Schumer: I'm Voting Against Iran Deal

[Valin]

The Weekly Standard:

DANIEL HALPER

Aug 6, 2015

 

Chuck Schumer, the third-ranking Democrat in the Senate, has released a statement saying he will oppose President Obama's Iran nuclear deal.

 

 

Every several years or so a legislator is called upon to cast a momentous vote in which the stakes are high and both sides of the issue are vociferous in their views.

 

Over the years, I have learned that the best way to treat such decisions is to study the issue carefully, hear the full, unfiltered explanation of those for and against, and then, without regard to pressure, politics or party, make a decision solely based on the merits.

 

I have spent the last three weeks doing just that: carefully studying the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, reading and re-reading the agreement and its annexes, questioning dozens of proponents and opponents, and seeking answers to questions that go beyond the text of the agreement but will have real consequences that must be considered.

 

Advocates on both sides have strong cases for their point of view that cannot simply be dismissed. This has made evaluating the agreement a difficult and deliberate endeavor, and after deep study, careful thought and considerable soul-searching, I have decided I must oppose the agreement and will vote yes on a motion of disapproval.

 

(Snip)

 

Therefore, I will vote to disapprove the agreement, not because I believe war is a viable or desirable option, nor to challenge the path of diplomacy. It is because I believe Iran will not change, and under this agreement it will be able to achieve its dual goals of eliminating sanctions while ultimately retaining its nuclear and non-nuclear power. Better to keep U.S. sanctions in place, strengthen them, enforce secondary sanctions on other nations, and pursue the hard-trodden path of diplomacy once more, difficult as it may be.

 

For all of these reasons, I believe the vote to disapprove is the right one.

 

 

____________________________________________________________________________________

 

Wow!

[Valin]

Obama Allies Blast Schumer on Iran Deal, Talk of New Leader (Updated)

Steven Dennis

11:47 p.m. on Aug. 6, 2015

 

Updated 12:08 a.m. | Did Sen. Charles E. Schumer just open himself up to a serious challenge to lead Senate Democrats in 2017? Top allies of the president say yes — and a major liberal advocacy group now wants him gone.

 

MoveOn.org announced a “donor strike” after the New York Democrat’s announcement that he opposes the Iran deal and compared him to Joe Lieberman, while former senior White House aide Dan Pfeiffer warned the Democratic base wouldn’t support Schumer for leader.

 

MoveOn said their 8 million members will withhold funding for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and from any Democratic candidate who sides with Schumer.

 

“While not unexpected, it is outrageous and unacceptable that the Democrat who wants to be the party’s leader in the Senate is siding with the Republican partisans and neoconservative ideologues who are trying to scrap this agreement and put us on the path to war,” said MoveOn.org Political Action Executive Director Ilya Sheyman in a statement.

 

(Snip)

[clearvision]

I hear feet stomping...

[nickydog]

And teeth gnashing.

[Geee]

So, Schumer is an Iranian Mullah then???

[Geee]

MoveOn.org Vows to Withhold Dem Donations Because Schumer Acting Too Lieberman

 

n protest of Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) acting too “Joe Lieberman” by deciding to vote against the Iran deal, MoveOn.org says it’s mobilizing a donor boycott of the Democratic Party.

 

“Diplomacy has yielded an agreement between the world’s major powers and Iran that will prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. The only other means of limiting Iran’s nuclear program is war,” MoveOn.org political action executive director Ilya Sheyman said in a statement. “While not unexpected, it is outrageous and unacceptable that the Democrat who wants to be the party’s leader in the Senate is siding with the Republican partisans and neoconservative ideologues who are trying to scrap this agreement and put us on the path to war.”

 

“…Our country doesn’t need another Joe Lieberman in the Senate, and it certainly doesn’t need him as Democratic leader. The vast majority of Democratic voters — the people who elected President Obama in part because of our shared belief that war must always be a last resort — will not stand for it…. No real Democratic leader does this. If this is what counts as ‘leadership’ among Democrats in the Senate, Senate Democrats should be prepared to find a new leader or few followers. This is not what the volunteers, activists, small-dollar donors, and voters who actually win elections spend their time and money to support.”

MoveOn.org claims eight million members and says it’s trying to get commitments to withhold $10 million from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee “and from any Democratic candidate who succeeds in undermining the president’s diplomacy with Iran” in the next 72 hours.

Other liberals on Twitter suggested calling Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-Mass.) office and encouraging her to mount a rebellion against Schumer’s presumed takeover of Senate Democratic leader when Harry Reid (D-Nev.) retires next year.

 

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2015/08/07/moveon-org-vows-to-withhold-dem-donations-because-schumer-acting-too-lieberman/

[Valin]

Slate

 

2 Comments

 

jimmyb 20 minutes ago

The Iran deal will ultimately fail because President Obama hasn't adequately made the case for it. It's not the best deal that there is, it's the best deal that a President who doesn't enforce our security commitments to Ukraine or his own red line in Syria can get.

 

And now, high-ranking Senate Democrats in deeply blue states have realized this, and don't have the benefit of leaving office in 16 months to go write books and give 6-figure speeches.

 

So yeah, get mad at Chuck Schumer because zionists, and let's totally ignore our feckless President's role in the entire affair.

 

 

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

argyle 9 hours ago

He clearly wants war, and he also can't stand the fact that a black man is president.

toxicorange9 hours ago

@Argyle58 Nope, I think it is because he is a super Jew, it has blinded his reason.

 

[Valin]

Why Schumer’s Opposition to the Iran Deal Matters
Fred Fleitz

August 7, 2015

 

In a surprise to both supporters and opponents of the controversial nuclear deal with Iran, Senator Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.), who is likely to succeed Harry Reid as the Senate’s top Democrat, announced his opposition last night. Schumer is also the top ranking Jewish senator.

 

Schumer said he does not think the deal will work because

 

 

In the first 10 years, there are serious weaknesses. First, inspections are not “anywhere, anytime”; the 24-day delay before we can inspect is troubling. More troubling is the fact that the US can’t demand inspections unilaterally. And the “snapback sanctions” provisions seem cumbersome and difficult to use.

 

 

(Snip)

 

Schumer’s decision to defect now despite intense pressure from the White House is a major blow to President Obama and the Iran deal. But the deal’s opponents still have lot of work to do to win enough support in the House and Senate to override a veto of a resolution of disapproval. Schumer may do little to convince other senators to oppose the Iran deal and could still vote to uphold a presidential veto.

 

The reason the Schumer defection matters is because it puts the lie to the Obama administration’s shameful claim that opponents of the Iran deal are partisan extremists who want war with Iran. Schumer’s announcement is a powerful indication that opposition to this terrible agreement is in fact principled and bipartisan.

[Valin]

@WestVirginaRebel

 

Dem defections show deep divisions in party over Iran nuclear deal

[Valin]

Getting uglier and uglier on Iran: Leading Jewish magazine accuses White House of “Jew-baiting”
Ed Morrissey

August 10, 2015

 

Tablet Magazine is not exactly a bastion of conservative thought among Jewish American publications. In fact, the editors didn’t appear impressed with Senator Chuck Schumer’s decision to oppose the deal with Iran that Barack Obama and John Kerry insist that Congress refrain from rejecting, calling it “calculations” geared toward Schumer’s “self-interest.” But they have been even less impressed with the rhetoric coming from the White House and the Left in demanding support for the deal, calling it “Jew-baiting” and worse. The editors blasted Obama for using the kind of rhetoric they would expect from white supremacists, not a President with a good case for supporting an agreement with Iran:

 

What we increasingly can’t stomach—and feel obliged to speak out about right now—is the use of Jew-baiting and other blatant and retrograde forms of racial and ethnic prejudice as tools to sell a political deal, or to smear those who oppose it. Accusing Senator Schumer of loyalty to a foreign government is bigotry, pure and simple. Accusing Senators and Congressmen whose misgivings about the Iran deal are shared by a majority of the U.S. electorate of being agents of a foreign power, or ofselling their votes to shadowy lobbyists, or of acting contrary to the best interests of the United States, is the kind of naked appeal to bigotry and prejudice that would be familiar in the politics of the pre-Civil Rights Era South.

 

This use of anti-Jewish incitement as a political tool is a sickening new development in American political discourse, and we have heard too much of it lately—some coming, ominously, from our own White House and its representatives. Let’s not mince words: Murmuring about “money” and “lobbying” and “foreign interests” who seek to drag America into war is a direct attempt to play the dual-loyalty card. It’s the kind of dark, nasty stuff we might expect to hear at a white power rally, not from the President of the United States—and it’s gotten so blatant that even many of us who are generally sympathetic to the administration, and even this deal, have been shaken by it.

 

We do not accept the idea that Senator Schumer or anyone else is a fair target for racist incitement, anymore than we accept the idea that the basic norms of political discourse in this country do not apply to Jews. Whatever one feels about the merits of the Iran deal, sales techniques that call into question the patriotism of American Jews are examples of bigotry—no matter who does it. On this question, we should all stand in defense of Senator Schumer.

 

 

It’s a big contrast with Schumer’s own argument, writes David Adesnik at the Weekly Standard. Schumer probably didn’t win many brownie points with his extensive thoughts on opposing the deal, but it comes across as “courtly,” Adesnik says, especially in comparison to the White House’s rhetoric:

 

(Snip)

[Draggingtree]

From Schumer to Suleimani

I doubt that the bulk of his supporters are opposed to the deal, and there is certainly no mass uprising against it from the American Jewish community.

 

by Michael Ledeen

August 9, 2015 - 2:19 pm

 

I am not very good at predicting political events, and I did not expect Senator Chuck Schumer to announce his opposition to the Iran deal before the August recess. After all, he’s in line to become the Democrats’ leader in the Senate, very important for a professional pol. That happy thought is now very much in jeopardy as he is targeted by the White House and the left wing – that is to say the majority – of the Democrat Party.

 

He certainly knew that he would be viciously attacked; the left, and not only in the United States, has pretty much given up trying to win rational arguments. The old pseudo-Marxist remedies having failed long since, their “politics” consist primarily of attempts at the personal destruction of their opponents and enemies. Schumer will now bear the full brunt of his party’s rage. It has already cost him money, no small matter

 

http://pjmedia.com/michaelledeen/2015/08/09/from-schumer-to-suleimani/