Free Republic

Are we be better off today with the thousands of U.S. factories that have shut down and millions of American jobs lost and the trillions in accumulated debt that we've run up in the last couple decades of free trade? And, of course, this is due to many factors including such things as: Big government Regulations High taxes Unions driving up costs Cheap labor overseas Fewer regulations overseas Lower taxes overseas Trade deficits etc., And doubly exasperated by poor trade deals? Or is this all a myth? Are we better off with cheaper foreign (cheap) goods, fewer U.S. factories, fewer...

No wonder Iran has given up its nuclear weapons development program. With the $150 billion we are giving them, they can buy all of the nukes they need from North Korea. Trump is correct when he says our country is run by stupid people!

Senior Iranian Negotiators Salehi, Kamalvandi: On October 19 President Obama Will Announce Lifting Of American Sanctions According to senior Iranian negotiators, Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and an architect of the nuclear agreement (JCPOA), and Beherouz Kamalvandi, the spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, on October 19, 2015 President Obama will announce that sanctions will be lifted and not merely suspended, contrary to the July 14, 2015 text of the agreement to which Iran is obligated.[1] If this report proves accurate, it means that President Obama surrendered to the threats and...

**SNIP** But though the United States and Iran each face domestic pressures against closer relations, some analysts see a more collaborative relationship as an inevitable if uneasy consequence of the negotiations leading up to the nuclear deal — despite the insistence of leaders on either side that the American-brokered agreement would be limited to Iran’s nuclear program. “Both the Iranian and American governments are going to approach expanded dialogue very gingerly,” said James Dobbins, a senior follow at the RAND Corporation. “But there will still be a gradual increase in at least communication between the two governments on areas beyond...

Tennessee Republican Senator Bob Corker, author of the treasonous Corker – Cardin bill to facilitate President Obama’s nuclear weapons treaty with Islamist Iran, has made another inexplicable betrayal of American military superiority and indeed the future of America itself. The Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, which Corker authored, requires the Administration transmit to Congress all documents related to the JCPOA —including side agreements—prior to a 60-day review period and subsequent vote. There’s no doubt that Obama has not complied with the terms of the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, indeed Senator Corker said “there’s no question that two of the...

. If Obama’s deal with the terrorist government of Iran is a treaty, then, by our Constitution, it needs a two thirds approval vote in the Senate to be finalized. In discussing this issue, it is important to note a fundamental rule of constitutional construction: 16 Am Jur 2d Constitutional law Meaning of Language Ordinary meaning, generally ”Words or terms used in a constitution, being dependent on ratification by the people voting upon it, must be understood in the sense most obvious to the common understanding at the time of its adoption…”__ (my emphasis) So, in determining if Obama’s deal...

Do you remember Lewis "Scooter" Libby? In 2003, the Department of Justice appointed a special counsel to investigate allegations that Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, unlawfully disclosed the covert status of CIA operative Valerie Plame. Yet Plame may not have been a covert undercover agent, based on the formal government definition of that role. And even if she were, it was widely known at the time that Secretary of State Colin Powell's subordinate, Richard Armitage, had most likely disclosed her status earlier. In other words, Libby was in an Orwellian position of being accused of a crime...

"It’s not too late for the Senate to stop the President’s dangerous Iran deal from becoming U.S. law. Here’s how to follow the Constitution." ConstitutionUPDATED: It’s late, but not too late, for the Senate to stop President Obama’s dangerous Iran deal from becoming U.S. law and putting the American people and our Arab and Israeli allies in grave danger jeopardy from an Iranian nuclear weapons program. We need to urge the Senate leadership immediately to: Declare that the President has not fulfilled the terms of Corker-Cardin. Declare the President’s Iran deal a foreign treaty, as per the Constitution. Hold a...

The White House campaign to save the Iran nuclear deal is getting a boost from the God squad. Faith-based groups, many of them increasingly nervous about the well-funded push by opponents of the deal, are intensifying their lobbying of lawmakers ahead of an important congressional vote on the agreement. Over the weekend, the Rev. Al Sharpton called on black churches to mobilize in support of the nuclear deal. On Monday, a group of 340 rabbis from multiple strands of Judaism released a letter, urging lawmakers to vote for the agreement. And plans are in the works for a coordinated rollout...

It does not bode well that an Obama administration that assures us that the nuclear deal with Iran will not be violated by the mullahs is clearly looking the other way as Iran’s ally Russia blatantly violates the 1987 Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty signed with the former Soviet Union. The Obama White House is sitting on a Pentagon risk assessment report completed last month that states “that the breach involved a new missile that violates the limits set by the treaty. The treaty bans holding, producing, or flight-testing ground-launched ballistic or cruise missiles with ranges of between 310 miles...

The White House is blocking the release of a Pentagon risk assessment of Russia’s violation of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, according to a senior House leader. Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee, disclosed the existence of the Pentagon assessment last month and said the report is needed for Congress’ efforts to address the problem in legislation. “As we look to the near-term future, we need to consider how we’re going to respond to Russia’s INF violations,” Rogers said in an Air Force Association breakfast July 8. “Congress will not continue to tolerate

Liberals are livid at Sen. Charles Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) decision to oppose the White House’s nuclear deal with Iran, and have threatened to launch a full-scale war as retribution. Activists and former top officials within the Obama administration are openly contemplating whether Schumer’s stance disqualifies him from serving as the next Senate Democratic leader — which he is primed to do — and seeking to temporarily cut off money to Democrats in the upper chamber. It’s unclear whether Schumer’s announcement will have a devastating effect on the White House’s efforts to prevent Democrats from killing the deal when it comes up...

President Obama: I realize that resorting to force may be tempting in the face of the rhetoric and behavior that emanates from parts of Iran. It is offensive. It is incendiary. We do take it seriously. But superpowers should not act impulsively in response to talks… Just because Iranian hardliners chant ‘Death to America” does not mean that that’s what all Iranians believe. In fact, it’s those hardliners that are more satisfied with the status quo. It’s those hardliners chanting “death to America” who’ve been most opposed to the deal. They’re making common cause with the Republican Caucus.

Obama has decided that two wildly unpopular policies, one foreign and one domestic, will be the final legacy of his wildly unpopular administration. The domestic policy is gun control. The foreign policy is Iranian nukes. While Americans will be disarmed, Iran will be getting ready for its ballistic missiles. Ramming through wildly unpopular policies is what this administration does best. More than anything else, this administration will be remembered for the mix of bullying, smears, pop culture distractions, outright lies, bureaucratic sabotage and blatant lawbreaking with which it achieved its policy goals.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said she believes Democrats will be able to uphold President Obama's veto if Republicans vote down his nuclear deal with Iran in September and she called the agreement "a diplomatic masterpiece." Pelosi, D-Calif., said Democrats will rally behind the agreement even after the long August recess, when outside groups plan a media blitz aimed at sinking public support. "More and more [Democrats] have conferred to me they will be there to sustain the veto," Pelosi told reporters on Thursday. Congress has begun a 60-day review of the deal, which would lift sanctions against Iran in...

The White House did not pursue the nuclear agreement with Iran as an international treaty, because getting U.S. Senate advice and consent for a treaty has “become physically impossible,” Secretary of State John Kerry told lawmakers on Tuesday. At a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on the agreement known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Kerry was asked about the administration’s approach of seeking a political accord between governments rather than an international treaty. Rep. Reid Ribble (R-Wisc.) recalled Kerry saying earlier in the hearing that if Congress rejects the JCPOA, other countries will in the future not...

Even the normally restrained if not downright tepid National Review has reached the obvious conclusion — Obama must be impeached for facilitating the acquisition of nuclear weapons by America’s worst enemy. Andrew McCarthy notes that in the time of the Founding Fathers, it was regarded as an impeachable offense for a president to withhold information from Congress regarding a treaty, or to use unscrupulous tactics to acquire Senate approval. Compare that to what Obama has done:

Conservative legal activist Larry Klayman is suing President Obama and members of Congress over a deal on Iran’s nuclear program that he claims flies in the face of the Constitution. The lawsuit, Klayman says, aims to block both the treaty and the “unconstitutional” law that Congress passed to guarantee a review of the multinational nuclear accord. The White House and Congress “gave away, abrogated and undermined [Klayman’s] constitutional rights, putting him in danger, including the protections inherent in the Constitution requiring a two-thirds vote to ratify a treaty,” he said in the lawsuit. Under the Constitution, two-thirds of the Senate...

How can Congress circumvent the Constitution by passing the Corker bill? Has anyone challenged the constitutionality of the Corker bill? The Corker bill provides a modified process for the review and approval of the treaty with Iran. It circumvents the procedure outlined in the Constitution in effect modifying the Constitution without following the process outlined in the Constitution. "The President...shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur... Constitution of the United States, Art. II, Sec. 2"

A senior Iranian cleric delivered Friday prayers in Tehran while standing behind a podium that declared, “We Will Trample Upon America,” according to photos released by Iran’s state-controlled media. Iranian cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Ali Movahedi Kermani, who was handpicked by the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader to deliver the prayers, delivered a message of hostility toward the United States in the first official remarks since a final nuclear deal was signed between Iran and world powers in Vienna last week. Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon adviser and expert on rogue regimes, said that the official remarks by Iranian officials and clerics...