EDITORIAL: Iran nuke deal will light Mideast fuse

As a wielder of political power, President Barack Obama has few peers. On issue after issue — from health care to gay marriage — he has seized the initiative and pressed his progressive agenda on the nation.

That is the opportunity which voters gave the president — twice — by entrusting him with the keys to the White House.

The deal which President Obama and his secretary of state, John Kerry, have completed with the Islamic Republic of Iran concerning nuclear proliferation is the latest evidence of Obama’s ability to overcome long odds in securing the changes he wants.

But it also raises serious questions about both his tactics and his intentions.

When it looked like the Senate might actually insist on performing its constitutional duty under the Treaty Clause to vote on the Iran nuclear deal, President Obama got Congress to back down. Instead of requiring a two-thirds vote in the Senate to approve the pact, as required by the Constitution in Article II, Section 2, Clause 2, Congress agreed that it would need two-thirds of both Houses of Congress to disapprove the treaty — turning an almost impossible goal for the president into one that gives his opponents very little chance of prevailing.

Congress is obviously complicit in surrendering its constitutional authority to the president, but this is not the first time President Obama has sought to expand presidential authority in questionable ways.

So what about this particular deal? Iran has agreed to halt weaponization of nuclear material for 10 years, although it also sounds like it has rejected the right of international inspectors to have unfettered access to Iran’s centrifuges and other nuclear facilities. Details have not been released yet, but if that is true, it will be a major stumbling block.

The treaty ends sanctions against Iran and frees up hundreds of billions of dollars of assets for the Islamic Republic to use as it sees fit. It also provides a timeline for ending the weapons embargo against Iran after five years, and the ban on missile technology in eight years. That is certainly convenient for Iran since it will be free to start working toward a nuclear bomb in 10 years.

Ultimately, what the president is saying is that he hopes that in 10 years, Iran won’t still harbor its long-stated wish to destroy Israel and the United States. That’s a dangerous bet because even the president has acknowledged that Iran will need less than a year to build a bomb once the terms of the treaty expire in 10 years.

In essence, the United States has capitulated on the main point of whether or not Iran should become a nuclear power. That has created fear not just in Israel, but also in a half dozen Sunni Muslim majority countries in the Middle East such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt. They too see themselves as potential targets of the Shia-dominated government in Tehran, and therefore one likely side effect of this deal will be a race to see which Sunni country can develop its own nuclear program in under 10 years to counterbalance the Iranian threat.

Can you say Armageddon?

Republican members of Congress are universally opposed to this disastrous deal. In Montana, Rep. Ryan Zinke declared, “This is a bad mistake of historic proportions... President Obama... is giving them a legal pathway to a nuclear bomb.” Sen. Steve Daines said, “This agreement paves the way for Iran to further direct its resources in leading the way as the world’s greatest state-sponsor of terrorism.”

 At this point, the only way to prevent the treaty from going forward is to convince Democratic members of Congress that it is more in their interest to protect world peace than to protect the political flank of President Obama.

So what about Montana’s Democratic senator, Jon Tester? Where does he stand? Fortunately, he is not just parroting the president’s talking points on this one. In a statement, he said, “Details matter, especially when ensuring Iran’s compliance with the deal. I am reviewing this proposal to make sure this agreement can deliver on its promise.”

Let’s hope that Sen. Tester does scrutinize the treaty with a skeptical eye, and eventually votes against it, but if President Obama gets his way and sees the deal go into effect, let’s also hope that the agreement does NOT ever “deliver on its promise,” because all it promises is more death and destruction in the Middle East and beyond.