Democrats deplore Republican letter to Tehran on nuke talks

[Omaha Steve]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by DonViejo (a host of the Latest Breaking News forum).

Source: AP-Excite

By DEB RIECHMANN

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats said Tuesday that the GOP letter about nuclear talks with Iran undercuts the U.S. at the negotiating table and threatens to torpedo bipartisanship on Capitol Hill when it comes to the delicate issue of preventing a nuclear-armed Iran.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also weighed in, saying Republicans were either trying to help the Iranians or hurt President Barack Obama.

As negotiators rush to reach an accord with Iran by the end of the month, partisan bickering continued on Capitol Hill, prompting Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia to ask, rhetorically: "Is the Senate capable of tackling challenging national security questions in a mature and responsible way?"

Kaine said the letter freshman Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., wrote to the leaders of Iran amounted to a partisan "sideshow."

FULL story at link.



FILE - In this Oct. 31, 2014 file photo, then-Rep., now Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark, speaks in Jonesboro, Ark. The man leading the effort to torpedo an agreement with Iran is a rookie Republican senator, an Army veteran with a Harvard law degree and a long record of tough rhetoric against President Barack Obama{2019}s foreign policy. Cotton{2019}s previous forays into foreign policy raised as many hackles as the letter he authored this week lecturing Iran{2019}s leaders on American democracy. This time, 46 fellow Republicans signed onto the document. (AP Photo/Danny Johnston, File)

Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20150310/us--congress-iran-aaaff99797.html

[riversedge]

1. All Dems in Congress need to speak up.

[Enrique]

2. "sideshow" is apt n/t

[Thinkingabout]

3. This should be a Remember the Alamo moment for us, hit them hard and often.

[saintsebastian]

4. Silliness

This whole hubbub has only served to misinform the people. Media coverage about this little squabble, if you can call it that, would have us believe that there's a huge gulf between the White House and Congressional Republicans. Both entities in fact are quite militant when it comes to Iran. Neither the president nor the congresspeople would like Iran to have any sort of autonomy when it comes to its means of generating energy. Both the president and the congresspeople support and have supported hypocritical sanctions which have ruinous effects on poor Iranians. Pres. Obama has even hinted at military action against Iran.

Meanwhile, we on the so-called left are sitting here, wrapping ourselves in nationalism, calling folks traitors, harping about the "commander-in-chief" like we live in some sort of state martial law.

[fasttense]

5. There are specific laws on the books to address these problems

Until Democratic leadership develops big enough mammary glands to use what is written in law, RepubliCONS will walk all over them.

This exact same thing happened when the bushes tortured and spied on Americans without warrants, when Nixon interfered with peace negotiations with Vietnam, when Raygun made a deal with the Iranian hostage terrorists. The Democratic leadership looks for all sorts of ways to ignore Impeachment, sedition, criminal politicians and traitors. But they never hold any white house RepubliCON politician accountable.

No one is going to be held accountable again. Democratic leadership does not know how to hold people accountable to the law. So, RepubliCONS continue to do stupider and stupider stuff.

[DonViejo]

6. Locking...

The AP article is over 12 hours old. From the SOP for the LBN Forum

Post the latest news from reputable mainstream news websites and blogs. Important news of national interest only. No analysis or opinion pieces. No duplicates. News stories must have been published within the last 12 hours. Use the published title of the story as the title of the discussion thread.