As Donald Rumsfeld might say, you can’t start a war with the Republican Party you wish to have.
Republicans in
Congress may want to stop the international nuclear deal with Iran. They
may prefer to provoke a war with Iran than break bread. But they can’t.
And it’s their own fault.
I mean that literally. President Barack Obama can only hold up his end of the deal by waiving sanctions passed by Congress. Obama has that waiver power because both parties in Congress gave it to him.
As I noted in a piece for Real Clear Politics
earlier this year: “All the various sanctions bills passed by Congress,
including those passed with bipartisan votes during Obama’s presidency,
grant waiver authority to the executive branch. (And one of the main
sanctions laws expires completely at the end of 2016.).”
Congress would
have pass a law with a veto-proof supermajority to revoke that
authority. Republicans can’t do that by themselves. And Democrats, even
the hawkish ones, can’t join them without risking their seats unless
public opinion is squarely opposed to the deal. The opposite is true.
President Obama won the nomination in 2008 in large part because he pledged to initiate direct diplomacy with Iran.
It’s what further distinguished himself from Hillary Clinton beyond
their positions on the Iraq War. It’s what exemplified Obama’s
willingness to buck establishment wisdom and break from the failed
foreign policy of the past. Now that the faith Democratic primary voters
put in him seven years ago has been validated with a capstone,
potentially game-changing peace agreement, it would be political suicide
for congressional Democrats to betray Obama now.
Which is why in May, Senate Democrats didn’t betray Obama and forced Republicans to accept a defanged bill
that gives Congress the ability to “review” any deal (power Congress
inherently has anyway) but no power to insist Congress must ratify any
deal.
The political
dynamic is no different in July than in May. If they didn’t have the
juice to kill off the preliminary agreement, they won’t be able to stop
the final agreement.
While
Republicans should acknowledge their legislative fingerprints on the
deal, having given Obama his waiver authority, they also should come to
terms with their political culpability: a party credible on national
security perhaps could persuade the public that this deal is flawed.
The Republican Party is not that party.
This is the same Republican Party that gave us the Iraq debacle and has never taken responsibility for it.
The same people who railroaded us into war last decade by warning of “mushroom clouds” are singing the same song now.
“It will make
everything worse and I live in fear that we have set in motion a decade
of chaos,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). “This is delusional and
dangerous,” said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz). “This ‘deal’ will only
embolden Iran — the world’s largest sponsor of terror — by helping
stabilize and legitimize its regime as it spreads even more violence and
instability in the region,” said House Speaker John Boehner.
No one but the delusional right-wing is buying what they are selling now.
For months they have tried to turn public opinion against an Iran deal. They have excoriated every preliminary agreement. They shipped in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to sound the alarm. But it’s Bibi’s credibility among Americans that suffered, not the prospects for a deal.
A clear-thinking
Republican Party, aware that George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq is their
albatross, would not attack the international nuclear agreement in
knee-jerk fashion. That only signals their appetite for more war remains
robust.
Even if they
were unwilling to shower President Obama and Secretary of State John
Kerry with praise, they could simply say something like, “We are hopeful
that the agreement will succeed in preventing Iran from obtaining a
nuclear weapon, and we will monitor its progress carefully.”
That would indicate a belief that peace is preferable to war, and a willingness to try when an opportunity is in front of them.
Such political
foresight and rationality is not yet present in this Republican Party.
Which is why it is no position to stop a deal, or start a war.
LaVern Isely ·
Pres Obama negotiated a great deal with Iran and it should be supported if you want to wind down the system of having continuous wars.
Brent Holman ·
The 'Republican Party' appears to have no reason to exist, except as The Greedy Opposition (Anti-People) Party.
The Republican Party has been exposed for what they are and it's not pretty. What a poor excuse for a political party. They drove all the moderates out, now just the rabid dogs are left.
Greedy Opposition Party of Pseudo-Conservatives. Lobbyists, really.
The Great American Star-Spangled Cash-Register! The GOP should just run a cash register for POTUS....Labor fills it, & plutocrats empty it....
The Great American Star-Spangled Cash-Register! The GOP should just run a cash register for POTUS....Labor fills it, & plutocrats empty it....
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