significance Tehran attaches to the agreement.

    Iranian diplomats in Vienna were unavailable for comment, Wednesday while IAEA spokesman Serge Gas said the agency had no immediate comment.

    The main focus of the July 14 deal between Iran and six world powers is curbing Iran’s present nuclear program that could be used to make weapons. But a subsidiary element obligates Tehran to cooperate with the IAEA in its probe of the past allegations.

    The investigation has been essentially deadlocked for years, with Tehran asserting the allegations are based on false intelligence from the U.S., Israel and other adversaries. But Iran and the U.N. agency agreed last month to wrap up the investigation by December, when the IAEA plans to issue a final assessment.

    That assessment is unlikely to be unequivocal. Still, it is expected to be approved by the IAEA’s board, which includes the United States and the other nations that negotiated the July 14 agreement. They do not want to upend their broader deal, and will see the December report as closing the books on the issue.

    © 2015 The Associated Press

  9. John Trudel says:

    Ten Ways the Iran Deal is Worse Than Munich
    GrassTopsUSA Exclusive Commentary
    By Don Feder
    August 24, 2015

    It’s 220 miles and 77 years from Munich – which epitomized the appeasement that led to World War II – to Vienna, where Obama’s nuclear capitulation to Iran was negotiated. Whenever a grounded-in-reality person (non-Democrat) compares the Iran surrender to peace-for-our-time, liberals get unhinged.

    In a way, they’re right. Vienna is worse than Munich.

    Hyperventilating in the pathetically predictable Christian Science Monitor, on July 26, staff writer Dan Murphy insisted, “The comparison being tossed around (Iran and Munich) is full of false equivalences, a misunderstanding of European history, and perhaps a deliberate distortion of the Iran deal.”

    Murphy argues that Iran “hasn’t invaded or annexed anything.” Its military capacity is insignificant compared to that of the West and it has no aspirations for global conquest. Apparently, the planetary Caliphate is to come about democratically.

    Besides, Hitler had a moustache and Grand Ayatollah Khamenei has a beard. So there!

    In September 1938, Hitler was relatively weak. Then, the combined aircraft production of Britain and France exceeded Germany’s.

    Before Munich, it could plausibly be argued that Hitler also hadn’t invaded anything. He had remilitarized the Rhineland, which was German territory. When the Wehrmacht crossed the border into Austria in March of 1938, there wasn’t even token resistance. The Anschluss was approved overwhelmingly by a plebiscite.

    Both Nazi Germany and Ayatollah-infested Iran were/are ruled by fanatical followers of megalomaniacal religions (the worship of the Aryan race on the one hand and Islamic millenarianism on the other). Like the Third Reich, the Islamic Republic of Iran is virulently anti-Semitic, hates the West, is committed to violence and is crazy enough to unleash its own Gotterdammerung.

    Here are ten ways the Iran deal is worse than the Munich Pact.

    1. Munich didn’t free up $100 billion to $150 billion in Nazi assets – Chamberlain at Munich: “Oh, Mister Hitler, you forgot your check for $150 billion.” Adolf; “How thoughtful of you, Neville. That will buy a lot of tanks and planes and help us to expand the Wehrmacht.” We don’t have to guess what the ayatollahs will do with $100 billion to $150 billion in newly thawed assets – hint: not build a Museum of Tolerance. The deal also includes lifting bans on conventional weapons and ballistic missiles, so Iran can buy a lot more of both.

    2. It was easier for Britain and France to deceive themselves about Hitler – At Munich, Hitler had been in power a shorter time than Obama. Iran’s ruling theocracy has been in place for 36 years. In that time, it hasn’t changed one iota. From Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini to Supreme Leader Ali Hosseini Khameini, the rhetoric, the goals, the hatred, and the brutality have been consistent.

    3. Chamberlain didn’t accuse Churchill of being allied with the SS – The president recently said radical Islamists opposed to the treaty-which-isn’t-a-treaty are “making common cause with the Republican Caucus.” In Obama-land, there are militant Iranians opposed to the deal, and moderate, reasonable, middle-of-the-road fanatics who support it. On his return from Munich, imagine Chamberlain telling the British people, “Radical National Socialists are allied with members of parliament opposed to the pact, which we negotiated with the nice Nazis.”

    4. By September 1938, Hitler hadn’t killed more than 1,000 British soldiers or held British hostages for over a year – We’re entering an agreement with same regime that held 60 Americans hostage for 444 days following the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Ret. Col. Richard Kemp and Ret. Major Chris Driver-Williams disclose: “Iranian military action, often working through proxies using terror tactics, has led to the deaths of well over a thousand American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade and a half.”

    5. The Nazis didn’t support a worldwide terror network – True, they intervened in the Spanish Civil War and supported indigenous Nazi parties in various European states. But, up to Munich, acts of terror were directed primarily against their own people. A State Department report says Iran’s support for terrorism was “undiminished in 2013-2014 and the U.S. remains very concerned about the activities of Iran’s Revolutionary regime and its proxies in the Middle East.” In testimony before a House committee late last month, Secretary of State John Kerry was asked if he believed “that Iran is the world’s foremost sponsor of terrorism?” Not wishing to elaborate on the point, Kerry simply said “Yes.”

    6. At Nuremberg, Hitler didn’t lead chants of “Death to England!” – On al-Quds (Kill Jews) Day, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani led the bloodthirsty mob in chanting “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.” There were also the standard flag-burnings and references to the Great Satan (us) and the Zionist Entity. Rouhani is Obama’s partner in the nuclear deal, you know, one of those sensible, trustworthy Islamists.

    7. Chamberlain didn’t promise to help the Germans defend their Panzer and Stuka factories – Senator Marco Rubio says the treaty’s Annex III (innocuously labeled on “civil nuclear cooperation”) provides that the United States will help the Iranian regime to secure its nuclear facilities against acts of sabotage. So if Israelis feel threatened because the ayatollahs have drawn a giant bull’s-eye around their country, and try to forestall a nuclear attack, we will have to help the Iranians protect their weapons of mass destruction.

    8. Britain didn’t have a leader who called National Socialism the ideology of peace – Chamberlain did not tell the British people: “You can’t blame all Nazis for random acts of violence perpetrated by a few troubled individuals. Ideologies aren’t responsible for violence and terrorism. People are responsible for violence and terrorism. Oh, by the way, Kristallnacht was workplace-related violence.”

    9. The Nazis didn’t promise to wipe Czechoslovakia or Jewish Palestine off the map. – That was always Hitler’s intension; he was just more circumspect than the Iranians. The Tehran regime has repeatedly pledged to annihilate the Zionist Entity and with it 6 million Jews (43% of the world’s Jewish population). Then it will get the rest. Mohammed told his followers that in the end times (which the ayatollahs believe is now) Moslems will institute their own final solution. Then every stone and tree will say: “‘O Moslem, ‘O servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me. Come and kill him.”

    10. Chamberlain didn’t hate his country. – Obama has told us that white people (a majority of Americans) are racists in their DNA, that small town America is made up of bitter-clingers (gun nuts, religious zealots and xenophobes) and that this nation has no right to control its borders. He began his political career in the home of Maoists Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn. He started his presidency with a notorious apology tour. He’s reached out to America’s sworn enemies (besides Iran – Cuba, China, and the Muslim Brotherhood), while jeering at our historic friends and allies. What does he have to do to make the point, burn the American flag on the South Lawn of the White House?

    Munich gave Hitler strategic territory and assets that allowed him to launch a war for world conquest a year later. The Iran deal will give a gang of apocalypse-drunk ayatollahs the power to bring about nuclear Armageddon.

    Don Feder is a former Boston Herald writer who is now a political/communications consultant. He also maintains a Facebook page.

    The following story can be found on the GrassTopsUSA website at http://www.grasstopsusa.com/df082415.html.

  10. John Trudel says:

    Yes, Iran would use nukes as part of a “conquest through martyrdom.” This is the plan. These are the same people who walked through minefields to clear them in their war against Iraq.

    The world survived the Cold War avoiding nuclear Armageddon by a strategy of “Mutually Assured Destruction” — MAD. If (when?) Iran gets nukes, other nations will rush to make sure they can overkill Iran. There will be a desperate proliferation of nuclear weapons in the hope that being able to overkill any nation who attacked will prevent an attack, just as it has in the past.

    This won’t work. To Mad Mullahs [and their terrorist proxies] who are happy to have their minions die gloriously for Allah, MAD will NOT prevent war. It may even invite it. A regional or wider war will be almost inevitable.

    I stated to my wife that there would be an nuclear attack by Iran after Obama leaves office if this treat passes.

    She said, “No. We would not allow that. We’d stop it.”

    My answer, “How?”

    — JDT opinion, FWIW

    Willingness to die for Allah is also a WMD. Only a few nukes used in an EMP attack would take down the power grid and kill tens of millions of Americans. See http://www.johntrudel.com/#rr for details. (The horrific death figures cited in my novel Raven’s Run come from actual scenarios run by the government during the Cold War. I didn’t just invent them, they were actual projections.)

    ***
    Excerpt:

    …The prospect of an Iran that can wield nuclear strategic power without having to launch a single missile, though not as spectacular as the Ahmadinejad-as-All-Four-Horsemen-of-the-Apocalypse scenario, is daunting. The distance from Iran to Saudi Arabia, between which lies Shi’a-populated, oil-endowed southern Iraq, is less than 200 miles. Saudi Arabia’s oilfields are in its Eastern Province, much of whose populace are Shi’ites, who are suppressed by, and hostile to, the House of Saud. The goal of Tehran’s nuclear weapons program is to enable Iran to attain hegemony over the entire littoral of the very aptly named Persian Gulf and, by exercising control of virtually all of the Mideast’s oil reserves, become a global power.

    Or die trying.

    SUICIDE SUPERPOWER: Martyrdom as a Weapon of Mass Destruction
    By Craig S. Karpel
    http://shilohmusings.blogspot.it/2006/10/suicide-superpower-martyrdom-as-weapon.html
    10/31/2006

  11. Pingback: The Iran Deal — May have harmful side effects…. | Freedom Writers

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