Senate Foreign Relations Committee Unanimously Approves Iran Nuke Review Legislation

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Our Iconoclast post title about a denouement today on the P5+1 Iran Nuke agreement review legislation was realized this afternoon in a unanimous Senate Foreign Relations Committee vote approving a compromise measure. The Committee action reasserted   Constitutional prerogatives forcing President Obama to relent his opposition. The vote was 19 to 0 based on the compromise language worked out between Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) and Ranking Member Benjamin Cardin (D-MD). Assenting to the new version of the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review  Act of 2015, originally co-sponsored by embattled  New Jersey U.S. Senator Bob Menendez and Sen. Corker, were two Committee Members, announced GOP Presidential Contenders, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Marco Rubio (R-FL).  Corker had not been a signatory to Arkansas Tom Cotton’s letter that was sent to the Leaders of the Islamic Republic in Tehran apprising them of the Senate’s advice and consent on major treaties and agreements.

This legislative victory preserves the right of the Congress to review changes in the prevailing sanctions against Iran occasioned by the presentation of the Administration of any definitive agreement reached between the P5+1 and Iran by the intended date of June 30, 2015.  Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif announced at a ministerial meeting in Spain today, that negotiations leading towards a possible definitive agreement would start April 21st in Lausanne, Switzerland.  U.S. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said the House would approve the veto proof measure. A vote on the measure should reach the floor of the Senate shortly, at which time Amendments might be introduced for possible consideration.

A Tower report noted:

Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), the chairman of the committee, said that the legislation, which passed 19-0, “absolutely, 100% keeps the congressional review process — the integrity of it — in place.”

The compromise language, which was worked out by Corker and ranking Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin (D – Md.), shortened the amount of time of Congress would get to review a nuclear agreement with Iran from 60 days to 30, and softened some other provisions of the bill.

The bill is consistent with a poll released today by Suffolk University showing that Americans favor congressional review of any nuclear deal with Iran by a wide margin—72% to 19%.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that President Barack Obama would sign the compromise bill, reversing the administration’s longstanding objection to any congressional oversight of a potential nuclear deal with Iran.

The New York Times reported how quickly Administration opposition to the legislation had folded:

Why Mr. Obama gave in after fierce opposition was the last real dispute of what became a rout. Josh Earnest, the White House spokesman, said Mr. Obama was not “particularly thrilled” with the bill, but had decided that a new proposal put together by the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee made enough changes to make it acceptable.

“We’ve gone from a piece of legislation that the president would veto to a piece of legislation that’s undergone substantial revision such that it’s now in the form of a compromise that the president would be willing to sign,” Mr. Earnest said. “That would certainly be an improvement.”

Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee and the committee’s chairman, had a far different interpretation. As late as 11:30 a.m., in a classified briefing at the Capitol, Mr. Kerry was urging senators to oppose the bill. The “change occurred when they saw how many senators were going to vote for this, and only when that occurred,” Mr. Corker said.

Mr. Cardin said that the “fundamental provisions” of the legislation had not changed.

But the compromise between him and Mr. Corker did shorten a review period of a final Iran nuclear deal and soften language that would make the lifting of sanctions dependent on Iran’s ending support for terrorism.

The agreement almost certainly means Congress will muscle its way into nuclear negotiations that Mr. Obama sees as a legacy-defining foreign policy achievement.

Under the agreement, the president would still have to send periodic reports to Congress on Iran’s activities regarding ballistic missiles and terrorism, but those reports could not trigger another round of sanctions.

The Times reported possible floor actions that might resurrect original provisions:

The measure still faces hurdles. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, fresh off the opening of his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination, dropped plans to push for an amendment to make any Iran deal dependent on the Islamic Republic’s recognition of the State of Israel, a diplomatic nonstarter.

But he hinted that he could try on the Senate floor.

“Not getting anything done plays right into the hands of the administration,” Mr. Rubio said.

Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, abandoned an amendment to make any Iran accord into a formal international treaty needing two-thirds of the Senate for its ratification, but he, too, said it could be revived before the full Senate.

The measure will be brought up for a floor vote later this month and is expected to pass both the Senate and the House in near veto proof form.

It is clear that the victors in this battle are the Republican Majority and concerned Democrats who have been monitoring polls and constituent opinions regarding Congressional Review prerogatives.  In retrospect  Sen. Cotton’s letter and the March 3rd address by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before a Joint Meeting of Congress alerted  Americans to problems with the P5+1 framework for a deal  announced on April 2nd despite the objections of President Obama and certain leading Democratic minority members of both the Senate and House. Perhaps the diktats announced last Thursday by Ayatollah Khamenei demanding the lifting of all sanctions upon signing of an agreement and denial of intrusive IAEA inspections of military nuclear weapons development sites conveyed to Senate Democrats that there were different opinions about the two Facts Statements. The one released by the State Department versus that of the Iranian Foreign Ministry. Add to that was Monday’s removal of a 2010 moratorium on the sale of an advanced Russian S-300 air defense system to Iran an indication that President Putin and Ayatollah Khamenei could void weapons sanctions agreements at will.

The losers in this episode are Secretary Kerry and President Obama. How those negotiations go starting April 21st will determine if Congress will have anything to review on June 30th.

RELATED ARTICLE: Commentators On Arab TV: Obama Supports Iran Because His Father Was A Shi’ite

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Corker (R-TN) and Ranking Member Benjamin Cardin (D-MD). Source: Politico

April 14, 2015: ‘Jew-Hate Day’ in the U.S. Congress

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jew-hate-revised-geller

For a larger view click on the image.

On Tuesday April 14, 2015 Muslim Terror leaders with on organization called “American Muslims for Palestine” which specializes in Jew-Hatred and disinformation about Israel are walking around the United States Congress demanding that our elected Representatives change federal law thereby making it harder to investigate Muslim terrorists.

I know, crazy stuff, but it is happening right in broad daylight! Thank Allah that we at The United West are experts at investigating Muslim Brotherhood terrorists and exposing their influence operations for all Americans to understand and properly respond. To accomplish this we are launched a five-part investigative series entitled: “Muslim Terrorists Lobby 114th Congress.”

Our show today, features Clarion Project National Security Analyst, Ryan Mauro, who specifically identifies several Muslim Brotherhood terror leaders who are organizers of this Congressional influence operation. Moreover, Ryan will reveal documentation that links Republican Conservative icon, Grover Norquist to a terror rally that was held in front of the White House in October 2000.

This information reveals how far and wide this Muslim Brotherhood influence operation has been active.

Watch this show as it is FULL of critically important information to help all Americans properly, professionally and legally DEFEAT this Muslim Brotherhood political influence operation.

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Islamic State cartoon shows Obama beheaded by Jihadi John

UK Pro-jihad Muslim group boasts: “negotiating with Tory & Labour leadership”

Rubio enters GOP Presidential Primary as ‘tomorrow’s candidate’ — says Hillary is so ‘yesterday’

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After making his 2016 presidential campaign official Monday morning, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) made a speech to supporters in Miami on April 13th, 2015, at 5:30 p.m. EST.

“The Republican Party, for the first time in a long time, has a chance in this election to be the party of the future,” Rubio told donors in a preview of his speech. “Just yesterday, we heard from a leader from yesterday who wants to take us back to yesterday, but I feel that this country has always been about tomorrow.”

“Yesterday is over,” stated Rubio.

Learn more about the Marco Rubio campaign at MarcoRubio.com.

Blacks Are Begging the Republican Party

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In the immortal words of former British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, “to every man there comes a time when he is figuratively tapped on the shoulder and offered the chance to do a great and mighty work; unique to him and fitted to his talents; what a tragedy if that moment finds him unprepared or unqualified for the moment that could be his finest hour.”

The Republican Party is currently being tapped on the shoulder and being asked to do “a great and mighty work, unique to them and fitted to their talents.”

They are being tapped on the shoulder by the Black community who are begging the Republican Party to give them a reason to vote Republican in next year’s presidential election.

The Black community gave Obama 94% of its vote in 2008, not just because he was Black; but because he said he was “change we could believe in.”

Obama said he would get the U.S. out of all these “unnecessary” wars; indirectly giving Blacks the impression that he would then redirect the money spent on war to dealing with the high Black unemployment rate, the lack of access to capital for Black entrepreneurs, shoring up the failing schools within the Black community, both secondary and college.

Six and a half years after Obama was “tapped on the shoulder;” he has indeed been found “unqualified and unprepared for the moment that could have been his (and America’s) finest hour.”

By any and all objective measurements, the Obama presidency has been an abject failure for Blacks: double digit unemployment, declining home ownership, shrinking net worth, decreasing college enrollment, especially at Black colleges, and non-existent government contracting opportunities for Black businesses just to name a few.

Republicans still have time to show the Black community that the party is prepared for this moment that could be its finest hour, but time is running out.

They need to start with something very simple: tell the Black community in no uncertain terms, that they are wanted and welcomed in the Republican Party.

Then the Congressional leadership must convene a series of private meetings with “the right” Blacks in education, business, the clergy. This is not to be confused with them meeting with Blacks that they are “comfortable” with.

Republicans have a history of favoring Blacks who will tell them what they want to hear, versus Blacks who will tell them what they need to hear.

Obama has done more to destroy Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) than any other person in this country’s history with the policies coming out of his Department of Education. What are Congressional Republicans prepared to do by way of hearings and legislation to repair this damage?

Government contracting opportunities for Black entrepreneurs has all but dried up under Obama. Banks refuse to loan money to many small business owners. What are Republicans prepared to do by way of hearings and legislation to change this?

The Black church is furious with Obama over his aggressive push for homosexual entitlements and his refusal to protect their commitment to faith if they receive government funds for after school activities for their church member’s kids. What are Republicans prepared to do by way of hearings and legislation to protect a church’s right to freely practice their faith without government interference?

Obama has intentionally done everything in his power to drive a wedge between Blacks and his administration. There is no poll that can accurately measure the disappointment and frustration Blacks have with Obama.

They are literally begging the Republican Party to give them substantive reasons to vote for them. But they first must be made to feel welcomed in the party.

The party must build relationships with the more than 200 Black newspapers in the country and spend advertising dollars with them. The party must stop being afraid to challenge the NAACP and the National Urban League when they are advocating liberal policies that will continue to adversely affect the Black community.

They must establish a surrogate program of “credible Black Republicans” that can represent the party on various radio and TV shows. The party has shown an extreme amount of incompetence and a total lack of understanding when it comes to branding the party within the Black community.

During presidential elections, Republicans average about nine percent of the Black vote. That’s with doing nothing. Just imagine what can happen with a little effort. Realistically it is very doable to get between 15-20% of the Black vote next year; but only if the party starts now with constructive engagement with the Black community, Black media, and Black organizations.

What a tragedy if this moment also finds the Republican Party “unprepared or unqualified for the moment that could be its finest hour.”

Terror Leaders in Congress, Today!

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clare lopez photo

Clare Lopez

On Monday April 13th and Tuesday, April 14th, Muslim Terror leaders are walking around the United States Congress demanding that our elected Representatives change federal law thereby making it harder to investigate Muslim terrorists. I know, crazy stuff, but it is happening right in broad daylight!

Thank Allah that we at The United West are experts at investigating Muslim Brotherhood terrorists and exposing their influence operations for all Americans to understand and properly respond. To accomplish this we launched a five-part investigative series entitled: “Muslim Terrorists Lobby 114th Congress.”

” Our show today, features retired CIA Operations Officer, Clare Lopez who specifically identifies several Muslim Brother terror leaders who are organizers of this Congressional influence operation. Currently Clare is the Vice-President of Research and Analysis for the Center for Security Policy in Washington D.C. Our investigative team also raises the very serious question – Why in the world should an elected Member of Congress give any time to KNOWN terrorists who have a written agenda that includes destroying the essence of the Capitol building in which they are meeting?

Watch this show as it is FULL of critically important information to help all Americans properly, professionally and legally DEFEAT this Muslim Brotherhood political influence operation.

RELATED ARTICLES:

42% of Muslims in Canada think Islam and West “irreconcilable”

Islamic State beheads “blasphemer” with meat cleaver

Islamic State cartoon shows Obama beheaded by Jihadi John

UK Pro-jihad Muslim group boasts: “negotiating with Tory & Labour leadership”

Marco Rubio: A New American Century [VIDEO]

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Foreign policy is taking center stage in both the Republican and Democratic primaries. Marco Rubio is announcing his run for the Republican presidential nomination. His theme is “A New American Century”.

Ken McIntyre in his column Marco Rubio Runs for President on America’s Place in the World writes:

To the extent primary voters question the wisdom of putting forward another first-term U.S. senator for president, Rubio fans counter not only with his rise to the speakership of the Florida legislature but his engagement with key foreign policy questions in the Senate.

Last May, delivering the Republican address that counters President Obama’s weekly message on radio and online, Rubio boiled down his post-9/11 thinking on the subject:

Today, foreign policy is an important part of our domestic policy. And our economic well-being is deeply dependent on our national security. The problem is that President Obama doesn’t seem to understand this. Instead of shaping world events, he has often simply reacted to them. And instead of a foreign policy based on strategy, his foreign policy is based on politics.

Read more.

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EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of The Daily Signal.

Freedom of Disassociation: Indiana Edition by STEVEN HORWITZ

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“Revulsion is not an argument; and some of yesterday’s repugnances are today calmly accepted — though, one must add, not always for the better. In crucial cases, however, repugnance is the emotional expression of deep wisdom, beyond reason’s power fully to articulate it.” — Leon Kass

First, let me say how happy I am to have my column back at the Freeman. I look forward to being here every other week alongside Sandy Ikeda and Sarah Skwire.

If you’ve spent any time on the Internet in the last couple of weeks, you’ve found it abuzz with opinions on Indiana and gay rights. The passage of the state’s version of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act has generated all kinds of commentary from both left and right, and most of it is misguided or overwrought.

I’d like to offer a few of my own thoughts on these matters, which, I think, add up to a call for both tolerance and freedom of association — as well as a rejection of repugnance as the basis for public policy.

Tolerance lies at the core of the libertarian worldview. Living peacefully with each other means accepting our differences and allowing others to engage in behavior that we might dislike but that does not harm third parties. “Anything that’s peaceful” is our lodestar, as Leonard Read often reminded us. Such tolerance does not require that we associate with people we disagree with, only that we leave them in peace. And this idea cuts to the core of the debate in Indiana.

If, like me, you think that gays and lesbians are not doing anything harmful to anyone, and that they should be treated just like other human beings, you might call the behavior of those who refuse to, for example, provide photography services at a same-sex marriage “intolerant.” Perhaps it is, but those who have such views are not engaged in any attempt to prevent gays and lesbians from getting married — or anything else — by refusing to provide them with a service. They are, in fact, tolerating them, but also refusing to associate with them.

Tolerance does not mandate association.

Any idea of tolerance that mandates association will quickly get us into trouble. If, for example, you object to those who refuse to sell their products or services to gays and lesbians because homosexuality runs counter to their deeply held beliefs, would it not be a far worse form of intolerance to make it illegal for them to act on their religious beliefs? After all, your side is willing implicitly (or explicitly) to back its intolerance of religious convictions with coercion — you know, guns, fines, and prisons — while the other side’s intolerance involves only the simple and peaceful refusal to sell.

To repeat: those who refuse to sell are not preventing people from behaving peacefully; those who would make the refusal to sell illegal are.

If, like me, you are bothered by the behavior of those who won’t deal with gays or lesbians, you shouldn’t make matters worse by using state power to engage in true intolerance. Instead, demonstrate how much you really care about tolerance by using persuasion and disassociation to change the behavior you find intolerant.

To see how real tolerance, persuasion, and disassociation in civil society can work, consider this story from Texas. A narrow-minded store clerk objects to a mom letting her little girl wear a boy’s suit. Mom’s friends hear the story and then give the store bad reviews online. (And unlike the small, Christian-owned pizzeria in Indiana, no one threatened the owners or threatened to burn down the store, both of which would be crossing the line that separates real tolerance from coercion.) The store pulls its Facebook page after people leave critical comments. Mom was not actually “denied service,” because she immediately declared she wouldn’t patronize the store due to the clerk’s attitude.

What didn’t happen?

No one sued, used violence, called the police, or said, “there ought to be a law.” People used words, reputation, and the power of exit to persuade others of who was right and who was wrong. This is how it should work. We don’t need a law. The mom had choices and exercised them, and the clerk and store paid a price for indulging their views on gender stereotypes. This is peaceful conflict resolution involving the rights of expression, exit, and disassociation — no need to get the state involved. Tolerance, after all, does not mean we have to like everything everyone else does. It only means we can’t and shouldn’t stop them from doing anything that’s peaceful.

Too often, we try to make laws on the basis of our mere dislike for others’ behavior. As a favorite Internet meme of mine says, “Everything I like should be mandatory and everything I don’t like should be banned.” This sort of reaction to our repugnance at the behavior of others is a real danger to liberal societies.

Whether it involves outlawing peaceful behavior, forced association, or state-sponsored discrimination, using repugnance as the basis for enacting laws is itself repugnant. What we end up with, after all, is poisonous discourse and a social order that is increasingly coarse and uncivil.

Why are people threatening the owners of a small pizza shop in Indiana who, hypothetically, said they would peacefully refuse to cater a same-sex wedding? What underlies such threats is the belief that repugnance (in whatever form it takes) justifies coercion. That belief also helps explain why others are so vehemently opposed to giving same-sex couples legal equality. Whether it’s repugnance at people’s religious beliefs or repugnance at the thought of two people of the same sex being married, such an emotion does not suffice to trump fundamental freedoms.

Sacrificing fundamental constitutional rights and our commitment to equality before the law isn’t worth the warm glow of an ephemeral “victory.” The trade-off is simply too steep — as is the slippery slope it could put us on.

About Steven Horwitz

Steven Horwitz is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Economics at St. Lawrence University and the author of Micro-foundations and Macroeconomics: An Austrian Perspective, now in paperback.

Iran’s Cheating Heart

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Country and Western Icon, Hank Williams wrote a ballad back in the 1950’s, “Your  Cheatin’ Heart”.  Perhaps there is a new version in the international arena, “Iran’s Cheating Heart”.  Iran’s track record of evading inspections by the IAEA under prior Additional Protocols has been, shall we say, less than fulsome. Add to that the Islamic Regime’s non compliance with requests by the IAEA for information on so-called previous military developments (PMD). Especially the barring of inspections at the military explosives test site of Parchin, where there appears to have been concealment  of  tests of nuclear triggers. We raise this because President Obama in his announcement of  the framework for a final agreement to be negotiated by June 30th had talked about “robust intrusive inspections.”  Moreover, he said, “ If Iran cheats, the world will know about it”. Further,  Secretary Kerry when asked during an NPR interview on April 8th about Iran’s PMD said that would be part of the negotiations.

Yesterday, Ayatollah Khamenei in his first public statement on the P5+1 Political Framework  stirred up a hornet’s nest of  controversy about major differences between the State Department Fact Sheet and Iran’s “understanding”.  Khamenei  said that all sanctions would be lifted  immediately upon signing of a definitive agreement, adding that PMD was off the table.  The Wall Street Journal  (WSJ) in its report on these latest disagreements over the political framework announced April 2nd drew attention to what Khamenei said:

It must absolutely not be allowed for them to infiltrate into the country’s defense and security domain under the pretext of inspections. Military officials must not allow strangers into this private domain under the pretext of supervision and inspection, or stop the defensive development of the country.

The WSJ noted this myopic comment of the eponymous senior administration  official:

We see the Iranians working to build support for the deal back home, which is a positive signal of their intent to complete the final agreement.

The Wall Street Journal cited  the usually clear-eyed Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL), chief Congressional critic of the P5+1 framework, saying:

As each new day reveals a new disagreement, it’s increasingly clear that Iran, in fact, failed to reach agreement with the United States and its partners on a political framework.

michael-makovsky-Michael Makovsky, executive director of the Jewish Institute  for National  Security Affairs  (JINSA) in  the current  edition of The Weekly Standard dissected the reality of those ‘robust intrusive inspections’ under Additional Protocols between Iran and  the IAEA in an article, “Iran’s Cheating: Can’t Trust, Can’t Verify”. First off, Makovsky notes there is “no Additional  Protocol”:

There is a model Additional Protocol that the IAEA uses as a basis for negotiating a specific agreement with each individual country tailored to its situation. Indeed, this provision opens the door to yet another round of haggling with Iran, making it impossible to know what exact measures Iran will end up being bound by.

But we do know, and this is the second concern, that no Additional Protocol contains the sort of “anytime, anywhere” inspections that UNSCOM provided for and that experts agree is necessary to police Iran’s program. What an Additional Protocol would likely contain, according to the framework agreement, is an expansion of the number of facilities subject to inspections—to include Iran’s uranium mines and centrifuge factories—and stricter requirements for advance notice of any nuclear facilities Iran plans to construct.

On why  the Military test site at Parchin is important:

If Iran decides to sprint for a nuke, however, it won’t do so in a uranium mine; it will do it at one of its enrichment plants, most likely a clandestine plant, potentially hidden on a military base. It is precisely such sites that the IAEA has been trying, unsuccessfully, to get access to for years. Of particular concern has been the Parchin military complex, where the IAEA suspects Iran tested high-explosives for a nuclear weapon. Yet inspectors have never been allowed to set foot on the site, watching instead as satellite imagery showed Iran demolishing the suspected site and paving it over to conceal any evidence of its cheating.

Then there is  Iran’s track record on ‘implementing “ Additional Protocols:

Third, there is the ambiguity of the term “implement.” Iran has previously “implemented” an Additional Protocol. In 2003, about the same time it was cheating on its agreement with the Europeans, Iranian leaders signed an Additional Protocol with the IAEA. Indeed, for the next two years they actually observed it. But in early 2006, Iran announced that it would no longer abide by the Additional Protocol and curtailed inspectors’ access. They could well try to pull the same stunt again. And according to a “fact sheet” released by the Iranian foreign ministry, Iran believes it has only committed “to implement the Additional Protocol on a voluntary and temporary basis for the sake of transparency and confidence building.”

Not only our intelligence but even Israel’s is deficient when it comes to  detecting Iran’s  covert  nuclear program:

U.S. intelligence services have a dismal track record of detecting clandestine nuclear efforts and predicting breakout—in North Korea, Pakistan, and India, for example. Israeli security officials have admitted in private that they too have significant gaps in their knowledge about Iran’s facilities. This is not an indictment of American or Israeli intelligence capabilities; it is simply very challenging to detect covert nuclear activities. Permitting Iran to keep its vast nuclear infrastructure largely intact, as the JCPOA does, only compounds the challenges the United States and the world will have in detecting Iranian cheating.

If Iran has been engaged in cooperative nuclear weapons development with North Korea, as we have written, that compounds the difficulty of detecting covert sites for storage of fissile material and research on nuclear warheads for those  ICBMs it is developing.

Makovsky concludes:

An intrusive inspections and verification regime is the sine qua non of any arms agreement, especially with a congenital cheater like the Islamic Republic of Iran. Unfortunately, the JCPOA fails on this crucial issue, by not demanding complete information about the extent of Iran’s past nuclear weapons research and eschewing “anytime, anywhere” inspections of all facilities. In other words, it is currently worth no more than the paper it might have been written on.

There’s an old Southern phrase in the U.S. that appears apt in the current controversy over what was intended in the P5+1 Political Framework  for a nuclear agreement  with Iran:  “this dog won’t hunt”.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is courtesy of Breitbart.

Communist member of the Seattle City Council steps down

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Goodbye Comrade Sally Clark City Council District 9 Seattle, Washington State. Many thanks for your personal email telling me you are now stepping down from this position. I hope my emails telling you over the years what a disaster you are-were for free markets and capitalism in Seattle helped you pack your little ditty bag and clean out your cubicle.

Your mission to raise the minimum wage in Seattle for entry level non skilled jobs from $9.32 to $ 15 was a huge success. Now you are part of the history books and can be remembered for crushing the Seattle economy and destroying jobs. Karl Marx would be very proud of you but now you are quitting and this is great.

So now your job killing strategy is a success and many workers look forward to the higher pay, while employers are looking for ways to absorb the big increase in labor costs. Some plan on eliminating jobs. Some plan on moving out of Seattle. I say come to Florida to a free market capitalist state free of Communism.

“We’re going to be looking at making some serious cuts,” said Cedarbrook Lodge General Manager Scott Ostrander. “We’re going to be looking at reducing employee hours, reducing benefits and eliminating some positions.” Hey Obama-Romney care did this too…. wam wam double wammy on Seattle.

A local trade group it is going to close one of its two restaurants, eliminating 200 jobs.

The plan has also caused Han Kim — who runs Hotel Concepts, a company that owns and manages 11 hotels in Washington state — to shelve plans to build a hotel in SeaTac. The company already has three hotels in SeaTac, and Kim and a business partner were looking to build a fourth on land they own. More jobs lost. Source Fox News.

“Uncertainty is bad for business, and right now we’re right in that area so we’re just putting everything on hold,” Kim said.

One of the biggest supporters is your friend Kshama Sawant, a self proclaimed socialist-Communist who also won her election to the Seattle City Council. She plans on keeping Seattle a $15 minimum wage city. You won’t have many hotels or restaurants left but who cares right ?

Your colleague Sawant said. “There may be a few jobs lost here and there, but the fact is, if we don’t fight for this, then the race to the bottom will continue,” Really…? The race to the bottom will continue ? My friend in Baton Rouge started out flipping burgers in McDonald’s 30 years ago and now he owns 9 restaurants. You call that a race to the bottom? Typical Communist mentality. Sawant needs to move back to North Korea cleaning the barracks at the forced labor camp.

The American Car Rental Association estimates 5 percent of low-wage jobs will be cut; and another 5-10 percent of those workers will be replaced by more experienced workers.

The owner of Dollar Rental Cars told Fox News she’ll outsource some functions, change schedules and cut some staff in response to the new policy. More jobs lost!

So Ms. Sally there you go, your Communist ideology just put thousands of people out of work but you did probably down size the city as more people move to free states. So as Seattle becomes a ghost town and you plug in your iron from your solar paneled apartment and run it over your Hammer and Sickle a few times before draping it over your balcony, smile.

Much luck in your future endeavors. I know you tried to ban plastic bags too and that failed but keep on trying Comrade. Don’t let the door hit you in your rear on the way out.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of Alan Berner / The Seattle Times, 2014.

Why Natural Born Citizen is Non-Negotiable

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Not so long ago, Americans placed little faith and trust in ambulance chasers (a.k.a. lawyers) or politicians, and wisely so according to our Founders who had no faith or trust in any person seeking power and dominion over others. Now, too many Americans place all of their faith in people seeking power and dominion over others, and even worse, a class of people who have already proven most dangerous to the Constitutional Republic and Rule of Law… the lawyer law-makers…

Ever since Barack Obama stole the show at the Kerry Convention in 2004 and rocketed from total obscurity to the most powerful political office in our land four years later, the subject of Article II requirements for the Oval Office has been a subject of great debate, all over three simple words, natural born Citizen (NBC), aka “True Citizen.”

Where did it come from, what does it mean, why did our Founders limit access to only two political offices in our nation to no one other than a natural born Citizen, and what do we do now that we know Barack Obama is not a natural born Citizen of the United States? These questions have been the source of much political debate, confusion and anxiety, now threatening the GOP as a result of numerous potential 2016 GOP candidates also failing to meet the requirement.

Some of the most blatantly insane arguments have been floated…

“Well, the constitution does not provide a definition for the term”… which is of course true, since the U.S. Constitution provides no definition for any word found in the document.

“Our naturalization laws define natural born Citizen” (when in fact our naturalization laws only pertain to naturalized citizens, immigrants seeking basic citizen rights from congress).

“The courts will have to tell us what the term means”… despite knowing that it is the courts that created terms of art like “undocumented citizen” (a.k.a. illegal alien) and “Constitutional Rights for non-citizens and even enemy combatants” (while denying American citizen any constitutional protection of natural rights at all) and “social justice” (the opposite of real justice under Constitutional Law).

Others rely upon “legal scholars” also known as lawyers of the political class in line for political appointments and eager to please those in positions to help them ascend to those lofty positions in the judiciary, ignoring the reality that these scholars have powerful political motivations for the opinions they write, and that no opinion has the power to amend the U.S. Constitution except by amendment process.

The simple truth is that Article II of the U.S. Constitution has only been amended once in U.S. history, by Amendment XII extending the requirements for President to the Vice President as well. It has not been otherwise amended, despite at least eight failed attempts by Congress to eliminate the natural born requirement for high office. Further, no amendment has ever mentioned, changed or in any way altered the original meaning of natural born Citizen as intended by our Founders and ratified by all fifty states.

So, the term natural born Citizen means the same today as it did in 1787 when the Founders placed that requirement in Article II… unless you buy into the notion that naturalization statutes or amendments, or scholarly legal arguments carry with them the legal force to amend the constitution – in which case, the term has no meaning at all, and neither does anything else in our Founding documents.

Before Barack Obama arrived on the scene, the nobody from nowhere with a blank résumé and no verifiable past, not too many Americans ever thought about the term. Most Americans assumed that no one would ever be bold enough to attempt such a massive fraud by falsely claiming natural born eligibility, and they assumed that if anyone ever did make such an attempt, our strict election laws, free press and national security agency oversight would surely catch it, expose it and stop it from happening. These assumptions have proven to be wrong… in fact, such attempts are now becoming common place. Barack was the first, but now there are others…

Most Americans have entered the discussion from a purely political purpose, attempting to either qualify their political messiah of choice, or disqualify another. But the natural born Citizen concept is actually far more important to our society than merely who can and cannot hold the office of Commander-in-Chief.

I was recently asked a question I have been asked literally thousands of times since I started writing on the subject, how do I know for sure what the Founders meant by natural born Citizen?

How do we know what any word or phrase means? Most people reach to their book shelf and grab a dictionary when they want to know the true definition of a word of phrase. Most people have never come upon a word or phrase that they needed a lawyer, or a court, or anything more than a dictionary to properly interpret… I find this to be the case here as well.

People don’t have any trouble understanding the word “born” (the moment of birth) or the word “citizen” (a legal member of a society). The word people seem to struggle with is “natural.”

At this moment, a collective effort is underway to claim that the following three words are synonymous… natural – native – naturalized…. Which would make anyone eligible for the Oval Office, including the courts new citizen class the “undocumented citizen.”

People trying to disqualify John McCain in 2008 decided that natural and native are synonymous terms and people now trying to qualify Obama, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio are claiming that natural, native and naturalized are all synonymous terms of art. Before they can eliminate the NBC requirement from Article II, they must first make the term ambiguous, potentially having more than one meaning… of course…

Any dictionary will disagree with these claims…

Naturalized – “to admit (a foreigner) to the citizenship of a country.”

Native – “being the place or environment in which a person was born.”

Natural – “existing in or formed by nature.”

Clearly, these three words have three very different definitions and meanings, only one of which is related to the Constitutional requirement for the Oval Office… “Natural.”

As a simple dictionary review confirms, these three words are in no way synonymous. It is not possible for the following three terms to be synonymous, natural born, native born and naturalized. Yet, many will continue to make the false claim that they are… because they believe these claims to suit their political agenda of the moment.

Many know exactly what natural born Citizen means, and still, for political expediency, they refuse to stand on this truth. Just this morning another “political commentator” wrote me this…

“NATIVE BORN CITIZENS ARE DIFFERENT… .. I see the reference to the father’s citizenship alone as determinING the birthright of the child… BUT YOU KNOW AS WELL AS I DO THAT AINT GONNA FLY today NO MORE THAN DENYING WOMEN THE RIGHT TO VOTE. YOU WILL ALIENATE HALF THE COUNTRY WITH SUCH NONSENSE” – Scott Rohter (exactly as sent to me, yelling caps and all)

As you can see, Mr. Rohter first confirms that he is aware of the truth, before shifting to all CAPS to scream his refusal to stick to the truth, referring to that truth as “nonsense” because that truth will offend some who do not like this truth. It is this practice which has made the NBC term appear “ambiguous,” opening the door for the lawyer law-making political class to enter the discussion with new invented definitions of the term.

As Mr. Rohter confirmed in our exchange, we agree on 99% of the issues… unfortunately, the 1% we disagree on is the most important – of critical importance, especially at this moment in history, when every American must deal only in truth. Mr. Rohter is not alone in his position. Numerous others have made the same false claims for exactly the same reasons.

The Harvard Lawyers are intentionally lying to the people when claiming NBC is synonymous with naturalized citizen at birth. But people like Rohter are also intentionally lying to the people for their set of political reasons. Both are responsible for allowing unconstitutional candidates to seek and hold the most powerful office in our land, that of Commander-in-Chief.

The term natural born Citizen is based on historical concepts as old as all recorded time. If you want to know where and why the Founders borrowed the term for Article II, I cover that in this piece… and if you want to know the true historical definition of the term, I cover that in this piece.

Natural born Citizen is a term based in biblical teachings based upon the concepts of a patriarchal society wherein in the Father is the head of the family unit. The intentional destruction of the family unit has greatly complicated the discussion with scholarly changes in the definition of words like marriage, family and shifting gender roles forced by liberal restructuring of American society, also for political purposes.

14th Naturalization Amendment terms like “citizen at birth” and “birthright citizenship” have been intentionally been tossed into the mix to further complicate the understanding of three basic English words defined in every English dictionary. The purpose of all these efforts is to eliminate the NBC requirement for office by simply redefining the term. But that is not the only purpose…

Setting politics aside for a moment, natural born Citizenship is the inalienable natural right of every child to inherit the country of their natural birth father upon birth, not only due to no application of man-made statute or legal opinions, but inalienable by these means.

When people begin to play with definitions, it is an overt effort to alter our Founding principles and values and Constitutional protections of all inalienable Natural Rights as guaranteed by our Constitution and Bill of Rights. It is a much larger issue than who can or cannot occupy the Oval Office, although this is indeed an issue paramount to the sovereignty and security of these United States.

Contrary to the intentional mis-education of American society, we do not enjoy “constitutional rights.” We have long enjoyed “constitutionally protected Natural Rights.”

Beginning in 2008, when folks were trying to disqualify John McCain, born the son of American parentage stationed abroad in Panama on the service of our country with the U.S. Navy, some plucked a single sentence from the proper source of the Founders NBC term, The Law of Nations by Vattel, as if they believe that it was unnecessary for Vattel to take great care to write an entire chapter on the subject, when a single sentence says it all.

“The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens.”

As already demonstrated above, natives and naturals are in fact two different things, which confirms that the structure of this single sentence is not the definition of any one thing, but rather a general statement about more than one thing… Reference to “parents” does not mean both parents within the family unit, but rather all citizen family units which bear “citizen” children.

Why did these individuals not pluck any of the following single sentences from Vattel, appearing in the same paragraph Section 212 of Chapter XIX of the Law of Nations?

“As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights.”

Or this one – “as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it.”

Or this one – “The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent.”

Or even this one – “I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.”

When trying to sum up natural born Citizen using a single sentence from Vattel, any of the four sentences above would be accurate. So, why didn’t the people who cherry-picked the unrelated general sentence pluck any of these other single sentences from the same paragraph?

There are two reasons… first, the truth did not suit the political agenda, which was to disqualify John McCain on the basis that although he was born to a citizen father (and mother), he was born in Panama, not on U.S. soil – and second, because the progressive shifting definitions of marriage and family, along with gender roles lead many to believe that the original definition and Founders intent of the term are antiquated and outdated. It leads many to falsely think it is some offense to women’s rights…

The Citizenship Act of 1934 pertaining only to “naturalized citizenship” is the cornerstone of today’s effort to destroy the NBC term and thereby eliminate the requirement from Article II. FDR’s Naturalization Act was the result of an international treaty from a Pan American conference of December 26, 1933, essentially agreeing that there should be no distinction between the sexes as it related to nationality under legislative processes. Of course, this pertained only to “naturalized citizenship” under congressional naturalization legislation.

Still, it has since been improperly used to claim that citizenship and even natural born Citizenship can pass from either Father or Mother, as a matter of alleged gender equality. Yet, this claim pertains only to naturalized citizenship, which is mutually exclusive of natural born Citizenship.

As all governmental power in the United States is limited in nature and derived from the people, nothing beyond what which was ratified by the people in the Constitution and Bill of Rights is under the consent of the people. The people have not consented to any alterations of Article II requirements for high office, so no alterations have been legally made.

Why natural born Citizen is non-negotiable

Much more than a political ambition or agenda is at stake here… The Natural Right of every child to inherit the condition of their birth family, specifically that of the Father (patriarch), the head of the family, is a constitutionally protected Natural Right.

Americans must understand that everything our Founders created was based upon inalienable Natural Rights, not man-made laws via legislative process or judicial review. When anyone begins to mess around with natural born, they are in fact messing around the Natural Law and all Natural Rights, the cornerstone of our Founders creation and any form of freedom and liberty.

If a child born to an American Father is stripped of their Natural Right to inherit the country of their Father, what other Natural Rights can be stripped from the child or the parent by mere man-made statute, court interpretation or Harvard Law Review? The answer is all of them…

In my personal opinion, the three most important words in all of the U.S. Constitution are natural born Citizen… because all Natural Rights flow through this patriarchal social concept and the sovereignty and security of our Constitutional Republic are protected from foreign invasion at the highest level by these three simple words, natural born Citizen.

Once any citizen of any type, by any means, including “undocumented citizens” can occupy the Oval Office, then any foreign entity can occupy that office, controlling the future of this nation and form of freedom and liberty itself as Commander-in-Chief of the most powerful military force on earth.

Mere momentary political interest is not enough reason to let everything die…

I pray that Americans will cease to be so blind and foolish…. quickly!

RELATED ARTICLE: Media Repression on the Question of What is a “natural born Citizen?”

The Iran Framework Disagreement and 50/50 chance of U.S. China War

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Last week we anticipated that no deal would be better than a bad deal. But this week it seems hard to know exactly what deal has been agreed. Each of the parties in the negotiations with Iran over its nuclear capability seems to have a different interpretation of what the much-heralded framework deal contains or means. But what is clear is that the framework is not only bad, but sloppy.

As HJS’s new briefing out this week makes clear, there is not even any single agreed upon framework proposal in the deal. Indeed, as our briefing outlines, the joint Iranian-EU statement made on 2 April had a number of differences to the one made by President Obama on the same day. Indeed the French fact-sheet on the framework contradicts the U.S. version, with the U.S. one appearing more stringent and implying sanctions relief would be staged – a claim that is, in turn, denied by Iran.

There seems to be an ongoing dispute over what has been agreed in regard to inspections. There is an ongoing lack of clarity on what this all now means for regional proliferation (in particular now that every other country will want to get their own nuclear assurance). And there is a deeply disconcerting anomaly about the number of centrifuges Iran needs. The framework deal seems to allow Iran to have 6,000 centrifuges, when it is generally agreed that the country would require no more than 2,000, if this were truly about the country’s search for nuclear technology limited solely for civilian use.

In all of its negotiations, Iran appears to have played a steady and consistent hand. But this is in stark contrast to the shifting moves by the P5+1. Only eighteen months ago President Obama agreed that the Fordow facility, its heavy water reactor and advanced centrifuges, were not necessary for the development of a civilian nuclear capability. Under the framework that seems to have been agreed in Switzerland, all of these capabilities remain in place.

So why the anomalies and why the uncertainties? Because it seems at present that the P5+1 agreement in Lausanne is aimed more at instilling confidence back home in the West than it is about coming to the best deal to prevent Iranian enrichment and development beyond civilian levels. There has been a steadily rising opposition to this deal from the general public in the U.S. and at the highest levels of experienced policy-makers, bolstered this week by the intervention of Henry Kissinger and George Shultz. The administration in Washington appears to be trying to placate this position while also trying to placate the Iranians. If there is a reason why the framework so far seems such a fudge it is because these two positions cannot be reconciled.

But neither can they both be danced around for long. The end aim of this process should not be to buy off critics of the Obama administration in Washington, but rather to prevent Iran from ever acquiring weapons grade nuclear capability. From the reaction to the agreement so far it seems that the Obama administration has achieved the impressive feat of failing in both these objectives.

Dr Alan MendozaFROM THE DIRECTOR’S DESK

There is a 50:50 chance of a war between the USA and China in the next 15 years. Not my words, but those of Professor Christopher Coker, the world’s leading international relations academic and a visiting speaker at HJS this week.

It would be fair to say that despite its size and growing importance on the world stage, China is a subject under-discussed in the UK. There are very few Sinologists located here, and political and media opinion on the subject tend to be dominated by the economic relationship – with the odd nod to human rights concerns when our leaders think they can get away with pointing out China’s many abuses without incurring its wrath in the form of trade restrictions in return. This is a pattern witnessed across Europe, where the relationship with China has become completely unbalanced in China’s favour, and our leaders are wary of speaking the truth for fear of offending a vital trading partner.

But as Professor Coker reminded us, ‘in times of peace, prepare for war’. China is the only real global challenger to the U.S., and therefore to our own liberal democratic and economic system, but it sees the international system today as made in America. This does not fit with the vision of a nation which was the world’s dominant power before 1820 and sees itself as returning to that trajectory.

Nothing is predetermined of course, and there are doves as well as hawks within the Chinese leadership. But the latter will have been emboldened and even inspired by Russia’s example of remaking the international system in its neighbourhood. Given the many tinderbox situations in East and South East Asia which have China as one of the potential protagonists, is it so far-fetched to assume that China will not at least try to probe the U.S. commitment of security guarantees for many of its neighbours in a bid to start supplanting U.S. influence in its own backyard?

As we have seen over the past few years, our leaders are often fixated by short-term threats rather than the ones just over the horizon. Coker’s analysis reminds us of the importance of vigilance in international affairs. And it deserves to be taken seriously.

Dr. Alan Mendoza
Executive Director of The Henry Jackson Society

Follow Alan on Twitter: @AlanMendoza

Using the Global Warming Hoax to Destroy America

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When President Obama announced on March 31 that he intends to ensure that the U.S. will slash its “greenhouse gas emissions” 26% below 2005 emissions levels by 2025 in order to keep pledges made to fulfill the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, he failed to mention that such levels would be comparable to what they were in our Civil War era, 150 years ago.

He also failed to mention that the U.S. has made no such pledges as regards the 1992 “Kyoto Treaty” which was resoundingly rejected by the U.S. Senate when then Vice President Al Gore brought it back from the U.N. conference.

There is no need, globally or nationally, to reduce such emissions. It would be a crime against humanity, especially for the millions that would be denied electrical power or would see its cost rise exponentially. “The President has no credible evidence to back up his claims,” said H. Sterling Burnett, a Research Fellow with the free market think tank, The Heartland Institute. “Obama’s climate actions are likely to cause far more harm to people, especially the poor, than any purported threats from global warming.”

“Global warming” and “climate change” are attributed to the use of fossil fuels to manufacture and transport ourselves and our goods, and to create electrical energy, despite the fact that the Earth, its oceans and land areas naturally generate such gases.

Volcano with SmokeThere are, for example, more than 1500 potentially active volcanoes and countless others under the oceans. They produce billions of tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other gases that are identified as “greenhouse gas emissions.” The human contribution pales in comparison to natural sources such as the warming ocean surface which releases CO2.

Even so, CO2 constitutes a mere 0.04% of the atmosphere. There is no evidence CO2 plays any role in the Earth’s global temperature.

Do these “greenhouse gas emissions” trap heat? Apparently not because the Earth has been in a natural cooling cycle for the past eighteen years breaking and making records for snow and ice. In the 1970s scientists were predicting a new Ice Age. Ten years later they were predicting “global warming.”

Why then is the President intent on slashing “greenhouse gas emissions” when (1) the Earth is not a greenhouse and (2) doing so would harm our economy for decades to come?

The answer lies in his promise to “fundamentally transform” a nation that does not need transformation except for the reduction of the size and scope of the federal government. Its economic system is the best in the world. Its military is the strongest. Its agriculture feeds Americans and is exported to other nations.

As David Rothbard, the president and co-founder of the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), a free market think tank, noted in the wake of Obama’s announcement, “The President will have to bypass the law-making process and use executive orders and regulations” to achieve his goal of slashing emissions. “To do so requires tortured readings of the Clean Air Act and other current laws.”

Significantly, “the President offers no suitable replacement for the lost generating capacity beyond pointing toward wind and solar which is not up to the task.” When Obama took office, coal-fired plants provided 50% of U.S. electricity. It is now down to 40% and headed lower if Obama has his way.

Rothbard warns that “Global warming campaigners see this presidency and the Paris U.N. Summit as the best chance they are likely to see to take control of American energy. The ramifications are disastrous for American freedom and prosperity.”

This brings us to the what John L. Casey, founder of the Space and Science Research Corporation (SSRC), an independent scientific research organization in Orlando, says about the forthcoming November 30 to December 15 U.N. climate conference in Paris which he describes as “doomed” and that’s the good news.

Its announced goal of imposing global limits on greenhouse gas emissions will not be mandatory and “President Obama has effectively gutted any meaningful agreement among the major industrialized nations, by having granted to the planet’s largest CO2 producer, China, free license to build as many coal power plants as they wish, and emit as many gigatons of greenhouse gases as they wish until 2030.”

This is, in fact, a global trend as many developing nations such as India do the same thing. Nor will they suddenly shut down electricity production fifteen years from now.

This huge, international farce formerly known as the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, began as an international treaty created in 1992. The U.S. Senate refused to ratify the Kyoto Treaty, but pledges to reduce greenhouse gases were made by 33 out of 195 countries, called their “Intended National Determined Contribution” are the main feature at the forthcoming Paris conference.

For all the media attention the President will try to generate for this idiocy, Ken Haapala, president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, says “It is unlikely that the current Senate would approve a binding agreement.” Haapala notes that lawmakers that include the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK)m and Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), “have all insisted that the international agreement the U.N. is working on is a treaty and cannot be enforced without Senate approval.”

Sen. McConnell warned, “Considering that two-thirds of the U.S. Federal government hasn’t even signed off on the Clean Power Plan and 13 states have already pledged to fight it, our international partners should proceed with caution before entering into a binding, unattainable deal.”

While most Americans have concluded that “global warming” or “climate change” are low on their list of fears President Obama has elevated this hoax to the top of his agenda for his last two years in office, along with the deal that would give Iran the opportunity to build a nuclear arsenal of weapons.

He doesn’t want to “transform” America. He wants to destroy it.

© Alan Caruba, 2015

Which Race, Gender, Generation, Education groups support Democrats or Republicans?

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A new analysis of long-term trends in party affiliation among the public provides a detailed portrait of where the parties stand among various groups in the population. It draws on more than 25,000 interviews conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2014, which allows examination of partisan affiliation across even relatively small racial, ethnic, educational and income subgroups. ( Explore detailed tables for 2014 here.)

The share of independents in the public, which long ago surpassed the percentages of either Democrats or Republicans, continues to increase. Based on 2014 data, 39% identify as independents, 32% as Democrats and 23% as Republicans. This is the highest percentage of independents in more than 75 years of public opinion polling. (For a timeline of party affiliation among the public since 1939, see this interactive feature.)

When the partisan leanings of independents are taken into account, 48% either identify as Democrats or lean Democratic; 39% identify as Republicans or lean Republican. The gap in leaned party affiliation has held fairly steady since 2009, when Democrats held a 13-point advantage (50% to 37%).

Read more.

party affiliation by group pew

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Muslim Terrorists Lobby 114th Congress on 4.13.15

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YES, YOU HEARD THAT RIGHT! On Monday, April 13th and Tuesday, April 14th there will be real live Muslim Terrorists walking around the United States Congress lobbying our elected Representatives on Muslim Brotherhood Advocacy Day in an effort to change federal law thereby making it harder to investigate Muslim terrorists.

I know, crazy stuff, but it is happening right in broad daylight!

Thank Allah that we at The United West are experts at investigating Muslim Brotherhood terrorists and exposing their influence operations for all Americans to understand and properly respond. To accomplish this we are launching a five-part investigative series entitled: “Muslim Terrorists Lobby 114th Congress.” Our show today focuses on the Muslim Brotherhood sponsoring organization, United States Council of Muslim Organizations and their direct involvement with Islamic terrorism.

We will reveal who these organizations and individuals are and what must be done to counter their anti-American activities. Tune in, sit back and get ready for the ride of your life!

Only Fools Trust Obama or the Iranians

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Only fools express any trust in Obama these days or the Iranians who have made him look the fool when no one in their neighborhood or the world trusts a thing they say or do.

After more than six years of listening to President Obama’s unremitting lies, when he says of the latest “accord” with Iran, “It’s a good deal” and standing in the Rose Garden declares that the U.S. and Iran have reached “an historic understanding” the only history being made his own ignominy and idiocy.

It would be historic if anyone could extend either President Obama or the Iranians any trust. Indeed, since the U.S. created its first atomic bombs to end World War II, one nation after another has secured their own nuclear weapons, starting with the then-Soviet Union who built theirs with plans stolen from us!

We have been down this road before. On April 1st Wall Street Journal columnist Daniel Henninger offered an abridged look at the quarter-century of negotiations with North Korea which agreed to all manner of terms, signed all kinds of agreements, and joined various international organizations to assure everyone of their peaceful intent. He warned that “No agreement is going to stop Iran. Agreements, and a lot of talk, did not stop North Korea.”

“Iran,” said Henninger, “knows it has nuclear negotiators’ immunity: No matter how or when Iran debauches any agreement, the West, abjectly, will request—what else?—more talks. Iran’s nuclear bomb and ballistic missile programs will go forward as North Korea’s obviously did, no matter what.”

All the back-and-forth between the White House and Congress about the “accord” is essentially meaningless. It is mostly a debate about the treaty-making powers the Constitution extends to the executive branch and, at the same time, limits with legislative “advice and consent” of the Senate. For now the Senate can only wait for whatever is decided by June 30, but it is unlikely Obama will send it the text of the agreement.

To influence the outcome, Congress talks of the sanctions it has imposed on Iran and says it will impose again, but Obama has no legal authority to lift those sanctions, only Congress does.

AA - Javad

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif

The same day the President made the announcement, Javad Zarif, the Iranian counterpart to Secretary of State John Kerry made his own announcement. The U.S. and Iran, he said, had agreed in principle to let Iran continue running major portions of its nuclear program. “None of those measures”, intended to slow Iran’s progress, “include closing any of our facilities. We will continue enriching; we will continue research and development.”

This is the result of 18 months of “negotiations” with Iran. In the same way the U.S. caved to North Korea since the 1990s, it has caved to Iran and it has done so with the blessing of the European Union and the other members of the P-5+1, France, Great Britain, Russia, China, and Germany.

For good measure, to show how wonderfully warm the relations between Iran and the U.S. are, within hours after Obama’s announcement, Foreign Minister Zarif accused the U.S. of lying about the details of the tentative framework—“the historic understanding”—saying that the U.S. had promised the immediate termination of sanctions.

The notion that we would know if Iran was continuing its nuclear program because the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) would be inspecting its facilities is about as credible as similar inspections in North Korea when, in 2002, it cut the IAEA seals on its nuclear factories and withdrew from the non-Proliferation treaty, starting a nuclear reactor. It has pursued its nuclear weapons and missile programs ever since.

In the same fashion as the Soviet Union, China, and Israel, we didn’t know that either Pakistan or India had acquired nuclear capability until after they tested theirs. That’s how we will know when Iran has nuclear weapons. It already has intercontinental missiles with which to deliver them.

As quoted in an April 3 article by Mark Dubowitz, executive director, and Annie Fixler, policy analyst, of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, they cite an unnamed “senior State Department official” as saying “The truth is, you can dwell on Yemen, or you can recognize that we’re one agreement away from a game-changing, legacy-setting nuclear accord on Iran that tackles what everyone agrees is the biggest threat to the region.”

Unless one believes in unicorns and other fantasies, this latest “accord” and what we are being told about it by the President and the State Department is not a great achievement. It is doomed to failure because Iran has had no intention of doing anything other than getting economic and other sanctions removed. Time is on their side as they work to develop their own nuclear weapons.

When Iran tests its first nuclear weapon, Obama should return his Nobel Peace Prize.

© Alan Caruba, 2015

RELATED ARTICLE: Iran Contradicts U.S., Plans to Use Advanced Centrifuges Immediately