U.S. wire payments to Iran Prove Obama Lied About Money Laundering

 

It's been proven that the United States made at least two separate payments to the Iranian government via wire transfer within the last 14 months, a Treasury Department spokesman admitted Saturday. So President Barack Obama was not telling the truth when he said that such payments were impossible.

This proves that the president knowingly lied, that the payments in cash were open appeasement to Iran as well as ransom for hostages, and constituted outright felony money laundering.

Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) discovered the two wire transfer payments during briefings with Obama administration officials.


At an August 4, 2016 press conference about a $400 million payment delivered in cash to the Iranian government that coincided exactly with the release of hostages Iran was holding, Obama said, “The reason that we had to give them cash is precisely because we are so strict in maintaining sanctions and we do not have a banking relationship with Iran that we couldn't send them a check and we could not wire the money.”

But a Treasury Department spokesman has now revealed that on at least two occasions, the U.S. did make payments to the Iranian government using wire transfers.

In July 2015, the U.S. government paid the Islamic republic $848,000 over a claim over architectural drawings and fossils that are now housed in Iran. Isn't it nice that our president is so scrupulous about paying Iranian claims when he won't allow U.S. citizens to sue Iran in our courts for damages? The second payment was made in April 2016,when the U.S. wired Iran $9 million to remove 32 metric tons of its heavy water from the Arak heavy water plant which is used to produce plutonium that can be used to make nuclear weapons:

The Treasury Department spokesman explained that the lifting of those sanctions allowed Iran “to gain incremental access to the international financial system, which opened up more options for executing transactions, such as the heavy water transaction” that occurred in April 2016. The spokesman declined to offer an explanation as to why the July 2015 payment was possible despite the full array of sanctions in place at the time.

Actually, both these payments violated sanctions still in place based on Iran's human rights abuses. The July 2015 payment was made while both human rights and nuclear-related sanctions were still in place, while the April 2016 payment was made while the human rights sanctions were in place.

That $400 million cash payment that Obama said could not have been delivered except in cash was part of a larger $1.7 billion settlement with Iran, the remainder of which was also delivered in cash. The president also claimed that the $400 million wasn't a ransom, but was paid to settle a dispute over military equipment ordered by the shah of Iran before the Ayatollahs took over.

That too is a fairy tale by our president, as anyone who knows anything about how arms deals and other large commercial deals are done between countries.

There's no way it was 'their money' we were holding:

The normal procedure is that the contracts are signed and the consignee (the purchasing country) goes to a large bank and obtains a Letter of Credit in the amount required. A Letter of Credit is a guarantee from a bank on behalf of one of its customers (in this case, Iran) to the seller's bank that the seller (in this case, the U.S.) will be paid in full to the amount of the Letter of Credit as long as the contracted goods and services are delivered.

To restate this more simply, the buyer's bank guarantees payment (normally they have the funds on hold) to the seller's bank when the buyer receive what they ordered.

Since, as President Obama told us, the arms were never shipped to the Ayatollahs, the money was never released to America by Iran's bank either.

So yes, that $400,000,000, was ransom money. And our president lied once again, without being challenged by a servile press.

And the reason it was released in cash? Simple...the Ayatollahs wanted a huge, physical amount of cash to photograph and humiliate America for propaganda purposes. Also, cash is fungible and easier to use without a paper trail to trace it. This was money laundering, plain and simple. And that is a felony.

So Obama lied about that too. End of story.

The Latest Lie...'We Got The Hostages Before We Gave Iran The Money'

 

Just when you think the Obama Administration has reached rock bottom when it comes to rank dishonesty, they dig deeper.

Many Americans were upset and disgusted by the spectacle of America appeasing Iran once again by handing over $400 million as ransom to release four American the Iranians were holding as hostages.

As I pointed out here, President Obama blatantly lied at a press conference he gave when he said that That it was U.S. policy never to pay ransom for hostages, ever and that the money arriving at the same time was just a coincidence and was a payment on an old claim by Iran on a missing arms deal to the Shah that we never delivered.

He also lied egregiously when he said that the Israelis were now in love with the Iran deal, but let's look at the latest horse manure Obama is having his minions push.

As the Wall Street Journal among other reported, the Regime was disturbed that the President's spiel not only didn't poll well, but that congress was taking notice. So they did what they always do - they doubled down and let their allies in the media push the narrative and then cover it up thoroughly. get a whiff of this load:

New details of the $400 million U.S. payment to Iran earlier this year depict a tightly scripted exchange specifically timed to the release of several American prisoners held in Iran.

The picture emerged from accounts of U.S. officials and others briefed on the operation: U.S. officials wouldn’t let Iranians take control of the money until a Swiss Air Force plane carrying three freed Americans departed from Tehran on Jan. 17. Once that happened, an Iranian cargo plane was allowed to bring the cash home from a Geneva airport that day.

President Barack Obama and other U.S. officials have said the payment didn’t amount to ransom, because the U.S. owed the money to Iran as part of a longstanding dispute linked to a failed arms deal from the 1970s. U.S. officials have said that the prisoner release and cash transfer took place through two separate diplomatic channels.

But the handling of the payment and its connection to the Americans’ release have raised questions among lawmakers and administration critics.

The use of an Iranian cargo plane to move pallets filled with $400 million brings clarity to one of the mysteries surrounding the cash delivery to Iran first reported by The Wall Street Journal this month. Administration officials have refused to publicly disclose how and when the transfer took place.

I'll just bet they're refusing to publicly disclose it!

The first lie is that this was a 'failed arms deal,' the same stuff the president tried to feed us. Arms deals between governments are done using Letters of Credit, where the buyer (in this case, Iran) places funds with their bank as a guarantee of payment to complete the transaction with instruction to release it to the seller (In this case,the U.S.) upon delivery. The buyer's bank issues the Letter of Credit and sends it to the seller. The seller delivers the goods and the buyer's bank releases the funds. No delivery, no funds released. And anyway, who pays for a legal claims settlement with a planeload of cash in foreign, untraceable currency?

The president also lied about the need for an Iranian cargo plane to ferry $400 million in cash to Iran because 'we don't have a banking relationship with Iran'. If the U.S. was going to pay ransom, they could very easily have deposited $400 million in a Swiss bank that does have that relationship, had them issue a letter of credit to the Ayatollahs and instructed the bank to release the ransom money to Iran when the hostages were freed. Converting American cash dollars the way the Obama regime did for this sort of purpose has a name. It's called money laundering and it's a major felony.

The reason the president and his minions did it was precisely because it was a ransom, and the Iranians, like all kidnappers set the terms...because they wanted to be able to humiliate the Great Satan another time and publicize and display how America bent over to their demands. Which is exactly what they have done. They're not at all embarrassed about calling it a ransom.


The president also lied when he said his administration doesn't pay ransom for hostages. I was able to think of several instances just off the top of my head where they've done exactly that.

Finally, just today, the Obama regime finally admitted the president flat out lied when he told the American people this wasn't a ransom. Just like the rest of his little performance. And now, the next question is what the remainder of the $1.7 billion Iran received was for. Terrorist kidnappers don't ordinarily take ransom in installments. What else did this president buy besides the release of 4 hostages?

And let's not leave out the latest nonsense, that the money wasn't released until the hostages were freed The hostages themselves have debunked that one, with one of them in particular being quite vocal about how the Iranians told them explicitly that they wouldn't be allowed to board the waiting plane to leave until the ransom was paid. There were other installments, fo ra total of $17 billion. By all accounts, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Rest assured they'll put it to uses that violate U.S. statutes on material aid to terrorism.

The contempt this president's policy of ransoming hostages shows for America is bad enough, and rest assured we'll see more attempts at kidnapping American before Barack Hussein Obama leaves office. It pays.

But what's even more evident is how much this disgusting episode shows blatantly how much contempt this president and his regime have for American people. They're not even bothering to try to sprinkle a little perfume around to disguise the stench of horse manure like this any more.

Hostages, Ransoms, Iran, and Israel - Obama Lies Again

 

It's been revealed that American hostages held unjustly by Iran were released this January, but only after a sum of $400 million in cash sent by the U.S. was received by the Islamic Republic. This transaction was meant to be hidden, but now it's come out, it has immediately raised questions. Was this a ransom? Why was this hidden from the American public?



The totally misnamed Josh Earnest, Obama's spokeshole was quick to say that no ransom was paid, and Hillary Clinton said - it seems to be her trademark -that this was old news and 'no one cares about it anymore.' Well, it worked for Benghazi and her illegal private e-mails and server, so why not?

But it was left for Barack Obama to pull off the biggest, most shameless lies of the bunch. He gave a press conference and asserted the following:

• That it was U.S. policy never to pay ransom for hostages, ever.

• That the money arriving at the same time was just a coincidence and was a payment on an old claim by Iran on a missing arms deal to the Shah that we never delivered. And that America's own lawyers advised paying this settlement because Iran had pursued litigation in court and by settling, 'we saved America billions of dollars.'

• That this was old news, that the Iran deal was working and that even Israel admitted it. Obama also said those who had been most critical of the deal should admit they were wrong:
  
  “What I’m interested in is if there’s some news to be made, why not have some of these folks who were predicting disaster come out and say, ‘This thing actually worked.’ Now that would be a shock,” he said.“That would be impressive. If some of these folks who said the sky is falling suddenly said, ‘You know what? We were wrong and we are glad that Iran no longer has the capacity to break out in short term and develop a nuclear weapon.’ But that wasn’t going to happen.”
  
  “The Israeli military and security community … acknowledges this has been a game changer,” he said. “The country that was most opposed to the deal.”

Well, let's examine these claims. First of all have we paid ransom before for hostages during Obama's term in office?

Remember these?


In 2011, the Obama Administration paid $1 million dollars to Iran as 'bail money' to get them to release two hikers, Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer who accidentally wandered over the Iranian border two years before and were being held in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison. An additional $500,000 in 'bail' was paid earlier for the release of Sarah Shourd, Bauer's girl friend when she became seriously ill in Evin. So, a total of $1.5 million in ransom money.

In 2012, the Obama Administration used USAid as a conduit to pay $4.6 million to the Egyptian Government for the release of 43 NGO operatives...including Sam LaHood, the son of the then Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood.

Then there was deserter Bowie Bergdahl. Remember him? Not only were 5 extremely skilled and dangerous Taliban commanders sent back to Afghanistan, but there a great deal of evidence that the Obama Administration also paid a ransom of something like $5 million to the Taliban for his release.

Even if Bergdahl's ransom consisted of just the five Taliban commanders alone, those of you with loved ones serving in AfPak can thank the Obama Administration and Mrs. Clinton, then Secretary of State for making things far more dangerous and life threatening for them.

These are just a few instances that come readily to mind, and I'm certain there are other instances. So contrary to what the president said, yes, his administration does pay ransoms for hostages. And if I remember, he mentioned that countries that do that see the price go up. That's certainly been the case for the United States!

 

Let's look at the president's next claim, that the cash payment of $400 million wasn't a ransom, it was a claims settlement for an arms deal that the Iranians were already pursuing via litigation. And the money just arrived there at the exact same time as the hostages were being released just by coincidence.

Now anyone who's ever paid a court judgment knows this is sheer fantasy. Settlements of this kind involve legal documents including one called a satisfaction of judgement filed by the litigant at the same time payment is made. And the president's nonsense - that's the most benign word I can use here - about the fact that it needed to be all cash 'because we don't have a banking arrangement with Iran' is a blatant falsehood. There absolutely no reason the U.S. couldn't have deposited the funds in a Swiss bank by check for the Iranians to have wired to wherever they wanted in any currency they desired.

There's a name for what the Obama Administration chose to do instead. It's called money laundering and it's a felony offense. No wonder even some of the officials in Obama's serially lawless Justice Department were concerned about this one.

The Iranians wanted cash for a simple reason - to humiliate the Great Satan and show the money off to prove it actually was a ransom. Which is exactly what they've done.

One of the the hostages has recounted that even though the plane to take them home was ready for takeoff, the Iranians told them that they were waiting for the plane with the money and they weren't going to be released until it arrived.

Another falsehood the president told us is that this was supposedly an arms contract that was never fulfilled. I know a little bit about arms dealing and how it's legitimately conducted. The normal procedure is that the contracts are signed and the consignee (the purchasing country) goes to a large bank and obtains a Letter of Credit in the amount required. A Letter of Credit is a guarantee from a bank on behalf of one of its customers (in this case, Iran) to the seller's bank that the seller (in this case, the U.S.) will be paid in full to the amount of the Letter of Credit as long as the contracted goods and services are delivered.

To restate this more simply, the buyer's bank guarantees payment (normally they have the funds on hold) to the seller's bank when the buyer receive what they ordered.

Since, as President Obama told us, the arms were never shipped to the Ayatollahs the money was never released to America either.

So yes, that $400,000,000, was ransom money. And our president lied once again, without being challenged by a servile press.

Finally, let's look at his claim that the Israelis are on board and just love the Iran deal.

Now, there are a few Israeli members of the military and security establishment that agree with the president, but what's notable is that they're all ex-members and almost all associated with the left wing Zionist Union (AKA Labor) party that the president tried and failed to put into power with substantial injections of cash and paid activists when he interfered with Israel's elections. They're the people whose mindset and opinions the Israeli electorate overwhelmingly rejected.

And the people who they elected and who have actual responsibility for Israel's security?

Avigdor Liberman, Israel's defense minister compared the Iran deal to Munich in 1938.

"The Munich Agreement didn’t prevent the Second World War and the Holocaust precisely because its basis, according to which Nazi Germany could be a partner for some sort of agreement, was flawed, and because the leaders of the world then ignored the explicit statements of [Adolf] Hitler and the rest of Nazi Germany’s leaders,” the ministry said.

“These things are also true about Iran, which also clearly states openly that its aim is to destroy the state of Israel,” it said, pointing to a recent State Department report that determined that Iran is the number one state sponsor of terrorism worldwide.

Yitzhak "Tzachi" Hanegbi, currently Minister in the Prime Minister's Office in charge of National Security and Foreign Affairs has a long history as part of Israel's security and defense establishment and who until recently chaired the Knesset’s powerful Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. He said, “I don’t know to which Israelis he (Obama) spoke recently. But I can promise you that the position of the prime minister, the defense minister and of most senior officials in the defense establishment has not changed.”

“The opposite is the case. The time that has elapsed since the deal was signed proved all our worries that, regrettably, we were justified before the deal was made.”

And Prime Minister Netanyahu? Netanyahu merely issued a statement that Israel “has no greater ally than the United States” but made plain nonetheless that Israel’s position on the Iran nuclear deal “remains unchanged.”

While he felt the need to be somewhat more diplomatic than Liberman (who later yielded and walked his initial statement back a bit), it's worth noting that Netanyahu used the example of Munich himself previously. And it's a correct one, with both involving a weak leader seeking to appease a vicious, aggressive enemy and buy 'peace' at an ally's expense. Czechoslovakia had a strong, well equipped military, strong, built up defenses on the German border and a world class armaments manufacturer in the Skoda Munitions Works. If Chamberlain had not sold out his ally, Hitler might never have felt secure enough on his Eastern front to start WWII and engage Germany in a two front war for some time. Certainly, it would have given the West a lot more time to arm and prepare if nothing else.

There should be no question in anyone's mind that President Barack Hussein Obama sees Israel as eminently disposable, just like Chamberlain saw the Czechs.

 

At any rate, another outright lie from this president.

And there was not a single question or followup at his press conference challenging any of these gross fabrications.

No one even challenged him by asking for his reaction to Iran's Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah Khamenei essentially dumping the Iran deal and any future negotiations in a very public manner. (Hat tip to Moon of Alabama via The Glittering Eye)

Which is exactly why he keeps doing it. Because what used to be a free, independent press is now largely his enabler, a group of courtiers and political activists that covers for him. For them, that is more important than truth, the nation's well being or even a semblance of ethics. And thus, they reinforce President Obama's gigantic ego in believing that he can lie with impunity and that he really is smarter than everyone else.

President Obama's SOTU - Out With A Pathetic, Self- Serving Whine

My normal saying when covering something like this is that I watch these things so you don't have to. This time, I couldn't even get close to lasting through the whole thing. You're welcome to try, but there should be a medical advisory on watching this one.

It's gotten to the point where our president doesn't even have to make an effort to act like he believes what he's telling us. The self-serving lies have actually gotten pathological. And as usual, nothing, absolutely nothing is ever his fault.

I think Rand Paul,being interviewed this morning on Good Morning with Dan Mitchell had it exactly right. “Well, I think from President Obama’s perspective, the best thing he could do would be to leave office early. I wish that tonight he would announce, ‘hey guys, I’ve really been a failure as a president over the last seven years and I’m gonna take off early so cause I want to go play golf.’"

As much as the president tried to use this to BS and build himself a legacy, the emperor's new clothes aren't covering a thing. For example, he touted the success of ObamaCare, totally ignoring the fact that most of the state exchanges have either gone belly up or are about to, that the 'savings' he promised are a total myth, that the 18 million new people he claims signed up are almost all freebies who are being subsidized and would have been covered far better by existing MedicAid programs anyway, without totally destroying the existing system and spending the billions ObamaCare cost to implement. The so-called Affordable Care Act is anything but, with many Americans forced to pay much more for a lot less care or even going without medical coverage and paying the tax penalty because it's actually a lot cheaper than Obamacare's cheapest Bronze coverage with its expensive premiums and huge deductibles.

I reached my limit at the part where this most partisan of presidents, who has done everything he could to illegally bypass congress, demonize Republicans and avoid working with them threw in his little song and dance about how we need to 'fix our politics,' something that of course, he had no part in wrecking. That's the point where I simply couldn't watch anymore.

There's a lot more I could do to tear this stuff apart, but why bother? He's a miserably failed president with a despicable character and the only question that remains is how much damage he's going to do before January 2017.

 

Obama's Gun Diktat - The Devil In The Details

 

President Barack Hussein Obama has followed through on his promise to 'go after guns' via executive order and it was really quite a show. I especially liked the part where he started weeping crocodile tears over schoolchildren gunned down in Newtown, Connecticut in 2012.

"First graders in Newtown. First graders," Obama said, pausing to collect himself. "Every time I think about those kids, it gets me mad."

This concern for children from a man who fought tooth and nail for infanticide?  So touching.

At first glance, the president's diktat on guns seems reasonable. Prog fascists are very good at that, and of course, the president was quick to use the usual progressive talking point  that everyone knows this is the right thing to do. Or to use his exact words, there's what he called 'a broad consensus' supporting this, but those mean nasty Republicans in Congress just won't act, so he has to.

The president admitted that his plan wouldn't have stopped what happened in San Bernardino, but he feels this has to be done anyway, in order to 'make if harder for criminals to get guns.'

I wish all the victims of the murders attributed to the President's own efforts to put guns in the hands of criminals via Fast and Furious had been in the room, looking right at him when he said that. Now, their reaction would have been must see TV.

Before we discuss what the president has in mind, let's get something out in the open. Prog fascists aren't interested in getting guns out of the hands of criminals. They want confiscation of guns from the law abiding, because that's the route to the absolute power they revel in. There's nothing the president is proposing that's going to get guns out of the hands of criminals, but it will make a lot of law abiding citizens helpless before them.

When you deal with a Barack Obama and those of his ilk, you have to realize that they play the long game. First, they propose something that sounds relatively reasonable, like say, ObamaCare where if you liked your plan, you could keep your plan...and just think of the savings and how cheap the premiums will be! Months later when the peons wake up down the road and realize how they've been lied to and screwed over, it's too late to get rid of it without a major effort.

Please keep this in mind as we continue our discussion...Obama's agenda never changes. When it comes to our pathological liar of a president, whatever he and his dutiful minions might say to grease something through has nothing to do with how it's eventually applied. And the ultimate destination remains the same. In this case, it's gun confiscation.

So with that said, let's look at President Obama's new diktat on guns. And remember, he's tried to get this sort of thing through congress twice before and both times it has failed by bi-partisan majorities.

The first thing he wants is to promulgate that wonderful lefty myth, 'the gun show loophole.' The truth, as anyone who's ever been to one can tell you is that it doesn't exist.

If you go to a gun show, what you will see is licensed dealers,, because the people whom put on these things aren't looking to go to jail for aiding and abetting illegal weapons transaction. If you see something on one of the dealer's tables you like, they still are required to do a background check, the same as if you were in a brick and mortar store. All the laws, restrictions, waiting periods etc. all still apply. Also, as a licensed dealer in every state of the union you're restricted to either selling guns at the registered address of your store or at an organized, licensed gun show. You can sell guns online out of state, but they must be legal in your buyer's home state and they must be shipped to a licensed dealer in your buyer's home state, where once again a background check has to be done and a waiting period imposed in accordance with the laws of the purchaser's home state. Doing it any other way is a felony offense and not something a licensed gun dealer is going to risk prison and the loss of his livelihood for. So the president talking about closing this fairy tale 'loophole' this means very little in and of itself and it certainly won't keep guns out of the hands of criminals, but it fits in with the rest of the president's agenda when it comes to convincing people who aren't even aware of which end of a firearm points where that this is somehow necessary and important.

The next thing he wants, and the heart of his plan is to hire a lot more ATF and FBI agents to provide scrutiny on things like enhanced background checks. But remember two things; first of all, they work for President Obama and are going to do what he tells them to do - just like the IRS. And second, criminals don't obtain firearms using methods where a background check is required. In the case of San Bernardino, the two killers and the friend that purchased additional firearms and explosives for them had no criminal record. And in the Newtown shooting, Adam Lanza likewise had no record, and got his weaponry by murdering his own mother in her bed. Not only that, but as I've pointed out before, the only reason any children died is because a school employee violated lock down procedure and let him in.

So if gun confiscation is the ultimate aim, criminals aren't really a very productive target. To really confiscate as many guns as possible, you have to go after the law abiding and somehow transform them into people who shouldn't be allowed to own firearms to defend themselves. And the best way is to work the 'mental health' and the enhanced background check angles, the really devious parts of Obama's plan.

Doctor-patient confidentiality? Faggedabboudit. Health and Human services rules have now been changed to put the onus on physicians to report anything you tell them that seems even slightly amiss to the FBI or the ATF. And what doctor is going to take the risk of potential liability by not doing so? No matter how minor or what the cause is, just a report from your physician that you seemed slightly depressed or not your usual self can ultimately be used to confiscate any guns you own.

And you can trust states ruled by 'progressives' to take this even further. California just put a law into effect requiring physicians to ask patients if they own guns, which guns they posses and where they keep them. Failure to answer alone is grounds for the doctor to report this to the FBI or the ATF, and a doctor can even order your guns seized by court order if he really wants to cooperate with the State. After all, if he doesn't and something happens...do I need to draw you a picture? We could even be talking about criminal liability here, or forfeiting a license to practice. Fear of government is the meat prog fascists thrive on.

VA will also be a fertile grounds for this. Veterans, after all, can all be labeled victims of PTSD, mental stress, maladjustment to peacetime society, call it what you want. The psycho veteran beloved of Hollywood scriptwriters has become a cliche these days. And these are men and women who likely own firearms and have been trained to use them. You can expect them to be heavily targeted for confiscation by the Regime.

What about victims of lawfare? A spurned girl friend can accuse a man of sexual assault, claim he threatened her and/or file a police report with no proof at all except her word. Thanks to VAWA, a woman can even have a man locked up with no real evidence at all, or say that self inflicted bruises were the result of assault or domestic abuse. Any family law attorney or criminal lawyer will tell you that this sort of thing happens with disturbing frequency nowadays. That's especially true when it comes to divorce cases, particularly where child custody is involved. And even if it's proven that the accusation is totally unfounded, it remains on the record. Goodbye Second Amendment rights!

The key, you see, is who gets to decide who has criminal intent or who is too mentally unstable to own firearms. With the enhanced background check phase of this, it's President Obama's employees who will now get to decide that. Trust them to follow orders and push it to the limit. And again, remember...the president's ultimate destination is full gun confiscation.

Ultimately, this can even be extended to 'extremists' whom criticize the president or his policies forcefully. And in time, it will be, bit by bit unless this is stopped in its tracks. Mark my words on that.

Congress has already spoken out about this to some extent:

Kevin McCarthy Verified account ‏@GOPLeader

Americans have a constitutional right to own firearms. @POTUS doesn't have a constitutional right to legislate from the executive branch.

Brian Babin ✔ @RepBrianBabin

Obama’s executive gun orders must be rejected. We are a #ConstitutionalRepublic & Pres. cannot bypass Congress when initiatives are blocked.

11:18 AM - 4 Jan 2016

Speaker Paul Ryan said none of Obama’s proposals would have prevented the recent mass shootings in the U.S. 

“His proposals to restrict gun rights were debated by the United States Senate, and they were rejected,” Ryan said. “No president should be able to reverse legislative failure by executive fiat, not even incrementally.”

Talk is cheap, fellas. let's see what you DO.


UPDATE: Ah well...unfortunately they're showing us the answer as I write this.

I've Read the Nuclear Deal, Mr. President, and It's Awful

 


By David Gerstman

In his combative press conference last week to defend the P5+1 nuclear deal with Iran, President Barack Obama issued the following challenge:

So to go back to Congress, I challenge those who are objecting to this agreement, number one, to read the agreement before they comment on it; number two, to explain specifically where it is that they think this agreement does not prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and why they’re right and people like Ernie Moniz, who is an MIT nuclear physicist and an expert in these issues, is wrong, why the rest of the world is wrong, and then present an alternative.

First off it’s worth noting that Energy Secretary and MIT nuclear physicist Ernest Moniz said back in April that to be effective the deal would have to include “anytime, anywhere,” inspections, so Obama’s explanation about why 24 days notice is now good enough fails to convince me.
I want Moniz to explain why he changed his position on this AND why 24 days is now acceptable. I would like Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes to explain why he walked back his comments on requiring “anytime, anywhere” inspections.

And I want a more convincing explanation than negotiator Wendy Sherman’s excuse that the term was just a “rhetorical flourish.” (If that was a rhetorical flourish, I’m curious how many other administration comments about the nuclear deal were rhetorical flourishes.)


But in that paragraph, Obama limits the grounds of questioning the deal to whether the language of the deal is insufficient to prevent Iran from achieving a nuclear breakout over the course of the deal.
Here’s where I have problem. Even if the agreement was airtight, and I doubt that it is, there’s a matter of the administration’s behavior during the Joint Plan of Action, which was agreed to in November 2013. The problem is that the Obama administration has acted as “Iran’s attorney” covering for Iran’s violations of the previous agreement.

In a notable episode last month, administration officials attacked The New York Times for reporting that Iran would likely fail to reduce its stockpile of enriched uranium by the June 30 deadline. In the end Iran did reduce its stockpile but not by the method prescribed and not to the form that it was required to.

The nonproliferation think tank, the Institute for Science and International Security, earlier this month, explained why the administration’s behavior in this case was troubling:

The reason is not that somehow one form or other of LEU oxide is harder to turn back into hexafluoride form for use in a breakout. This is almost irrelevant to the debate. Unfortunately, these main forms of LEU oxide are straightforward to convert back and use during a breakout. That is a principal reason that in a final deal the United States wants all but 300 kilograms (kg) of Iran’s near 10,000 kg of LEU shipped out of the country or blended down to natural uranium. The United States is now making a very narrow interpretation of this provision in the JPA, and an interpretation that is at odds with its previous positions and common sense. It is also an interpretation that appears to favor Iran and not the United States. Reaching this interpretation seems overly driven by the administration’s fear of Congress. The administration appears to have lost sight of the true adversary in its on-going battle with Congress.

This weakening of interpretations is a bad precedent for the future. This case signals a U.S. willingness to legally reinterpret the deal when Iran cannot do what it said it would do, in order to justify that non-performance. The United States should have said, like we do, that Iran has not met its commitment in the JPA on this issue and fully explained the status of the stocks and what the future remedy will be. It should have used that position as leverage to gain additional concessions from Iran. Experts and Congress may have noted the discrepancy with concern but few would have advocated walking away from the JPA as a result of a frank discussion of this issue last winter or even now.

So President Obama made a point of appealing to science or scientific expertise as proof that his deal is solid, but when science said that a previous deal wasn’t being observed, the administration attacked the science!

President Obama insists that the fear of “snapback sanctions” (probably unworkable) will keep Iran from cheating. But if the administration’s past performance is any indication, Iran has nothing to fear. There will be no “snapback’s” if no violation is declared. If the administration papered over Iranian violations to keep negotiations going, what are the chances it will declare Iran in violation now that a new agreement has been reached?

So Obama’s challenge doesn’t work on two levels. The science might not be right and the problems with the deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), extend to more than just what’s written in the deal.

 

But there’s another aspect to the deal that’s disturbing. I will quote a few non-contiguous items from the deal:

18. The UN Security Council resolution endorsing this JCPOA will terminate all provisions of previous UN Security Council resolutions on the Iranian nuclear issue – 1696 (2006), 1737 (2006), 1747 (2007), 1803 (2008), 1835 (2008), 1929 (2010) and 2224 (2015) – simultaneously with the IAEA-verified implementation of agreed nuclear-related measures by Iran and will establish specific restrictions, as specified in Annex V.

26. The EU will refrain from re-introducing or re-imposing the sanctions that it has terminated implementing under this JCPOA, without prejudice to the dispute resolution process provided for under this JCPOA. There will be no new nuclear related UN Security Council sanctions and no new EU nuclear-related sanctions or restrictive measures. The United States will make best efforts in good faith to sustain this JCPOA and to prevent interference with the realisation of the full benefit by Iran of the sanctions lifting specified in Annex II. The U.S. Administration, acting consistent with the respective roles of the President and the Congress, will refrain from re-introducing or re-imposing the sanctions specified in Annex II that it has ceased applying under this JCPOA, without prejudice to the dispute resolution process provided for under this JCPOA. The U.S. Administration, acting consistent with the respective roles of the President and the Congress, will refrain from imposing new nuclear-related sanctions. Iran has stated that it will treat such a re-introduction or re-imposition of the sanctions specified in Annex II, or such an imposition of new nuclear-related sanctions, as grounds to cease performing its commitments under this JCPOA in whole or in part

36. If Iran believed that any or all of the E3/EU+3 were not meeting their commitments under this JCPOA, Iran could refer the issue to the Joint Commission for resolution; similarly, if any of the E3/EU+3 believed that Iran was not meeting its commitments under this JCPOA, any of the E3/EU+3 could do the same. The Joint Commission would have 15 days to resolve the issue, unless the time period was extended by consensus. After Joint Commission consideration, any participant could refer the issue to Ministers of Foreign Affairs, if it believed the compliance issue had not been resolved. Ministers would have 15 days to resolve the issue, unless the time period was extended by consensus. After Joint Commission consideration – in parallel with (or in lieu of) review at the Ministerial level – either the complaining participant or the participant whose performance is in question could request that the issue be considered by an Advisory Board, which would consist of three members (one each appointed by the participants in the dispute and a third independent member). The Advisory Board should provide a non-binding opinion on the compliance issue within 15 days. If, after this 30-day process the issue is not resolved, the Joint Commission would consider the opinion of the Advisory Board for no more than 5 days in order to resolve the issue. If the issue still has not been resolved to the satisfaction of the complaining participant, and if the complaining participant deems the issue to constitute significant nonperformance, then that participant could treat the unresolved issue as grounds to cease performing its commitments under this JCPOA in whole or in part and/or notify the UN Security Council that it believes the issue constitutes significant non-performance.

37. … Iran has stated that if sanctions are reinstated in whole or in part, Iran will treat that as grounds to cease performing its commitments under this JCPOA in whole or in part.

Item (18) quoted above means that all of the resolutions involving Iran’s failure to comply with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) will be erased. These resolutions were passed because Iran pursued an enrichment program outside of its NPT obligations and failed to account for all of its past nuclear research.

Iran has maintained its enrichment program, and will be allowed to continued it under the terms of the JCPOA. It still has not come clean about its past nuclear work, and for the sanctions relief to take hold, Iran apparently only has to commit to admitting its past nuclear work to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The JCPOA, in effect, legalizes Iran’s years of violations and rewards them for limiting their level of violations in the future.

The best analogy I could think of would be a corporation having been found in violation of emission standards for years agreeing to a deal that would absolve them of all fines accumulated over the years, have the violations expunged from government records and allowing the corporation to continue polluting at 50% over the standards instead of 100%.

Item (36) is curious too. I know that Iran’s Foreign Minister started off these negotiations with a presentation calling the crisis over its nuclear program an “unnecessary crisis.”
All along Iran called the sanctions “illegal.” So part of its goal was not just to get the sanctions removed, but to rewrite history so that Iran becomes the aggrieved party. By agreeing to cancel all the relevant Security Council resolutions about Iran’s nuclear program, the P5+1 nations are effectively rewriting history to Iran’s benefit. Worse, the Joint Commission empowers Iran to bring complaints against the other nations involved.

If the IAEA detected a violation and, say, France initiated an action against Iran in the Joint Commission, (another reason “snapback” is a fantasy), what would stop Iran from bringing some arbitrary action against France, and offer to drop it if France drops its action? I’m not a lawyer, maybe this is addressed elsewhere, but based on Iran’s behavior they will take advantage of any opening it is afforded in the deal.

And this brings us to (37) and the end of (26). If the process of finding Iran in violation is completed and an effort is made to reimpose sanctions, what is to stop Iran from saying, “okay we’re leaving the JCPOA.” Obama has said that this negotiation process has kept a rein on Iran’s nuclear development, but doesn’t this mean that an attempt to re-impose sanctions if Iran is found in breach of its obligations could mean that Iran could then legally “cease performing” its JCPOA obligations?

I see that (26) has language about the dispute resolution process, but if Iran loses that process and still maintains that it committed no breach, what’s to stop Iran from saying it was framed? Remember that the JCPOA rewrites history saying that Iran committed no violations in the past, what’s to stop Iran from doing that again,especially when there’s language that seems to preemptively gives them the means to do so?

So yes, Mr. President I have read the deal. Given the combination of your administration’s behavior and what’s written in this document, it is awful.

Obama explodes When Asked why American Hostages in Iran Weren't Released

President Obama went ballistic when CBS News' Major Garrett asked him during a scheduled White House press briefing on the Obama administration's Iran deal about four Americans still held hostage by the Iranian regime.

"As you well know there are four Americans in Iran. Three held on trumped-up charges, according to your administration, and one whereabouts unknown," he said, referring to Christian pastor Saeed Abedini, retired U.S. Marine Amir Hekmati, Washington Post Tehran bureau chief Jason Rezaian and former FBI agent Robert Levinson, who went missing in Iran years ago.

Garrett continued, "Can you tell the country, sir, why you are content with all the fanfare around this deal to leave the conscience of this nation, the strength of this nation, unaccounted for in relation to these four Americans?"

President Obama, of course, didn't actually answer the question. Instead, he lashed out at the reporter:

"I got to give you credit, Major, for how you craft those questions. The notion that I am content as I celebrate with American citizens languishing in Iranian jails — Major, that's nonsense and you should know better," Obama said.

"I've met with the families of some of those folks. Nobody's content," he added.

So, with the Obama regime basically giving the Iranians everything they wanted that meant anything, they couldn't include freedom for four hostages as part of the deal? The prisoners are languishing in Tehran's notorious Evin prison. There are credible reports that at least one of the hostages has been tortured, and in fact all four may have been.
And John Kerry couldn't spare the time to insist on them being released? After the Bowe Bergdahl fiasco?

Garret responded to the president's criticism after the briefing, explaining that he intended to be "provocative."

"Sometimes you have to take a scolding from a president to get to an answer," he said during a CBS News live report. "That's part of my job."

"Politics, especially those elected as president, are very adept at creating straw men … that's exactly what the president did," he added. "Clearly it struck a nerve. That was my intention. Was it provocative? Yes. Was it intended to be as such? Absolutely."


I personally doubt this president actually met with their families, certainly not recently. But regardless of that it is singularly disgraceful that while giving away the store to a terrorist regime, this administration refused to insist on redeeming its American hostages. It sounds suspiciously four other Americans who were left to die in a place called Benghazi.

Kudos to Major Garrett for actually practicing journalism. And being willing to stand up to the inevitable retaliation from the Obama Regime for speaking truth to power.

The New Iran Deal - the Stench Of Appeasement

Over the weekend, I received intel from some of my sources outlining the framework of the proposed deal by John Kerry and the P5+1 with Iran regarding its illegal nuclear weapons program, where I reported on here. It was so bad that I don't mind telling you that it took me a couple of days to get to a place where I could write about what was involved, and I hoped that for once my sources were exaggerating a bit or that the West might finally come to its senses and walk away.

Today, the deal, known as the 'Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action' was announced, ad as usual, my notorious Little Birdies did not exaggerate at all, and the 'Plan of Action' is pretty much what they said it was with a few last minute minor changes, none of which mean much in practical terms.

Iran will be able to veto any IAEA inspections, and will be able to pick and choose where those inspections take place. It will likewise be able to delay any inspections through the mechanism of an 'arbitration system' giving Iran plenty of time to clean up and move anything they want to conceal while still technically being in compliance.

As I reported, the sanctions officially won't be lifted until 2016. In the real world, the sanctions have disappeared already and countries are already cutting deals with the regime. That includes the UN arms sanctions on Iran as a supporter and enabler of terrorism, which are supposed to remain in place for five years but will supposedly be lifted after certification of Iran's compliance. In the real world, Russia and China among other countries will cheerfully violate the sanctions, which they never approved of in the first place. Money talks, and Russia especially is not going to take weapons sanctions seriously anymore.

The Iranians have apparently agreed to reduce their centrifuges to 6,000 and to destroy most of their stockpile of enriched uranium. Since we only know approximately how much of each they have and inspections are at Iran's discretion, this is a fairly meaningless concession on their part. Expect that many of the centrifuges Iran disposes of will be the old, first generation IR-1s, which the Iranians want to replace anyway, and as part of the agreement, the Western powers have also agreed to work with Iran to help it install and operate more advanced centrifuges. As far as the nuclear stockpile goes, again, we have no clue how much they really have, and there are technical ways to 'destroy' enriched uranium that allow it to be reprocessed at a later date.

There was also no mention in this 'plan' of Iran's heavy water reactor at Arak, which has no peaceful application and produces plutonium, a second route to nuclear weapons. Presumably, Arak will continue to operate.

I'm not surprised at all Iran signed on to this. It provides this fascist regime with billions of dollars to keep it in power, develop nuclear weapons and expand its power in the region. And it demands nothing significant from them.

President Obama announced what a wonderful deal this was, saying that because of this deal, "We have stopped the spread of nuclear weapons in the Middle East."

For a sitting president of the United States to say this is the very height of either ignorance, arrogance or sheer deception..perhaps all three. Because of this president's 'diplomacy,' the Saudis have already announced that they will now obtain nuclear weapons and Egypt is working on a deal with Russia for a new reactor to enhance its own already existing nuclear program. And let's not even mention the almost certain Iranian bomb to come.

A second blatant lie in this morning's output by President Obama is that "the international community will be able to verify that the Islamic Republic of Iran will not develop a nuclear weapon. "

As I pointed out above, the exact opposite is the case. Before this was announced, I gave you what has turned out to be a pretty accurate preview yesterday of the sort of horse manure this president would use to sell this to the American people:




And here's another thought to consider. This dubious achievement is Obama's legacy. Even if Iran cheats, does anyone really think this president is going to be the one to admit he was wrong and take action? Anyone who has been paying attention to Barack Hussein Obama's conduct in office knows better. He will ignore it, claim plausible denial and leave it to be someone else's problem. Just like Bill Clinton did on North Korea and other fiascoes.

The president made a point of castigating the Republican controlled congress as 'playing politics' and letting them know that he will veto any attempts by congress to reject this ridiculous travesty.

Surprisingly, to me the best comment on this came from none other than Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush, who derided the agreement as a "dangerous, deeply flawed, and short sighted deal," saying that it still allows a path for Iran to develop a nuclear bomb.

"A comprehensive agreement should require Iran to verifiably abandon – not simply delay – its pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability," Bush said in a statement. He added: "This isn't diplomacy – it is appeasement."

Winston Churchill had this to say after Neville Chamberlain came back from Munich in 1938 with his own version of peace in our time: “You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor and you will have war.”

It's very possible that having made the same choice, we will have the same result, and at a time of Iran's choosing, not ours. They remain committed to the destruction of the country they call the Great Satan, and that has not changed.

Breaking - The Sordid Details Of Munich II Leak Out

 

Some of my sources have given me an outline of some of what's in the coming Iranian nuclear agreement, and it's even worse than I thought it would be. The blather we heard about 'no deal being better than a bad deal' and 'hard choices' from Secretary of State John Kerry turned out to mean a deal at any price, and the hard choices being made not by Iran but by John Kerry and the Obama Administration.

For starters, remember how we were told that Iran would be required to allow inspections to verify they were keeping their agreement? Well, in this new agreement, there are no real inspections involved, and the IAEA has been totally castrated. Any inspections that do take place will be prearranged with the Iranian regime at a time and place of their choosing. Since the Iranians have already said repeatedly that no inspections will be allowed in any of their military facilities under any circumstances, that essentially means no inspections at all and no ability to verify if Iran is keeping its word.

Considering the sort of regime we're dealing with, backing down on inspections is unbelievable.

Another red line the Iranians have been able to get President Obama to back down on was the insistence that Iran detail all activities it conducted regrading weaponization in violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty it signed prior to the this new agreement. This was important because the whole idea of this farce was supposedly to keep Iran within one year of 'breakout' - the time when the Iranians can develop a nuclear weapon.

Since the Obama Administration backed off on this condition, we now will have no idea how close they are to breakout, there will be absolutely no way to tell if they're a year away, six months away of one month away..especially as there will also be no meaningful inspections.

Originally, the position of the P5+1(the US, Britain, France, China, Russia and Germany)was that Iran would be allowed only 500 to 1,500 centrifuges and they were all supposed to be IR-1s, Iran’s first generation centrifuge. That number is now 6,500, and the Iranians have actually been offered more up-to-date centrifuges by the P5+1 as an incentive. To give you an idea of the realities involved, contrary to President Obama's own assurances about 'freezing Iran's enrichment', Iran has actually increased its nuclear stockpile in violation of the framework agreement. This is 20% enriched uranium, 90% of the way toward weaponization, which can be reconverted into material suitable for further enriching to weapons-grade levels in only  a few weeks at most. Just as we have no idea of exactly what or where all of Iran's nuclear facilities are, we have no clue as to exactly how much enriched uranium they have...nor will we, based on the current agreement being finalized.

Another important concession Iran won is their 'right' to continue what Iran's President Rouhani called 'all forms of nuclear research and development.' That includes Iran's plutonium producing heavy water reactor at Arak, which has no peacetime application. You might remember that when John Kerry originally presented the framework agreement back in November 2013, he claimed that the Iranians had agreed to shut Arak down. The Iranians said in no uncertain terms that Kerry and President Obama were lying, and the end result was that the Obama team signed off on Arak, where Iran will continue to produce plutonium.

I could be charitable and say it was an error in translation, but in view of all the other differences between what our president and his  secretary of State told the world and what the Iranians claim they agreed to, I'll call it willful deception.

Keep in mind that none of this has anything to do with a peaceful nuclear power or medical uses because nuclear enrichment isn't needed for that. Canada, Sweden, Argentina and other countries all have peaceful nuclear programs without enrichment capacity. It's only needed if you're building nuclear weapons. President Barack Obama himself admitted this, back in December 2013.

But wait, there's more.

 

President Obama made a point of using the term 'snap back sanctions' last April to describe what the consequences for Iran would be if they cheated on the agreement. As our president knew full well, this term meant nothing when he used it and is even more meaningless now.

The sanctions regime took years to assemble in a form where at least most of the international community would go along with it. The sanctions have now been almost totally undone since the president's Iranian-born consigliere Valerie Jarret's secret, back channel negotiations with Iran for most of 2013 were concluded. President Obama actually watered down many of the sanctions with waivers prior to and after the initial framework agreement, and when he spoke to the American people last April, he knew that the sanctions regime was history.

Moreover, he also knew that Russia and China, whom were never that keen on the sanctions to begin with had already announced that they won't participate in future sanctions, something Russian Foreign Minister Serge Lavrov recently repeated. And of course, with verification now entirely gutted, any attempt at revising the sanctions for cause is going to be difficult if not impossible to get through the UN. I'm informed that there may be a face saving plank moving sanctions relief to 2016, but that's fairly meaningless because it's not going to be observed anyway.

You see, not only did President Obama invalidate the sanctions, the one thing that brought Iran to the table. He rewarded the fascist Iranian regime with billions in badly needed cash for the privilege of talking to them. In fact, the Iranian regime's central bank just received 13 tons of gold with a value of $11.9 billion as part of a package of sanctions relief before signing or agreeing to anything. Any idiot knows that money changes hands when a deal is concluded, not before. The Iranians will keep that money regardless, and it's surprising to me that John Kerry left the conference room in Vienna still retaining his pants and shoes.

 

And there's even more. The Iranian regime came up with yet another demand at the last minute. As a major supporter and enabler of Islamist terrorism worldwide, Iran is under a UN arms embargo. And Iran is insisting that it be lifted as part of this deal. No word yet, but according to the Iranian Official News source Fars, the Obama Administration is going to go along with that too. And why not? They've given the Ayatollahs everything else they wanted.

And don't be surprised if the US provides some of those weapons, In fact, right now in Iraq, US advisers are sharing bases with Hezbollah fighters and Iranian Revolutionary Guard troops, and some are surprised to see Hezbollah troops flaunting US weaponry. They shouldn't be.

Having created ISIS, President Obama wants Iran to do the dirty work on the ground to clean up the mess he created. To get that, he's willing to allow Basher Assad to survive, return Iraq to Iran as a Shi'ite colony, and allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons. The arms race this will set off in the region is of no concern to him. Neither is the security threat to the US of a nuclear armed Iran, or the Second Holocaust the Iranians continue to promise to unleash on Israel as soon as they're able to do so.

So to sum up, this deal does not provide for any real verification of Iran's breakout capacity, nuclear facilities or IBCMs, does not stop Iran from proceeding towards developing nuclear weapons, does away with what's left of the sanctions, and will reward the Iranian regime with billions in cash beyond what they've already received. In exchange for that, there's a worthless piece of paper President Obama can figuratively wave in the Rose Garden.


 

Would you like to know how President Obama is going to try to sell this to the American people? Here's a sneak preview:



Why yes, it's Mr. Bill, whom some Americans still see a a great president. The North Korean deal he and Marilyn Albright cooked up with the Kims led directly to Pakistan's nuclear weapons and Iran's clandestine nuclear weapons program. President Obama will attempt to use the same sort of turgid prose to tell us all lies about what a wonderful deal this is. After all, he'll almost certainly be out of office when the damage he did to this nation becomes evident, just like Bill Clinton. And rest assured, that damage will likely be profound.

Because of the way President Barack Hussein Obama has set this up, congress is entirely out of the loop on a major security issue because this is agreement is being done via the UN Security Council. The Senate can vote for a motion of disapproval, which would keep some US sanctions in force. But when the president vetoes it, the chances of getting 12 Democrats senators to vote to override that veto are very slim, given the pressure being put on them.

The real joke is that even if the Iranians don't sign on to this deal, they still got everything they wanted - 17 months to continue their nuclear weapons development and to further protect their nuclear facilities from attacks, billions in cash and the destruction of the sanctions regime. And if they do sign on, nothing changes.After all, what's one more UN resolution to cheat on? They don't even have to make a pretense of changing their hostility to the west or their ultimate objective towards the nation they call The Great Satan as they move towards the day they announce their successful test of a nuclear device.

The Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran's President Rouhani and Iran's Foreign Minister and chief negotiator Mohammad Javad Zarif sized up early the weak, craven and self-obsessed men they were dealing with quite some time ago,and played them thoroughly.

This is the post-American presidency indeed, when the practitioners of what my friend calls wifebeater patriotism have taken over our Republic and are doing their very best to loot it, damage it, and weaken it for their own purposes as they attempt to remake it to conform to the distorted mirror of their own image.

UPDATE: The Iranian nuclear deal was announced today, and once again my notorious Little Birdies came through - the deal as presented was pretty much what they said it would be, with a few last minute minor changes, none of which mean much in practical terms. The name of this new agreement is a dead giveaway - the 'Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.' Note the word 'plan.'

The details are here.

Breaking: NYT Admits Obama Deliberately Manufactured Netanyahu Spat

President Barack Obama and his minions in the White House and the press have had a lot to say about how 'disrespectful' it was for Congress to invite Israeli PM Benyamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of congress without informing the White House. And how wrong it was for Netanyahu to accept when he knew the White  House hadn't been informed.

Read this correction , from Pravda-on-the-Hudson own website.

Correction: January 30, 2015
An earlier version of this article misstated when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel accepted Speaker John A. Boehner’s invitation to address Congress. He accepted after the administration had been informed of the invitation, not before.

Omri Ceren first spotted the correction and explained on Twitter:

 NYT tries to promote anti-Netanyahu talking point that #Israel blindsided Obama. They got just 1 tiny detail wrong.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/30/us/politics/benjamin-netanyahu-is-talking-to-harry-reid-and-leading-democrats-to-little-effect-so-far.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=2

Correction: January 30, 2015 

An earlier version of this article misstated when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel accepted Speaker John A. Boehner’s invitation to address Congress. He accepted after the administration had been informed of the invitation, not before.

This correction literally destroys the entire accompanying NYT article, about how Netanyahu was trying to make peace with Democrats in congress and explain why he had cooperated in 'bypassing the White House.'

Let's look at what originally ran, in the print edition:

Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, said Thursday that Mr. Netanyahu had called him the previous afternoon to explain why he had accepted an invitation to speak to Congress without first notifying the White House.

Then it was revised in the online edition:

Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, said Thursday that Mr. Netanyahu had called him the previous afternoon to explain why the White House had been circumvented before he was invited to speak before Congress. 

And let's look again the correction at the bottom of this piece of journalistic chicanery, online:

An earlier version of this article misstated when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel accepted Speaker John A. Boehner’s invitation to address Congress. He accepted after the administration had been informed of the invitation, not before.

Of course, the truth is that the White House was never bypassed or circumvented. Netanyahu only accepted Speaker John Boehner's invitation after he knew the White House had been informed and had a chance to object.

And if the Obama White House had some objection  and had actually communicated it to  Netanyahu, do you think that just maybe, he might have made decision not to accept the speaking invitation?

Instead, the Obama White House said nothing, and Netanyahu, whose country gets threatened with destruction by Iran about every other week  decided to accept Boehner's invitation to speak to congress and help provide an impetus for legislation on Iranian sanctions that's in both Israel and America's interest .

American Thinker (where yours truly has been proud to appear in from time to time) blogged on this and revealed another tidbit :

In 2011, Boehner sent a notice to the WH stating his intention to invite Netanyahu to speak before a joint session of Congress. The White House never responded (spite? incompetence?) and Boehner proceeded to extend the invitation to Netanyahu. Netanyahu accepted the invitation and spoke. The White House did not express any outrage in 2011.

So there was a precedent set then, and no reason for Boehner or Netanyahu to assume there was any problem when the White House didn't respond with any objections this time.

The resulting fracus was simply kabuki outrage manufactured to create a negative impression that Israel had somehow 'disrespected' an American president. And of course, to assist Netanyahu's political enemies in the coming election...where the Obama Administration has already sent a crack campaign team and millions in campaign funds for the same purpose. The shotgun wedding of Labor's Yitzhak Herzog and Tzipi Livni lost no time in trying to spin this to show that 'Netanyahu was destroying Israel's relationship with the U.S.'

Actually, the reality is that it really doesn't matter what Netanyahu says or what Israel does.If it wasn't this, President Obama would have set up something else, and there will certainly be more of this coming no matter who gets elected in March and no matter how many of Mahmoud Abbas's demands Israel submits to.


This president wants very much to curtail America's alliance with Israel. That's the goal, and it has been ever since President Barack Hussein Obama first entered the White House.

Obama Soils Himself At The UN With Weakness, Appeasement And Israel Bashing

 

President Barack Hussein Obama addressed the UN General Assembly today. Even by Obama standards, an admittedly low bar, it was a turgid speech that lacked even elementary common sense, and threw out gratuitous insults that undercut its supposed goals. But it's worth analyzing as a clear indicator of how this president thinks and what he's planning as commander-in-chief.

The president, of course, sees the Ebola outbreak, Russian aggression and Islamist terrorism as all problems that have been caused by America not giving enough money and resources to the UN, or in ObamaSpeak, "the failure of our international system to keep pace with an interconnected world."

Of course, the president also includes Israel in those problems, but more on that shortly.

As always, President Obama substituted verbiage for real action. He took a few minutes to bash Russia over the situation with Ukraine, explicitly comparing them with Nazi Germany.

Now, here's something to consider. This president is already having problems building an 'international coalition' that means anything more than a little logistical support and a handful of Arab nations making token contributions to the air strikes against Islamic State.

Remember too, that Putin understood a long time before President Obama that the Syrian opposition were mostly Islamist jihadis, and that it was Russia's Putin that approached Obama about crafting a diplomatic solution for Syria - only to be double crossed by the president when Putin found out Obama was covertly arming and training what became ISIS and had secretly moved 1,800 troops to the Syria/Jordan border.You'd think that perhaps one of his advisers might have mentioned that Russia is an important actor in the region, that any UN action of the kind the president was talking about would require Russia's assent, and that the Ukraine was perhaps best dealt with in an actual private interaction between the U.S. and Russia. But of course, no one can tell this president anything, except maybe Valerie Jarret. So out came the nasty and counterproductive rhetoric.

It reminds me of nothing so much as a weak, obnoxious ten-year-old on the playground shouting out schoolboy insults at other kids, knowing he's safe because Teacher Is Watching.

And by the way...is anyone considering that the president is making air strikes on Syria and arming Islamist 'rebels' who want to overthrow Basher Assad, something not too much different than he's accusing Russia of doing in Ukraine? Certainly the Russians will see it that way.And react accordingly.

The president went on to mention his pursuit of 'a diplomatic resolution to the Iranian nuclear issue', urging Iran to "take this historic opportunity." Considering how America has appeased the Iranian regime and allowed the Iranians to play for time as Iran ramps up its enrichment and weapons development, I'm sure the Iranians would agree that they are definitely taking this historic opportunity they're being offered. Just not the one the president's talking about.

 

After some blather about climate change, the president went on to use almost one third of his speech to talk about what a peaceful religion Islam is, and how The Islamic State (AKA ISIS) have nothing to do with Islam whatsoever. Oddly enough, at one point, after saying they have nothing to do with Islam, he referred to them as “religiously motivated fanatics” , even if they are universally Muslims, and even if their leader, al-Baghdadi has a doctorate in Islamic studies from Baghdad University!

In another part of the speech, he again retreated into Obama Fantasyland, talking about how he defeated al-Qaeda (he arguably strengthened it), is supporting a sovereign government in Iraq and chest thumped about how he "supported a transition to a sovereign Afghan government" as 'triumphs'.

He then went on to assure those “religiously motivated fanatics” that the U.S. isn't ever going to put boots on the ground or invade their countries. Taking ground troops off the table and tipping off our enemies in the region in advance about our weakness and lack of a working strategy is pretty bad, although it certainly appeases his Leftist base. But here's something else that seems to not square at all with what he calls his 'successes' in Iraq and Afghanistan. What passes for 'sovereign governments' in those countries was only achieved after an American military occupation. Yet he's already telling the world (and our enemies) he's not going to use the tool that achieved whatthe president calls his 'successes' in this latest conflict!

After which he of course says, standing before the most corrupt and wasteful institution in the world, that the real solution to dealing with those “religiously motivated fanatics” who have nothing to do with Islam is for the West to gift the UN a lot more money for development in an area that just happens to be exclusively Muslims, serially corrupt and governed by the Religion of Peace!

The most surreal part of the speech is where he talks about attacking all those “religiously motivated fanatics” who have nothing to do with Islam ideologically. Or, to quote this president directly, "That means cutting off the funding that fuels this hate. It’s time to end the hypocrisy of those who accumulate wealth through the global economy, and then siphon funds to those who teach children to tear it down."

Well! I'm certainly relieved to hear that America is going to pull all of its forces out of Qatar, cancel that $11 billion arms deal that the president just approved with them and introduce sanctions on sales of Qatari oil and gas as well as banking sanctions that won't allow any financial institution dealing with Qatar to be involved in any financial transaction with American banks, just as President Bush did with al-Qaeda.

And also, that America is going to cut off the funds from overseas that finance all of the Muslim Brotherhood linked jihadi mosques and madrassahs here in America.

Oh, wait..that's just the president running his mouth again! We aren't actually going to do anything concrete that really involves "cutting off the funding that fuels this hate."

But wait, there's more:

"All religions have been attacked by extremists from within at some point, and all people of faith have a responsibility to lift up the value at the heart of all religion: do unto thy neighbor as you would have done unto you."

"The ideology of ISIL or al Qaeda or Boko Haram will wilt and die if it is consistently exposed, confronted, and refuted in the light of day. Look at the new Forum for Promoting Peace in Muslim Societies – Sheikh bin Bayyah described its purpose: “We must declare war on war, so the outcome will be peace upon peace.”

Hmmmm...

Now as it happens, I'm not unfamiliar with the Qu'ran,and while I don't recall much at all about 'do unto thy neighbor as you would have done unto you' unless we're talking about how Muslims are supposed to treat fellow Muslims, there's all sorts of things in there about fighting the unbelievers, being harsh with them, making them pay outrageous taxes in exchange for the right to life and generally taking their rights away altogether..particularly if they're women. In fact, the Qu'ran says specifically not to take unbelievers as friends, (Qu'ran 5:51), calling them Muslim's 'inveterate foe' (4:101), that 'those who reject Islam serve the cause of evil'(4:76). In fact, according to all the hadiths, Mohammed himself shortly before his death enjoined all Muslims to fight the unbelievers until they died, became Muslims, or paid the jirzya (the heavy monetary tribute literally, protection money) willingly and 'felt themselves subdued.'

Now while a lot of Muslims reject this, there are also quite a few who see it as authentic Islam and it's more than just a few “religiously motivated fanatics.”

So our president is either willfully and knowingly lying, hideously ignorant, has a very different idea than most people about what constitutes terrorism and fanaticism that most of the rest of us, or perhaps all three.

That he sought to rationalize what's going on in Islam by saying "All religions have been attacked by extremists from within at some point" (news to Buddhists, Jews and many Christian denominations!) and cites Sheik Abdullah bin Bayyah as his example of a 'peaceful, moderate Muslim leader' who can aid the West in combating jihad.

Really?

Sheik bin Bayyah is the principal deputy to Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leader who favors a second Holocaust against Jews performed by Muslims, genocide and ethnic cleansing in Israel, female circumcision and wife beating, and the establishment of the Caliphate under strict sharia law.

Sheik bin Bayyah works with Qaradawi as second in command of Qaradawi's International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) which among other things strongly supports Hamas, an officially designated terrorist organization designated as such under American law. Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and Turkey’s Islamist anti-semitic president Tayyip Erdogan are both members of IUMS.

The group is violently anti-Israel, and bin Bayyh himself issued a fatwa in 2004 calling the killing of U.S. troops in Iraq 'a duty for all Muslims.'

The president has perhaps forgotten(or more likely,shrugged off) that when most Islamists use the term 'peace' they mean something very different than we do. They means Dar Islam, the 'peace' that will come when Muslims rule the world and all of Dar Harb (literally 'the house of war' the part of the world ruled by non-Muslims) has been conquered and subdued.

The Sheik has never formally broken with Qaradawi or Hamas, but merely claims he left the IUMS 'about a year ago.'. And this hardcore Islamist is the example of 'moderate Islam' being pushed by the president. For that matter, even Qaradawi himself isn't exactly considered off limits when it comes to the Obama regime.

And oh yes, of course the president had something to say about Israel. According to the president, too many Israelis are "ready to abandon the hard work of peace" after having to live for years of being attacked, of genocidal terrorism and with having their very legitimacy as a nation with a right to defend themselves essentially ignored by most of the UN.

And that's Israel fault, or as President Obama said, departing from his printed remarks made available to reporters beforehand, "And that’s something worthy of reflection within Israel."

It's not something Hamas, Hezbollah and the Palestinian Authority ought to think about, you see...just those pesky Israelis. It's their fault. After that, the president went back to the script:

"But let’s be clear: the status quo in the West Bank and Gaza is not sustainable. We cannot afford to turn away from this effort – not when rockets are fired at innocent Israelis, or the lives of so many Palestinian children are taken from us in Gaza. So long as I am President, we will stand up for the principle that Israelis, Palestinians, the region, and the world will be more just with two states living side by side, in peace and security."

Rockets have been being fired at Israelis all throughout the Obama presidency. Has he ever done anything about it? Nope. In fact, he's been funding Hamas through USAid and through the Palestinian Authority for quite some time.

Notice too how our Dear Leader equates Hamas's terrorist aggression with Israel defending itself. And of course, it's Israel that are the child killers..forget about Hamas using children for human shields or using schools, mosques, hospitals and UN facilities as rocket and mortar launching sites for their military.

Abbas and the PLO are allied with the genocidal Hamas and the Palestinian Authority is making no attempt whatsoever to disassociate themselves from Hamas - the reverse in fact. Yet President Obama has the unmitigated gall to tell Israel that they had better make even more concessions and work a lot harder at making peace with people who have sworn to kill them.

I doubt it's a coincidence that the president made this speech in front of the UN when he knew very well that Israeli PM Benyamin Netanyahu is en route to address the UN in a day or so. It's the same thing he did the last time Netanyahu came to America, a blatant attempt to poison the water and undercut him.

Then again, think about this. If you were actually trying to work on a peaceful solution to the conflict between Israel and the Arabs whom identify themselves as Palestinians, would you signal your bias in this fashion? Would you signal a country that is supposedly your ally that you can't be trusted and reveal the same thing to its enemies?

In this speech to the UN, President Barack Hussein Obama gives us a classic rundown on why he is such an abysmal failure; his refusal to recognize reality, his ability to continue to lie to himself as well as to others, his weakness, his duplicity, his inability to admit mistakes or ever take responsibility for anything, his blatant hypocrisy and most of all his low moral character.

Such men can destroy if they attain power, but in the end they can build nothing at all.

This speech tells us why President Obama's place in history is assured. That at least is certain.