Posted on 11/13/2010 9:32:26 PM PST by Nachum
President Obama assured Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Sunday that the lame-duck session will be used to ratify the START nuclear-arms treaty. According to the White House pool report, Obama gave his commitment to his Russian counterpart as the two met, both lauding their friendship and relationship built up over the past two years. "I reiterated my commitment to getting the START treaty done during the lame-duck session," Obama said at a photo op, calling passage of the treaty a "top priority" of his administration.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
The list, ping
Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list
We must all make it a priority to think about their priorities.
Obama IS a lame duck
“Obama IS a lame duck”
I think was thinking something very similar.
What an idiot! He keeps setting himself (and us) up for epic fail. When will he learn to keep his yap shut? We don’t want the new START treaty, and he can cram it.
Obama is so ‘08.
Hopefully he’ll get another slap just like the mid-terms.
The Heritage Foundation says of this go-round of START (http://www.heritage.org/research/factsheets/the-start-treaty-undermining-national-security)published April 5, 2010:
Undermines America’s Deterrence Strategy
* START: After more than a year of negotiations on a follow-on to the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev reached an agreement. While many arms control advocates are jubilant about a 30% reduction in U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals, larger questions linger.
* No Priority on Defense: President Obama has slashed the defense budget and pulled back on building a comprehensive missile defense system. Now he wants to destroy weapons in the name of diplomacy when Iran and North Korea are developing nuclear capabilities. The Administration’s claim that this treaty will induce Iran to discontinue developing nuclear weapons is, at best, misguided. Tehran wants these weapons to intimidate us and its neighbors.
* Protecting America in the New Missile AgeTimes Are Different: When President Reagan originally proposed the predecessor treaty, the world was dominated by only two superpowers. But the world today is much different, with many nations having nuclear capabilities.
Opens Way for Russian Vetoes of U.S. Missile Defense
* Dangerously Links Offensive Weapons with Missile Defense: When President Obama abandoned missile defense systems in Poland and the Czech Republic during early START negotiations, he unwisely played into Russia’s strategy to link these weapons.
* Misperceptions: While the Administration insists the text of the treaty imposes no constraints on testing, development, or deployment of current or planned U.S. missile defense programs, Russia has stated that there is indeed a “legally binding linkage between strategic offensive and strategic defensive weapons.”
Questions About Modernization, Verification, and Transparency
* Verification: Russia has a history of violating arms control agreements, and verifying the number of deployed warheads in its arsenal is difficult. The treaty will allow for warhead estimates based on the number of launchers, but it is unclear whether it will provide a method to ensure Russia doesn’t put more than the estimate on each launcher.
* Abandoned: When the START treaty expired in December, the U.S. had to abandon a monitoring station for Russian weapons in Votkinsk. The U.S. is now unable to monitor Russia’s production of the highly destabilizing RS-24 mobile multi-warhead intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). Open sources indicate that this missile will be the mainstay of Russian strategic forces by 2016.
* Modernization: Some arms control advocates insist that the U.S. has a robust nuclear modernization program, which is simply inaccurate. America’s nuclear infrastructure is rapidly aging, is in deep atrophy, and is losing its reliability and effectiveness. The U.S. is not producing or testing nuclear weapons, and its aging ICBM force is shrinking.
* Others Are Modernizing: Russia and China are engaged in major modernization efforts. On December 16, 2009, 41 U.S. Senators voiced concern and sent the President a letter saying they will oppose the new treaty if it does not include specific plans for nuclear modernization as stipulated in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010.
The Road Ahead
* U.S. Conventional Forces Adversely Affected: The treaty also applies to bombers and launchers that could be used for conventional purposes, which will put more reliance on nuclear weapons.
* Bad Policy Should Be Rejected: Signing arms control treaties to score public relations points in pursuit of a “getting to zero” nuclear pipe dream is bad policy. The Senate should not be rushed into ratifying a treaty that would undermine national security.
Regards
Time to go cry in your slurpee, zero. You're history -- you're irrelevant. You just don't realize it yet (although everyone you just met with on this latest trip undoubtedly does, and is laughing at you behind your back).
Not to worry, he’s focused like a laser on, errr, something or other.
Like or dislike 0bama, as a tactical matter this is a STUPID promise to make, with an implied pass/fail deadline.
I don’t think any treaty is going to be ratified by the U.S. Senate as long as there is a ‘Mercader’ in the United States looking to assassinate Colonel Shcherbakov.
Its just sort of...oh how shall I say it?
BAD FORM.
He also assured him he could keep his health plan if he likes it.
He needs a 2/3 vote in the senate of Treaties, right? Does he have 67 votes? I don’t think so!
POST 9 a good summary.
Meanwhile Republican debate which party to attend...
sigh.
The Republicans are not united because there are 3 distinct foreign policy groups in the GOP.
1. The Republican Foreign Policy Realists support the treaty.
2. The Republican Foreign Policy NeoCons oppose the treaty.
3. The Republican Isolationists support the treaty.
If you look at the vote on the treaty in committee there were 3 republican realists(Lugar, Corker, Isackson) who voted for the treaty and it passed out of committee on a vote of 14 to 4.
this must be stopped
this must be stopped
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