{"id":38221,"date":"2020-02-20T16:35:09","date_gmt":"2020-02-20T21:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=38221"},"modified":"2020-02-20T16:35:09","modified_gmt":"2020-02-20T21:35:09","slug":"ignoring-the-law-because-you-think-you-can","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=38221","title":{"rendered":"Ignoring The Law Because You Think You Can"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, CNS News<\/a> reported the following:<\/p>\n

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) confirmed Tuesday that he met with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif on the sidelines of a security conference in Germany at the weekend, justifying his decision to do so by saying that \u201cif [President] Trump isn\u2019t going to talk to Iran, then someone should.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

There is little doubt that Iran is an enemy of America. Why is a member of Congress meeting with their Foreign Minister?<\/p>\n

The article continues:<\/p>\n

Murphy said he also wanted to request the Iranian regime\u2019s help in bringing the civil war in Yemen to an end; and to push for the release of Americans incarcerated in Iran.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know whether my visit with Zarif will make a difference. I\u2019m not the President or the Secretary of State \u2013 I\u2019m just a rank and file U.S. Senator,\u201d Murphy wrote.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot conduct diplomacy on behalf of the whole of the U.S. government, and I don\u2019t pretend to be in a position to do so.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBut if Trump isn\u2019t going to talk to Iran, then someone should. And Congress is a co-equal branch of government, responsible along with the Executive for setting foreign policy. A lack of dialogue leaves nations guessing about their enemy\u2019s intentions, and guessing wrong can lead to catastrophic mistakes.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Senator Murphy may consider Congress a ‘co-equal branch of government,’ but the President is the person who conducts foreign policy. Congressmen on their own do not have that authority.<\/p>\n

The article concludes:<\/p>\n

The 1799 Logan Act prohibits unauthorized persons from negotiating with foreign governments which have a dispute with the United States. No-one has been convicted<\/a> for violating the act.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 2015, 47 Republican senators signed a letter to the Iranian regime suggesting that a nuclear agreement between President Obama and supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would be an executive agreement which another president or Congress would be empowered to abrogate.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The initiative prompted some critics to invoke the Logan Act.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Among the Democrats who condemned the letter was Murphy, who accused the signatories of \u201cundermining the president.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t even imagine the uproar if Democratic senators [had been] writing to Saddam Hussein in the lead up to the Iraq War,\u201d Murphy told <\/a>the National Journal<\/em> at the time.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I guess that was then and this is now. It’s amazing how quickly the rules change for the Democrats.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, CNS News reported the following: Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) confirmed Tuesday that he met with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif on the sidelines of a security conference in Germany at the weekend, justifying his decision to do so … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[12329,2436,669,5215,2578,246,10926,4629,1139],"class_list":["post-38221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-chris-murphy","tag-cns-news","tag-democrat","tag-foreign-minister","tag-foreign-policy","tag-iran","tag-logan-act","tag-member-of-congress","tag-national-journal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38221"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38221\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38222,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38221\/revisions\/38222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}