(03-11-2015 10:46 PM)Max Power Wrote:  I'm saying that's what Cotton thinks. He clearly doesn't respect the intelligence of his audience if he's pretending he didn't know what Kerry meant.

I don't think he's pretending that he didn't know what Kerry meant. I think he has a pretty good idea, and that prompts the question.

I have pretty much the same question. What does a non-ratified agreement accomplish?

It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

(03-11-2015 11:07 PM)Max Power Wrote:  It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

I agree generally.

So what good is the agreement? There's nothing we can do with it that we can't do without it. All I see that we do is agree to some limitations on our behavior.

I just don't see that it accomplishes anything but to give Obama a piece of paper for his legacy.

The way to get substantive agreement is to be willing to impose severe consequences for failing to agree. We've shown no indication of that. Iran will be perfectly willing to sign a meaningless piece of paper that Obama can hang on his trophy wall.

(03-11-2015 11:35 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  The way to get substantive agreement is to be willing to impose severe consequences for failing to agree. We've shown no indication of that. Iran will be perfectly willing to sign a meaningless piece of paper that Obama can hang on his trophy wall.

And that is all this is.

(03-11-2015 11:07 PM)Max Power Wrote:  It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

What court are you planning on going to that would force Iran to "meet some part of it"? Do you really think that whatever court you went to Iran would say "Oh, this court says we can't do what we're doing - we better stop pronto!!"

As I said before, Obama and Kerry should promote this as a show and sell tickets, because that is all it is - a show.

(03-12-2015 07:33 AM)Crebman Wrote:  

(03-11-2015 11:07 PM)Max Power Wrote:  It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

What court are you planning on going to that would force Iran to "meet some part of it"? Do you really think that whatever court you went to Iran would say "Oh, this court says we can't do what we're doing - we better stop pronto!!"

As I said before, Obama and Kerry should promote this as a show and sell tickets, because that is all it is - a show.

Yeah, that's the fantasy world where liberals live.

(03-12-2015 07:37 AM)blunderbuss Wrote:  

(03-12-2015 07:33 AM)Crebman Wrote:  

(03-11-2015 11:07 PM)Max Power Wrote:  It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

What court are you planning on going to that would force Iran to "meet some part of it"? Do you really think that whatever court you went to Iran would say "Oh, this court says we can't do what we're doing - we better stop pronto!!"

As I said before, Obama and Kerry should promote this as a show and sell tickets, because that is all it is - a show.

Yeah, that's the fantasy world where liberals live.

Max actually knows that this is all a charade. He's just p!ssed his king looks like a joke about this in the eyes of the rest of the world - again.

What he fails to see is that Obama has been viewed as a joke for far longer than this latest episode.

He fails to see it because in his eyes, his king is infallible and does no wrong - kind of like how the Japanese people viewed their Emperor prior to WWII.

The sad thing is that Max will do this for whatever politician has a "D" next to their name, and anyone with a "R" next to their name is the devil incarnate.

Number one, if we truly want to prevent Iran from getting nukes, the only way for us to do that is to invade, conquer them, and physically shut the program down and prevent it from reopening. Is that worth the cost? I don't think so. Is having nukes in the hands of crazy, unstable, radical, Muslim governments the end of the world? If so, why hasn't Pakistan ended the world yet?

Number two, what good is an agreement? Does it let us do anything that we can't do without it? Almost certainly not. If it were given treaty status and properly ratified, then as Max has noted we could presumably take it to the World Court if Iran violates it. But what good would that do? Could the Court shut down Iran's nuke program? No. On the other hand, under the terms of any agreement, would we take on any obligations with regard to Iran or agree to forego any actions that would otherwise be available to us? Almost certainly yes--that's how agreements normally work. So we invariably give up something to get nothing. Why is that a good idea?

Number three, what happens if Israel tries to take out Iran's nukes? They would almost certainly have to use their own nukes to accomplish this. Would they? Or would they confine it to conventional strikes and accept the likelihood of failure? I don't know, do you? What happens next if they try?

Number four, despite all the rhetoric about Israel, Iran's objective is not destruction of Israel, it is domination of the region. Israel is only incidental to that objective. Iran wants an Aryan empire extending from Istanbul to Kabul to Aden to Cairo. With the Tikrit assault they are cultivating Iraq as a client state. If they eliminate ISIS, they will be able to add Syria. They are making significant headway in Yemen. And they are doing all this without nukes.

Number five, let's assume Iran gets its nukes. They will, it's only a matter of time. What happens then? They're not going to go nuke Israel on day one. They won't have the capability for years. And it will be many years before their nuke arsenal would even remotely approach Israel's, meaning that they would be the big losers in the exchange that would result when Israel retaliates. I would expect the Saudis would move very quickly to become nuke. I'm not sure there's anybody else in the region that could actually do so.

This agreement will accomplish nothing. You can't get people to negotiate in good faith unless they are worried about the consequences of not doing so, and we are not prepared to impose any consequences that Iran fears. So we'll get a worthless piece of paper. Suppose we impose sanctions. Will Putin and the Chinese a) uphold the sanctions or b) see that as an opportunity to make a new ally?

Stop looking at the trees and step back and see the forest.

(03-12-2015 08:07 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  Number one, if we truly want to prevent Iran from getting nukes, the only way for us to do that is to invade, conquer them, and physically shut the program down and prevent it from reopening. Is that worth the cost? I don't think so. Is having nukes in the hands of crazy, unstable, radical, Muslim governments the end of the world? If so, why hasn't Pakistan ended the world yet?

Number two, what good is an agreement? Does it let us do anything that we can't do without it? Almost certainly not. If it were given treaty status and properly ratified, then as Max has noted we could presumably take it to the World Court if Iran violates it. But what good would that do? Could the Court shut down Iran's nuke program? No. On the other hand, under the terms of any agreement, would we take on any obligations with regard to Iran or agree to forego any actions that would otherwise be available to us? Almost certainly yes--that's how agreements normally work. So we invariably give up something to get nothing. Why is that a good idea?

Number three, what happens if Israel tries to take out Iran's nukes? They would almost certainly have to use their own nukes to accomplish this. Would they? Or would they confine it to conventional strikes and accept the likelihood of failure? I don't know, do you? What happens next if they try?

Number four, despite all the rhetoric about Israel, Iran's objective is not destruction of Israel, it is domination of the region. Israel is only incidental to that objective. Iran wants an Aryan empire extending from Istanbul to Kabul to Aden to Cairo. With the Tikrit assault they are cultivating Iraq as a client state. If they eliminate ISIS, they will be able to add Syria. They are making significant headway in Yemen. And they are doing all this without nukes.

Number five, let's assume Iran gets its nukes. They will, it's only a matter of time. What happens then? They're not going to go nuke Israel on day one. They won't have the capability for years. And it will be many years before their nuke arsenal would even remotely approach Israel's, meaning that they would be the big losers in the exchange that would result when Israel retaliates. I would expect the Saudis would move very quickly to become nuke. I'm not sure there's anybody else in the region that could actually do so.

This agreement will accomplish nothing. You can't get people to negotiate in good faith unless they are worried about the consequences of not doing so, and we are not prepared to impose any consequences that Iran fears. So we'll get a worthless piece of paper. Suppose we impose sanctions. Will Putin and the Chinese a) uphold the sanctions or b) see that as an opportunity to make a new ally?

Stop looking at the trees and step back and see the forest.

Owl - none of this matters to Max, or any of the libs for that matter. Their boy was made to look the fool again, they want their pound of flesh.

It's funny, but every time I think of Obama I have this picture of him wearing mom jeans, wearing a stupid "protective hat", astride a girls bike. My suspicion is that's how the rest of the world views him - and long before this situation.

(03-11-2015 11:07 PM)Max Power Wrote:  It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

So, the Administration is entering an agreement that constrains United States actions, but has no enforcement provisions on the Iranians.

Applying the logic that you attribute to Tom Cotton - how stupid do you think your audience is to believe that there is an objective reason to bypass Congress with this agreement?

The Administration is bypassing Congress because they are trying to enter an agreement that Congress will find unacceptable.

(03-12-2015 08:07 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  Number five, let's assume Iran gets its nukes. They will, it's only a matter of time. What happens then? They're not going to go nuke Israel on day one. They won't have the capability for years. And it will be many years before their nuke arsenal would even remotely approach Israel's, meaning that they would be the big losers in the exchange that would result when Israel retaliates. I would expect the Saudis would move very quickly to become nuke. I'm not sure there's anybody else in the region that could actually do so.

Saudi Arabia teams up with Korea on SMART
Korea extends nuclear cooperation to Qatar
Saudi Arabia and Argentina form R&D joint venture

Saudi Arabia is pursuing a Heavy Water reactor, which means they can bypass Uranium enrichment (generally the step that trips up countries like Iran and Iraq in the non-proliferation regimes). However, it produces substantial Plutonium as a by-product, meaning that getting the material for a bomb is not complicated for them, once they get that in place. Inspection should be much simpler - you can't hide a heavy water reactor. And, you should be able to calculate how much Plutonium they have at any given time. I think it will be very difficult for Saudi to develop weapons with this kind of reactor program. Most countries that have weapons programs will develop highly enriched uranium as a weapons source or have a research reactor to produce plutonium.

(03-12-2015 08:07 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  Number one, if we truly want to prevent Iran from getting nukes, the only way for us to do that is to invade, conquer them, and physically shut the program down and prevent it from reopening. Is that worth the cost? I don't think so. Is having nukes in the hands of crazy, unstable, radical, Muslim governments the end of the world? If so, why hasn't Pakistan ended the world yet?

Number two, what good is an agreement? Does it let us do anything that we can't do without it? Almost certainly not. If it were given treaty status and properly ratified, then as Max has noted we could presumably take it to the World Court if Iran violates it. But what good would that do? Could the Court shut down Iran's nuke program? No. On the other hand, under the terms of any agreement, would we take on any obligations with regard to Iran or agree to forego any actions that would otherwise be available to us? Almost certainly yes--that's how agreements normally work. So we invariably give up something to get nothing. Why is that a good idea?

Number three, what happens if Israel tries to take out Iran's nukes? They would almost certainly have to use their own nukes to accomplish this. Would they? Or would they confine it to conventional strikes and accept the likelihood of failure? I don't know, do you? What happens next if they try?

Number four, despite all the rhetoric about Israel, Iran's objective is not destruction of Israel, it is domination of the region. Israel is only incidental to that objective. Iran wants an Aryan empire extending from Istanbul to Kabul to Aden to Cairo. With the Tikrit assault they are cultivating Iraq as a client state. If they eliminate ISIS, they will be able to add Syria. They are making significant headway in Yemen. And they are doing all this without nukes.

Number five, let's assume Iran gets its nukes. They will, it's only a matter of time. What happens then? They're not going to go nuke Israel on day one. They won't have the capability for years. And it will be many years before their nuke arsenal would even remotely approach Israel's, meaning that they would be the big losers in the exchange that would result when Israel retaliates. I would expect the Saudis would move very quickly to become nuke. I'm not sure there's anybody else in the region that could actually do so.

This agreement will accomplish nothing. You can't get people to negotiate in good faith unless they are worried about the consequences of not doing so, and we are not prepared to impose any consequences that Iran fears. So we'll get a worthless piece of paper. Suppose we impose sanctions. Will Putin and the Chinese a) uphold the sanctions or b) see that as an opportunity to make a new ally?

Stop looking at the trees and step back and see the forest.

As the kids like to say; it is what it is. We are looking at a nuclear Mexican Standoff in the Middle East. I would work with Israel on land based interceptor batteries and have the UN Security Council have frank discussion about the consequences of a nuclear attack.

(03-11-2015 10:46 PM)Max Power Wrote:  I'm saying that's what Cotton thinks. He clearly doesn't respect the intelligence of his audience if he's pretending he didn't know what Kerry meant.

No, you pretty much called anybody that felt the same way as Cotton stupid. I believe the actual quote was "YOU GUY'S". No need to backtrack now.

As for the point of Cotton's statement, I think it went over a lot of people's heads. In my opinion he is poking fun at the administration trying to downplay their deal with Iran that blew up in their face by saying it wasn't legally binding anyway so it didn't matter that Iran said no.

Of course it isn't legal until its ratified, but why would Kerry bother to mention that as if to dismiss the importance of the agreement. The admin would obviously be hoping it would be ratified and become legally binding eventually, otherwise it would be purely symbolic. The 47 republicans eliminated any symbolic meaning the deal could have in their letter.

(03-11-2015 11:35 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  The way to get substantive agreement is to be willing to impose severe consequences for failing to agree. We've shown no indication of that. Iran will be perfectly willing to sign a meaningless piece of paper that Obama can hang on his trophy wall.

The details are classified. How do you know there won't be severe consequences? Much harsher sanctions, diplomatic/political/economic isolation by the US and the other partners in this negotiation, and even military action are all on the table for Obama if they don't live up to their end. They **** up, bomb em. Sounds severe to me.

(03-12-2015 07:33 AM)Crebman Wrote:  What court are you planning on going to that would force Iran to "meet some part of it"? Do you really think that whatever court you went to Iran would say "Oh, this court says we can't do what we're doing - we better stop pronto!!"

As I said before, Obama and Kerry should promote this as a show and sell tickets, because that is all it is - a show.

That's exactly my point!!! The courts are largely irrelevant in talks such as this. That's why they're often bypassed.

There is no court Obama will need to go to. He can bomb 'em without going to Congress. Many GOP members of Congress were calling for him to do just that when Assad used chemical weapons, so I'm sure they'd be fine with this.

(03-12-2015 07:50 AM)Crebman Wrote:  Max actually knows that this is all a charade. He's just p!ssed his king looks like a joke about this in the eyes of the rest of the world - again.

What he fails to see is that Obama has been viewed as a joke for far longer than this latest episode.

He fails to see it because in his eyes, his king is infallible and does no wrong - kind of like how the Japanese people viewed their Emperor prior to WWII.

The sad thing is that Max will do this for whatever politician has a "D" next to their name, and anyone with a "R" next to their name is the devil incarnate.

We all look like a joke because of this letter. It makes us look extremely dysfunctional to have a minority party write letters to a country in negotiations with our State Department to undermine that State Department. I mean we are, but let's not broadcast that to the entire international community please.

Obama is far, far, far more respected on the international stage than Bush was.

(03-12-2015 08:07 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  Number one, if we truly want to prevent Iran from getting nukes, the only way for us to do that is to invade, conquer them, and physically shut the program down and prevent it from reopening. Is that worth the cost? I don't think so. Is having nukes in the hands of crazy, unstable, radical, Muslim governments the end of the world? If so, why hasn't Pakistan ended the world yet? I agree with this.

Number two, what good is an agreement? Does it let us do anything that we can't do without it? I imagine it will allow our nuclear inspectors great access to Iran's existing nuclear facilities, and hopefully access to any suspected nuclear facilities, to verify that enrichment has stopped/slowed. That's something. Almost certainly not. If it were given treaty status and properly ratified, then as Max has noted we could presumably take it to the World Court if Iran violates it. But what good would that do? Could the Court shut down Iran's nuke program? No. On the other hand, under the terms of any agreement, would we take on any obligations with regard to Iran or agree to forego any actions that would otherwise be available to us? Almost certainly yes--that's how agreements normally work. So we invariably give up something to get nothing. Why is that a good idea? Verifiable-- to some degree-- slowdown-- again, to some degree-- is not nothing.

Number three, what happens if Israel tries to take out Iran's nukes? They would almost certainly have to use their own nukes to accomplish this. Would they? Or would they confine it to conventional strikes and accept the likelihood of failure? I don't know, do you? What happens next if they try? I agree with the premise here. I'm sure they'd do a conventional strike at first, but 1-3 years down the road when faced with it again they'd have to nuke or get us to invade or accept it. I'm afraid if they try Iran would retaliate against US interests directly or through its proxies, and it could lead to escalation. This won't be like when Israel bombed Assad or Saddam's nuclear facilities. Iran can do much in retaliation and won't just lie down and take it most likely. They probably use proxies to attack or embassies and/or bases.

Number four, despite all the rhetoric about Israel, Iran's objective is not destruction of Israel, it is domination of the region. Israel is only incidental to that objective. Iran wants an Aryan empire extending from Istanbul to Kabul to Aden to Cairo. With the Tikrit assault they are cultivating Iraq as a client state. If they eliminate ISIS, they will be able to add Syria. They are making significant headway in Yemen. And they are doing all this without nukes. Ok

Number five, let's assume Iran gets its nukes. They will, it's only a matter of time. What happens then? They're not going to go nuke Israel on day one. They won't have the capability for years. And it will be many years before their nuke arsenal would even remotely approach Israel's, meaning that they would be the big losers in the exchange that would result when Israel retaliates. I would expect the Saudis would move very quickly to become nuke. I'm not sure there's anybody else in the region that could actually do so. Agreed

This agreement will accomplish nothing. You can't get people to negotiate in good faith unless they are worried about the consequences of not doing so, and we are not prepared to impose any consequences that Iran fears. So we'll get a worthless piece of paper. Suppose we impose sanctions. Will Putin and the Chinese a) uphold the sanctions or b) see that as an opportunity to make a new ally? I think we have the will to conduct airstrikes if the agreement is breached, and impose more sanctions. Putin and the Chinese are already fairly close with Iran. They'd get closer, but I doubt whatever gains Putin or China can offer would offset the losses from the west. We consume a lot more oil than Russia and China and our economy is doing better.

Stop looking at the trees and step back and see the forest.

(03-12-2015 09:39 AM)I45owl Wrote:  

(03-11-2015 11:07 PM)Max Power Wrote:  It doesn't need to be ratified unless you need a court to enforce some part of it. The Iran hostage agreement wasn't ratified, and last I checked the hostages made it back. The Obama administration can ease sanctions or threaten military action or maneuvers or impose a no fly zone or freeze assets or diplomatically isolate them or take one of any number of creative ways to influence Iran's behavior just using their executive discretion.

You only worry about getting a treaty ratified if it contains law you want to be able to take to a court to enforce. More often than not that's not the case, which is why most executive agreements are never ratified.

So, the Administration is entering an agreement that constrains United States actions, but has no enforcement provisions on the Iranians.

Applying the logic that you attribute to Tom Cotton - how stupid do you think your audience is to believe that there is an objective reason to bypass Congress with this agreement?

The Administration is bypassing Congress because they are trying to enter an agreement that Congress will find unacceptable.

It doesn't need enforcement provisions for Obama to bomb 'em. And we don't know what the agreement says yet.

You're turning the burden of proof on its head. The question isn't why is Obama bypassing Congress. It's why Obama should have to go to Congress. Unless there's a reason it can't be done as an executive agreement it's just fine as an executive agreement.

Cotton's tweet was dishonest, yes. He knew that Obama can bomb em or do any number of things for violating the agreement without ever taking it to Congress. He implied otherwise, because he thought his audience didn't know any better.

(03-12-2015 03:59 PM)200yrs2late Wrote:  

(03-11-2015 10:46 PM)Max Power Wrote:  I'm saying that's what Cotton thinks. He clearly doesn't respect the intelligence of his audience if he's pretending he didn't know what Kerry meant.

No, you pretty much called anybody that felt the same way as Cotton stupid. I believe the actual quote was "YOU GUY'S". No need to backtrack now.

As for the point of Cotton's statement, I think it went over a lot of people's heads. In my opinion he is poking fun at the administration trying to downplay their deal with Iran that blew up in their face by saying it wasn't legally binding anyway so it didn't matter that Iran said no.

Of course it isn't legal until its ratified, but why would Kerry bother to mention that as if to dismiss the importance of the agreement. The admin would obviously be hoping it would be ratified and become legally binding eventually, otherwise it would be purely symbolic. The 47 republicans eliminated any symbolic meaning the deal could have in their letter.

Holy reading comprehension fail, Batman! I said what I said.

Kerry sent that tweet in response to people asking why it wouldn't be submitted to Congress. It's a legal technicality he was clearing up. Was Cotton being "cheeky" or disingenuous. Call me a cynic but I'll say disingenuous. Remember when he warned Arkansans about Mexican drug lords teaming up with ISIS and how it's an "urgent problem"? The guy is a demagogue and scaremonger.

Actually, the symbolism would be in taking it to the Senate to ratify it, if indeed that is unnecessary.