Republican Senators Channel Nixon

Just when you thought they couldn't sink any lower, the members of the Republican  majority go and prove you wrong.

Last week it was Boehner having Netanyahu speak to a joint session of Congress to undermine President Obama's negotiations with Iran, but now the Republicans in the Senate have topped him.

Monday 47 Republican senators sent an open letter to the president of Iran again seeking to undermine the nuclear weapon negotiations by means of a veiled threat to refuse to ratify any treaty reached by the parties, and to rescind any executive action Obama may take to implement an agreement.

Their letter says, in part:

First, under our Constitution, while the president negotiates international agreements, Congress plays the significant role of ratifying them.  In the case of a treaty, the Senate must ratify it by a two-thirds vote.  . . .
 Anything not approved by Congress is a mere executive agreement.

What these two constitutional provisions mean is that we will consider any agreement regarding your nuclear-weapons program that is not approved by the Congress as nothing more than an executive agreement between President Obama and Ayatollah Khamenei.  The next president could revoke such an executive agreement with the stroke of a pen and future Congresses could modify the terms of the agreement at any time.

Sadly, this repeats a pattern the Republican Party has been guilty of before. In 1968, when he feared that Hubert Humphrey might seize victory from the jaws of electoral defeat, Richard Nixon dispatched Anna Chennault to South Vietnam to encourage them to block any possible negotiation in the Paris peace talks, promising a better deal if he was elected. Nixon's sabotaging of the peace talks may have extended the war for another five years, at a cost of untold tens of thousands of lives.

Once again, the Republicans have chosen to put their partisan interests ahead of the national security of the United States. If they are successful, the product of their betrayal will be the defeat of the nuclear weapons talks, the immediate resumption of nuclear weapons development by the Iranian government, and the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran within a few years.

Boehner, McCain, Orrin Hatch, and most of the Republican extremists in the Senate (along with so-called moderates like Kelly Ayotte) seem intent on a 2015 version of the October Surprise plot of 1968.

Have you ever seen anything more contemptible?

Who's blocking peace in the Middle East? More evidence.

Here's a story that hasn't been in the Times yet, probably because it's a New England centered story. It could be read as just one more petty story of intra-diplomatic intrigue, but it seems to be revealing of one of the main barriers to peace in the Middle East.

Leaders of Boston’s Jewish community yesterday rallied strongly behind Israel’s consul general for New England, Nadav Tamir, who was summoned to Jerusalem this week to explain his controversial memo saying Israel’s handling of its relations with the United States was “causing strategic damage’’ to American public support for Israel.

Here's a quote from the memo:

Throughout the years, opinion polls have shown that the two most significant factors in US public support are the perception of a partnership in values and interests, and the perception that Israel seeks to end the conflict with its neighbors (hence the consistent public support of our right to self defense). These two parameters have suffered greatly recently. In many American circles, there is a feeling these days, that while the Obama administration tries to resolve global conflicts, it must deal with the refusal to cooperate by governments in Iran, North Korea, and Israel. Aaron Miller's words, spoken after the Obama-Netanyahu meeting, clearly show this feeling. He said it was a meeting between Obama yes we can and Netanyahu no you won't.

So what's he talking about? How about the fact that after years of international recognition that Israel's settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, and years of politely requesting that Israel stop, the Obama administration is showing signs that it might be serious about it? How about the fact that Netanyahu is continuing to insist on expanding Israel's illegal settlements? How about the fact that Americans are finally starting to catch on that Israel is pursuing a maximalist policy?

Of course, this kind of thing never gets leaked by accident. Whenever you see one of these diplomatic kerfuffles, whether it be the U-2 spy plane case back in the 1960's, the confrontations with Iran in the Persian Gulf a few years ago, or this, you need to think about who's doing the leaking and why.

In this case, it appears to be the hardliners, leaking the memo in order to publicly recall the consul general and undermine his position.

In other words, the opponents of peace with the Palestinians are demonstrating that they have the upper hand. Not surprising considering Netanyahu is on top, is it?

What's indecent?

I'm fond of pointing it out when Islam is revealed as the sexist, oppressive force that it is, but don't get the idea that I'm singling Islam out.

Here, for example, are two photographs published this week in Israel.

They look very similar, don't they?

See if you can play "Junior Detective" and find the differences.

All done?

That's right, the top picture has two women, both members of the Israeli cabinet. The bottom picture is the same shot, but it has replaced the two women with men.

Now why would somebody do that? It's because the bottom picture was published in an ultra-Orthodox Israeli newspaper that determined that publishing the pictures of women would be indecent.

If you ask me, what's indecent is oppressing women and distorting the truth.