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Yesterday, French president Emmanuel Macron bemoaned the fact that
President Trump is poised to remove the United States from the Iran Nuclear
Deal. Macron declared unequivocally that Iran must never have a nuclear weapon,
while saying that America should stay with the deal. He later added that he believed that America will pull out.
One understands that Macron's audience is on the other side of the Atlantic. Seeing the failure of Angela Merkel over migrants, he is seizing the opportunity to make himself the leader of Europe. That is the impetus behind his friendly relations with President Trump.
There’s so much handwringing and general anguish over the
fate of the Iran Nuclear Deal that we forget a simple fact. When Barack Obama
called it a deal and not a treaty he invited a future president to repudiate
it.
You know and I know that Barack Obama did not call it a
treaty because then the senate would have had to ratify it. Obama called it a
deal in order to circumvent constitutional checks and balances.
The Iran Nuclear Deal, the JCPOA, was imposed by an
autocratic president. The same holds true of the Paris Climate Deal. It will be
a good thing for President Trump to withdraw
from it. Though, one wonders, can he relabel it a treaty and submit it to the
senate for ratification?
2 comments:
Stuart: You know and I know that Barack Obama did not call it a treaty because then the senate would have had to ratify it.
That's what John Kerry admitted as well.
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/patrick-goodenough/kerry-iran-deal-not-treaty-because-you-cant-pass-treaty-anymore
“I spent quite a few years ago trying to get a lot of treaties through the United States Senate, ... Because you can’t pass a treaty anymore, ... I sat there leading the charge on the Disabilities Treaty which fell to, basically, ideology and politics. So I think that’s the reason why.”
I see Kerry's example, the only one that failed with more than 53 votes. We couldn't even get 50 votes to ratify a nuclear test ban treaty.
https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Treaties.htm
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The constitutional requirement that the Senate approve a treaty with a two-thirds vote means that successful treaties must gain support that overcomes partisan division.
...
Oct 13, 1999 Multilateral Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Yeas=48; Nays=51
Dec 4, 2012 Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Yeas=61; Nays=38
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I saw this video a few years ago, had no idea how many nuclear tests we performed. You can see why some might consider us hypocritical to tell other nations what they can or can't do to "protect themselves".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-QWXvNFWrc A Time Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Since 1945 by Isao Hashimoto
Anon, does name-calling make you feel better?
Hypocrisy simply means we claim liberty to ourselves while say others can't be trusted. I'd be tempted to accept we can be better trusted to not use our weapons, but of course there's really no situation I'd say the U.S. should use nuclear weapons for mass-murder. Even if a dozen terrorists from Saudi Arabia exploded a nuke in a large US city, I don't think nuking Riyadh in return would help as a deterrent against future terrorists.
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