My Blog Posts

• Lugar’s Delicious Leaves of Tea
  08/30/2010 12:30:52 PM EST
  Sayeth Saint Dick:

  If it is brought up, "a large number of Republicans will be in favor of the [New START] treaty, but not all of them," he said.

  [snip]

  "I think a large majority of Republicans agree with me" on arms reduction, he said.

  [snip]

  “I think we will not deal with the treaty on the floor until after the election."

  [snip]

  "No I'm not predicting anything" when asked if it will pass by the end of this year, "beyond the fact that I think we will get to the floor and we'll have a chance to vote upon it, debate it in the lame-duck session."

  Here’s hoping that Lugar’s optimistic estimate of his colleagues’ support is based on an actual nose count, not an assumption that they are as principled, knowledgeable, and reasonable as he is.
• Open-Mindedness!
  08/10/2010 09:57:35 AM EST
  You know how New START skeptics in the Senate have complained about the agreement’s verification provisions and definitions, Russian cheating, nuclear modernization, and the supposed lack of dissenting witnesses in hearings? Yeah, well they didn’t give a hoot about any of that back in 2002 and 2003 when the Senate was considering the Moscow Treaty (aka SORT), according to Walter Pincus’s definitive account in today’s WaPo. Loyal NOH readers will recall our series of posts highlighting this hypocr…uh, open-mindedness! (Here – here – here – here) But remember, their complaints are serious and have nothing to do with politics. Nothing at all. Not a thing.
• Key Validator Joins Push for New START
  08/09/2010 04:59:38 PM EST
  Snooki, do you think the U.S. Senate should approve New START? Her response speaks volumes about how passionately people support this agreement.
• Chartastic
  08/09/2010 11:23:10 AM EST
  Courtesy of Ben Loehrke at the Prague Project (h/t friend-of-NOH Kelsey Hartigan), we get this nice visual reminder of the overwhelming bipartisan expert consensus that supports New START.
• On Tubes and Budget Games
  08/05/2010 11:35:00 AM EST
  Reuters today explains how New START negotiations have devolved into (dis)armed robbery. Money grubbing for nuclear modernization funds is fair, if unbecoming, as part and parcel of congressional sausage production. But not this s*** again:

  Corker who along with Kyl and other senators recently visited three national laboratories, called the state of the facilities and weapons, “pretty alarming.” Kyl was struck by the way that Sandia National Lab showed him a plastic container with 1950s-era vacuum tubes that are being replaced with new circuit boards. “They’ve got to get on with this,” Kyl said.

  Kingston is going to pop a blood vessel in his eyeball (read his previous diatribes on vacuum tubes). While horse trading is part of the game, potential treaty skeptics’ funding demands at this point have become rather trifling. Increased nuke money is in the FY 2011 request. It’s in the 10-year plan. It’s in the 20-year plan. Senior administration officials have publicly reiterated their commitment to it. But some senators are unhappy because the planned investment will come from “savings the government hopes to get from interest rates”? Put the nation on a more sound fiscal footing and you won’t have to worry about it, for chrissakes! Future year budget plans are not set in stone. (Remember when the Bush administration used to project decreased defense spending? Ha! How’d that turn out?) Senators of course understand this variability. They know the administration can’t guarantee future funding streams, as doing so would infringe on Congress’s power of the purse and neuter the U.S. government’s ability to adjust future funding to meet shifting priorities. Congress fights tooth and nail to preserve such flexibility, which is why appropriators are always hesitant to approve multiyear procurement of major weapon systems. But senators are still objecting on this basis when it comes to nuke modernization. In other words, senators are asking President Obama to guarantee something (modernization funding) that only they themselves can constitutionally guarantee. The administration has done its part to integrate the modernization program into its future planning, but all it can do is ask for the money. It is up to Congress, including New START skeptics, to provide the funds. Senators: this is ultimately your responsibility, not that of the executive branch. Stop trying to pass the buck.