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Will’s Unpersuasive Case Against the Nuclear Deal

The "best reason" to reject the deal isn't even a good reason.
Switzerland: Secretary Kerry Takes Walk Through Geneva With Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif During Break in Nuclear Program Talks
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif cross the Rhone River on the Pont de la Machine Bridge while taking a walk in Geneva, Switzerland, on January 14, 2015, during a break in their negotiations about the future of Iran's nuclear program. (Photo by State Department) *** Please Use Credit from Credit Field *** (Newscom TagID: sipaphotosfive157877.jpg) [Photo via Newscom]

George Will makes a wholly unpersuasive case against the nuclear deal. This was probably the weakest part of his argument:

The best reason for rejecting the agreement is to rebuke Obama’s long record of aggressive disdain for Congress — recess appointments when the Senate was not in recess, rewriting and circumventing statutes, etc.

This isn’t the “best reason” to reject the deal. It’s not even a good reason. If one wants to rebuke Obama for ignoring and going around Congress in other situations, it would make sense to rebuke him directly on those. Obama has been waging an illegal war against ISIS for almost a year now, but Congress seems quite content to allow Obama’s disdain for their role to continue indefinitely. It is only when he is proposing to strike a nonproliferation deal that they are suddenly concerned to take an interest. Congress has desperately sought to meddle in diplomacy in which it has no proper role. This is one case where Obama’s treatment of Congress has been defensible and appropriate. If this is the “best reason” for rejecting the deal, it’s a safe bet that there aren’t any good reasons.

Later on, Will asserts that the “Iran agreement should be a treaty.” There’s no particular reason why it should be treaty, except perhaps that it would make it easier to kill the agreement. He then compares it to the Treaty of Versailles, with which it has nothing in common, and regrets that Obama did not imitate Wilson by embarking on a fool’s errand of trying to get a hostile Senate to ratify something it hates. Wilson ended his presidency in failure and practically killed himself stumping for a treaty that was never going to be ratified, and then Will wonders why Obama didn’t want to follow his example.

Will also says that the deal “should not have been submitted first to the United Nations as a studied insult to Congress,” but that doesn’t make much sense. For one thing, previous presidents have gone to the Security Council regarding possible military action before going to Congress, so unless Will thinks those were “studied insults” to Congress his objection doesn’t hold up at all. Besides, why wouldn’t an agreement negotiated between the permanent members of the Security Council and a member state be submitted to the Security Council first? Will wants to treat this as if it were a bilateral agreement with Iran, but that is exactly what it isn’t.

It is somewhat encouraging that the arguments against the deal are consistently so weak and unpersuasive. That reflects the bankruptcy of the opponents’ position. But it is also dismaying that so many people on the right are only too willing to repeat and endorse such incredibly weak arguments.

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