The GOP's New Foreign Policy: Undermine American Diplomacy

[ProSense]

The GOP's New Foreign Policy: Undermine American Diplomacy

Eric Kleefeld

An interesting pattern has been emerging in the Republican Party's handling of foreign policy: Individual GOP officials are now making a regular point of not only formulating an alternative foreign policy, to be presented to the American people and debated in Congress -- they're acting on it too, and undermining the official White House policies at multiple turns:

• Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) is visiting Honduras in order to support the recent military coup against a leftist president, which has been opposed by the Obama administration and all the surrounding countries in the region.

• Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) will be going to the upcoming climate change conference in Copenhagen, bringing a "Truth Squad" to tell foreign officials there that the American government will not take any action: "Now, I want to make sure that those attending the Copenhagen conference know what is really happening in the United States Senate."

• House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) traveled to Israel, where he spoke out against President Obama's opposition to expanded settlements. He also defended Israel on the eviction of two Arab families from a house in east Jerusalem, which had been criticized by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

• Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) boasted in June that he told Chinese officials not to trust America's budget numbers. "One of the messages I had -- because we need to build trust and confidence in our number one creditor," said Kirk, "is that the budget numbers that the US government had put forward should not be believed." Since then, he has declared his candidacy for U.S. Senate.

Honduras de facto leader meets with U.S. lawmakers

TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) - Honduran de facto President Roberto Micheletti met on Friday with a delegation of U.S. lawmakers who have called on the Obama administration to stop supporting the return of ousted President Manuel Zelaya.

Zelaya, who upset Honduran elites with his ties to Venezuela's socialist president and fierce U.S. critic Hugo Chavez, was toppled by a coup in June and last week sneaked back into Honduras to take refuge in the Brazilian Embassy.

The Honduran standoff is President Barack Obama's first key test in Latin America after he promised a new engagement with a region that often had testy ties with Washington when George W. Bush was in office.

U.S. officials have pressed for Zelaya's restoration but criticized his surprise return. They have pressured Micheletti supporters by cutting aid and revoking U.S. visas but Obama has shied away from tougher measures such as trade sanctions.

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[kestrel91316]

1. At some point they will run afoul of the law........not that they will actually face

the slightest punishment, of course.........

Laws are for The Little People. And Democrats.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

2. Isn't this a long proud Republican tradition?

Paris Peace talks, Reagan and Iran hostage crisis, etc. etc. etc.

They are jumping the gun in terms of time frames, however, because usually these tactics are deployed close to a national election.

They are leaving themselves open to some serious questions and charges if there were anyone around to actually do that.

[eppur_se_muova]

6. I was going to say -- "new"?? How so? nt

[babylonsister]

3. This is a disgrace. Why aren't the Dems firing back? nt

[ProSense]

4. They should be charged with violating the Logan Act. n/t

[Arkana]

5. The Inhofe and DeMint things are perhaps the worst

and most worthy of them being arrested for treason.

[ProSense]

7. Republicans visit Honduras despite US coup policy (may have violated Logan Act)

Republicans visit Honduras despite US coup policy

By BEN FOX, Associated Press Writer

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Four U.S. Republican lawmakers met with Honduras' interim president on Friday in a challenge to Washington's condemnation of the coup that brought him to power.

The brief, amicable visit with the leaders of the coup that ousted President Manuel Zelaya highlights a divide in Washington, where the Obama administration is working to reinstate Zelaya but many conservatives side with the government installed after soldiers arrested the president in his pajamas and flew him into exile.

South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint, the leader of the delegation, said before the trip that even calling Zelaya's overthrow a coup is "ill-informed and baseless."

DeMint and three representatives — Aaron Schock and Peter Roskam of Illinois and Doug Lamborn of Colorado — smiled for photographs in a book-lined office of the stately presidential palace with interim President Roberto Micheletti.

link

DeMint Defiantly Leads GOP Delegation To Meet With Illegitimate Honduran Post-Coup Government

The Logan Act forbids “unauthorized citizens” from negotiating with foreign governments. In a 1936 Supreme Court ruling, Justice Sutherland wrote that “the President alone has the power” and “the Senate cannot intrude, and Congress itself is powerless to invade it.”

<…>

Senate Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry (D-MA) attempted to block approval of DeMint’s self-described “fact-finding trip,” citing the defiant role DeMint has taken in attempting to alter US policy on Honduras by brazenly blocking the confirmations of Arturo Valenzuela, Obama’s nominee to be assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, and Thomas A. Shannon Jr., the nominee to be ambassador to Brazil. However, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) interfered and appealed to the Defense Department to provide an airplane for DeMint and his delegation, which the Pentagon allowed. DeMint will be joined by US Reps. Aaron Schock (R-IL), Peter Roskam (R-IL), and Doug Lamborn (R-CO). Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) will be visiting Honduras on Monday. Ros-Lehtinen and the congressmen plan on meeting with Micheletti, members of the Honduran Supreme Court, election officials, and Honduran business and civic leaders. However, they are snubbing Zelaya who recently returned to Honduras and took refuge in the Brazilian Embassy in Tegucigalpa.

Perhaps the public relations firm Chlopak, Leonard, Schechter & Associates — which Micheletti’s regime hired to “bolster its image in Washington” — helped convince DeMint to overlook the fact that Micheletti has suspended constitutional guarantees to civil liberties, including freedom of assembly and freedom of the press. Meanwhile, the U.N. Human Rights Council has unanimously called for an immediate end to all human rights violations in Honduras on behalf of the de facto government.

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[wisteria]

8. DeMint and his ilk are traitors- what nerve to do something like this. I am outraged! n/t