Hoocuddanode, Climate Change Edition

Greg Sargent notes that now that Senate Democrats have all but agreed with the GOP that the Senate and not President Obama should have the final say over negotiations with Iran, Senate Republicans are insisting that the Senate have the same final veto power over any international climate change treaties as well.

Hoocuddanode, right?

Who says the new GOP Congress isn’t interested in getting anything done? The Wall Street Journal reports that Senate Republicans are hard at work hatching a new strategy to accomplish a key piece of their agenda: Undermining President Obama’s chances of reaching an international deal in which major countries agree to curb climate emissions, by sowing doubts about his ability to deliver on our end of the bargain. 

Republicans are already fighting in court to block Obama’s proposed new EPA rules curbing emissions from existing power plans, which is central to U.S. efforts to reach a global climate deal in talks later this year. They argue that the rules are unconstitutional and amount to more executive overreach. The Journal reports that the idea is to send a message that Obama cannot unilaterally negotiate a climate deal, and the model is Tom Cotton’s recent letter to Iran.

Gosh, it's almost like this was the point all along: to set a precedent for every international treaty going forward that the Senate should get the final say.

Whenever there's a Democrat in the White House, anyway.

Sen. James Inhofe said Mr. Obama’s unilateral pursuit of the climate accord exceeds the scope of president’s power. Mr. Inhofe, the chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, plans to hold a hearing this summer focused on the Senate’s advice-and-consent process and its possible application in international climate negotiations. 

Additionally, Mr. Inhofe said the Iran letter, which was penned by Sen. Tom Cotton, could be a useful model to send a message about the climate agreement. 

“The Tom Cotton letter was an educational effort,” Mr. Inhofe said in an interview. Other countries think “if the president of the United States says something, it’s just automatic…His letter was over there saying, ‘the president says he can do this; he can’t do this.’ ”

Some 43 other presidencies were allowed to.  Apparently, when the president is Barack Obama, then the President no longer speaks for the United States of America in international affairs.

Imagine that.  And once again, Senate Democrats have helped by backstabbing the president.