The Real Story Behind the Republicans’ Iran Letter
This post first appeared at Middle East Eye.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu waves after speaking before a joint meeting of Congress on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, March 3, 2015. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
The “open letter” from Senator Tom Cotton and 46 other Republican senators to the leadership of Iran, which even Republicans themselves admit was aimed at encouraging Iranian opponents of the nuclear negotiations to argue that the United States cannot be counted on to keep the bargain, has created a new political firestorm. It has been harshly denounced by Democratic loyalists as “stunning” and “appalling”, and critics have accused the signers of the letter of being “treasonous” for allegedly violating a law forbidding citizens from negotiating with a foreign power.
But the response to the letter has primarily distracted public attention from the real issue it raises: how the big funders of the Likud Party in Israel control Congressional actions on Iran.
The infamous letter is a ham-handed effort by Republican supporters of the Netanyahu government to blow up the nuclear negotiations between the United States and Iran. The idea was to encourage Iranians to conclude that the United States would not actually carry out its obligations under the agreement – i.e. the lifting of sanctions against Iran. Cotton and his colleagues were inviting inevitable comparison with the 1968 conspiracy by Richard Nixon, through rightwing campaign official Anna Chenault, to encourage the Vietnamese government of President Nguyen Van Thieu to boycott peace talks in Paris.
But while Nixon was plotting secretly to get Thieu to hold out for better terms under a Nixon administration, the 47 Republican Senators were making their effort to sabotage the Iran nuclear talks in full public scrutiny. And the interest served by the letter was not that of a possible future president but of the Israeli government.
The Cotton letter makes arguments that are patently false. The letter suggested that any agreement that lacked approval of Congress “is a mere executive agreement”, as though such agreements are somehow of only marginal importance in US diplomatic history. In fact, the agreements on withdrawal of US forces from both the wars in Vietnam and in Iraq were not treaties but executive agreements.
Equally fatuous is the letter’s assertion that “future Congresses could modify the terms of the agreement at any time.” Congress can nullify the agreement by passing legislation that contradicts it but can’t renegotiate it. And the claim that the next president could “revoke the agreement with the stroke of a pen,” ignores the fact that the Iran nuclear agreement, if signed, will become binding international law through a United Nations Security Council resolution, as Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has pointed out.
The letter has provoked the charge of “treason” against the signers and a demand for charges against them for negotiating with a foreign government in violation of the Logan Act. In a little over 24 hours, more than 200,000 people had signed a petition on the White House website calling such charges to be filed.
But although that route may seem satisfying at first thought, it is problematic for both legal and political reasons. The Logan Act was passed in 1799, and has never been used successfully to convict anyone, mainly because it was written more than a century before US courts created legal standards for the protection of first amendment speech rights. And it is unclear whether the Logan Act was even meant to apply to members of Congress anyway.
AIPAC Marching Orders
The more serious problem with focusing on the Logan Act, however, is that what Cotton and his Republican colleagues were doing was not negotiating with a foreign government but trying to influence the outcome of negotiations in the interest of a foreign government. The premise of the Senate Republican reflected in the letter – that Iran must not be allowed to have any enrichment capacity whatever – did not appear spontaneously. The views that Cotton and the other Republicans have espoused on Iran were the product of assiduous lobbying by Israeli agents of influence using the inducement of promises of election funding and the threat of support for the members’ opponents in future elections.
Those members of Congress don’t arrive at their positions on issues related to Iran through discussion and debate among themselves. They are given their marching orders by AIPAC lobbyists, and time after time, they sign the letters and vote for legislation or resolution that they are given, as former AIPAC lobbyist MJ Rosenberg has recalled. This Israeli exercise of control over Congress on Iran and issues of concern to Israel resembles the Soviet direction of its satellite regimes and loyal Communist parties more than any democratic process, but with campaign contributions replacing the inducements that kept its bloc allies in line.
Cotton’s Loyalty to Israel
Rosenberg has reasoned that AIPAC must have drafted the letter and handed it to Senator Cotton. “Nothing happens on Capitol Hill related to Israel,” he tweets, “unless and until Howard Kohr (AIPAC chief) wants it to happen. Nothing.” AIPAC apparently supported the letter, but there may be more to the story. Senator Cotton just happens to be a protégé of neoconservative political kingpin Bill Kristol, whose Emergency Committee on Israel gave him nearly a million dollars late in his 2014 Senate campaign and guaranteed that Cotton would have the support of the four biggest funders of major anti-Iran organizations.
Cotton proved his absolute fealty to Likudist policy on Iran by sponsoring an amendment to the Nuclear Iran Prevention Act of 2013 that would have punished violators of the sanctions against Iran with prison sentences of up to 20 years and extended the punishment to “a spouse and any relative, to the third degree” of the sanctions violator. In presenting the amendment in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Cotton provided the useful clarification that it would have included “parents, children, aunts, uncles, nephews, nieces, grandparents, great grandparents, grandkids, great grandkids”.
That amendment, which he apparently believed would best reflect his adoption of the Israeli view of how to cut Iran down to size, was unsuccessful, but it established his reliability in the eyes of the Republican Likudist kingmakers. Now Kristol is grooming him to be the vice-presidential nominee in 2016.
So the real story behind the letter from Cotton and his Republican colleagues is how the enforcers of Likudist policy on Iran used an ambitious young Republican politician to try to provoke a breakdown in the Iran nuclear negotiations. The issue it raises is a far more serious issue than the Logan Act, but thus far major news organizations have steered clear of that story.
The views expressed in this post are the author’s alone, and presented here to offer a variety of perspectives to our readers.
...So the real story behind the letter from Cotton and his Republican colleagues is how the enforcers of Likudist policy on Iran used an ambitious young Republican politician to try to provoke a breakdown in the Iran nuclear negotiations. The issue it raises is a far more serious issue than the Logan Act, but thus far major news organizations have steered clear of that story.
ReplyDeleteOf course the major news organizations have steered clear of the story.
Who steers them?
Operating at the behest of a foreign power goes beyond disloyalty. Elevating the interests of another government over the interests of the United States as an act of government is contemptible.
ReplyDelete.
ReplyDeleteCotton proved his absolute fealty to Likudist policy on Iran by sponsoring an amendment to the Nuclear Iran Prevention Act of 2013 that would have punished violators of the sanctions against Iran with prison sentences of up to 20 years and extended the punishment to “a spouse and any relative, to the third degree” of the sanctions violator. In presenting the amendment in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Cotton provided the useful clarification that it would have included “parents, children, aunts, uncles, nephews, nieces, grandparents, great grandparents, grandkids, great grandkids”.
And we thought destroying the homes of suspect's families was bad.
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Cotton is a pig.
ReplyDeleteOne that obviously does not respect individualism nor personal responsibility.
The Israelis prefer Netanyahu and all that he represents: racism, apartheid settlements, and continued war mongering. Netanyahu maintains his leadership of his minions in the US Congress. Americans will be reminded, up to the US elections about Israeli values and their influence on so-called US representatives in Congress.
Deletefter a hard-fought contest, Benjamin Netanyahu is set to become the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history, overtaking founding father David Ben-Gurion. A straightforward rightist coalition, his simplest option, would include the settler-dominated Jewish Home and Yisrael Beiteinu parties, the two ultraorthodox parties and perhaps the soft-right Kulanu party. This would offer a narrow, homogenous and perhaps stable majority.
Other possibilities include incorporating the centrist party Yesh Atid or even going for a grand coalition with the Zionist Union of Yitzhak Herzog, his erstwhile election opponent.
{...}
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ReplyDeleteIsraeli electoral politics has been at an impasse for some time. The right tends to emerge victorious by joining forces with the ultraorthodox or by carrying enough of the centrist parties — or both. The centre-left, by placing its Jewish-Zionist identity above its progressive one and refusing alliances with the non-Zionist representatives of Israel’s Palestinian citizens, is burdened with a permanent and crippling handicap.
This is the most telling victory of the right in Israeli politics — the effective exclusion and denial of legitimacy to parties representing almost 20 per cent of the country’s citizenry.
The Joint List of non-Zionist and predominantly Arab parties, formed in response to a rise in the threshold for entering parliament, has become the third-largest grouping in the Knesset. But it is being ignored in coalition calculations and its representatives have become invisible. So the first piece of clarity in this result is for those Palestinians living inside Israel as citizens. The message is one of continued marginalisation and an unwillingness to fully enfranchise the Palestinian-Arab minority.
That message was brought home most powerfully by Mr Netanyahu himself, warning in a short election-day video message that droves of Arabs were descending on the polls and needed to be counterbalanced. This was a prime minister talking about his own citizens exercising their most basic democratic right. Imagine if a similar comment were made by a European prime minister about Jewish or black people.
The second point of clarity is for Palestinians living beyond the green line — in the occupied territories, in refugee camps and in the diaspora.
Mr Netanyahu’s apparent success was achieved by cannibalising the votes of his rightwing allies. The Jewish Home and Yisrael Beiteinu parties both lost seats to Likud. Mr Netanyahu chose to speak at a last-minute election rally called by the settlers movement and later disavowed his supposed commitment to a two-state solution, pledging that under his leadership there would be no Palestinian state.
Even if his rhetorical embrace of two states always rang hollow given his actions on the ground and thickening of settlements, it nevertheless facilitated the continuation of a make-believe peace process. Former prime minister Ehud Barak liked to boast that he had unmasked the true face of Yasser Arafat. Mr Netanyahu appears to have gone one step further in unmasking his own true face as a peace rejectionist. Even if he were to form a grand coalition with the Zionist Union, he would struggle to reassume the mantle of would-be peacemaker.
It remains to be seen whether the Palestinians under their current leadership can develop more effective strategies to capitalise peacefully on Mr Netanyahu’s rejection of the international consensus and on his increased isolation. Scepticism would be well-advised.
But while Mr Netanyahu’s re-election will be met with little enthusiasm in western capitals, clarity is not necessarily a bad thing.
He will have to decide whether he wants to stand alone against Israel’s western allies on both the Palestinian issue and the prospective US-led nuclear deal with Iran. America and Europe will have to decide how much further to indulge a troublesome ally for whom impunity has encouraged increasingly indefensible and reckless (even self-destructive) behaviour. Some kind of reassessment appears inevitable.
The Israeli opposition again attempted to unseat Mr Netanyahu without offering an alternative path on national security. Far from being a winning card, it seems that in Israel to think only of the economy is stupid. To delink the economy from issues of peace and occupation, as Mr Netanyahu’s centre-left opponents have done, and as Israel’s leading trade partners in Europe continue to do, is stupider still.
The writer, a director at the European Council on Foreign Relations, is a former adviser in the Israeli prime minister’s office and official negotiator.
March 18, 2015 9:15 am
DeletePolarised Israel brings Palestinians clarity
Daniel Levy
Netanyahu has unmasked himself as a peace rejectionist, writes Daniel Levy
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/d340a7f6-ccd6-11e4-b5a5-00144feab7de.html#axzz3UjGB24fm
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DeleteNot to worry. We are told by the Lobby that the Israeli Arabs don't even bother to vote because they are so contented.
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Wildlife officials from Idaho reported that more than 2,000 wild geese fell down from the sky. The geese were already dead when they hit the ground, said the researchers involved in the case.
ReplyDeleteThe draft dodger blame wolves.
The draft dodger blames wolves.
DeleteThat link in your article to Mr. Rosenberg's site was interesting Deuce:
ReplyDelete"How We Know AIPAC Wrote The GOP’s “Treason” Letter To Iran
...
Here is how it worked. (Although I focus on the Lowey experience, every other Israel initiative I worked on, and there were dozens, went through the same process, whether on the authorizing or appropriating side, or in the House or Senate).
An AIPAC lobbyist sent over its demands, the specific provisions it wanted in the bill. Every possible provision was spelled out, not just the big aid items but small ones and also the specific details of how the money must be disbursed.
Every Member of the Committee considered friendly to AIPAC was given the exact same language. Then those legislators would write letters to the chairman stating that, after due consideration, this is what they wanted in the bill. AIPAC tries to get as many Members of the Committee to include the same language as possible. It invariably got all the Democrats and most of the Republicans. None of them changed a word.
The chairman, upon receiving the letters, and knowing that a clear majority wanted the AIPAC provisions, simply included them in the bill. AIPAC’s name was never mentioned nor was the fact that Israel itself crafted the specific language along with the AIPAC lobbyists. No Member of Congress changed a word. (One recent chairman, David Obey, a progressive from Wisconsin, hated the idea that AIPAC decided what would be in the bill. He wanted more money for the needy, at home and worldwide. But he knew that AIPAC, and not him, controlled the majority of the votes. There was nothing he could do.)
Bottom line: the foreign aid bill is written and then enacted by AIPAC. And not just the Israel portions either. AIPAC (and Israel) also craft the parts dealing with Egypt, the #2 aid recipient after Israel. AIPAC also wrote the Iran sanctions laws. In fact, there have been no major laws or resolutions that did not originate at AIPAC.
..."
http://mjrosenberg.net/2015/03/09/how-we-know-aipac-wrote-the-treason-letter-to-iran/
Rotten bastards.
DeleteI think there are some deep flaws in the US electoral system that stem from the costs of running for office and the unfettered role money plays in the game.
DeleteWhy not do a tread on the actual letter?
Deleteor is it easier just to slime the authors?
The authors slimed themselves with the letter. Mr Rosenberg has some interesting tales to tell it seems. Do you not think they are true?
Delete.
DeleteWhy not do a tread on the actual letter?
or is it easier just to slime the authors?
There have been numerous articles on the letter, some of them linked here. However, if there was a thread on the letter it would inevitably circle back to the nitwits that wrote it and their motivations.
Easier to slime the authors?
Of course, they are slimy pricks.
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Here is the heart of the problem:
DeleteAt its prime in 1988, Kodak, the iconic American photography company, had 145,000 employees. In 2012, Kodak filed for bankruptcy.
The same year Kodak went under, Instagram, the world’s newest photo company, had 13 employees serving 30 million customers.
The US model of a broad and deep middle class doing their civic duty by working a job that could support a family, having one vote and exercising it to select a candidate that represents their interest is gone. It is over.
Today, those owners of Instagram have more political power because of money than the 145,000 Kodak workers ever dreamed of having. The US Congress is owned by the political donors who can donate unlimited amounts of money and dictate their political careers.
The politicians only care about their political careers. The voters are gerrymandered in such a fashion that the individual votes are meaningless when the options are either D or R.
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ReplyDeleteAre you saying that rather than being Gruberred we are being AIPACed?
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ReplyDeleteAbbas is pursuing the only option possible for the Palestinians. Hamas is not.
The right wing is growing in Israel. The demographics support them. The growing population of settlers, immigrants who tend to be more right wing, higher birth rate amongst the right wing religious groups, etc. Whatever chance there was for a peaceful settlement under terms either side was willing to agree to disappeared a long time ago. The Oslo Accords were a joke. However, Hamas tactics are not only indefensible they are self-defeating. There is no defense for taking innocent lives. None. And it's a political non-starter. It provides an excuse for the Israeli policies of occupation and discrimination. It provides an excuse the sycophants in Congress to offer justification for their obeisance to AIPAC and to Israel. It provides low-information voters an excuse for going along with Israeli policies. It provides the US with an excuse for supporting Israel at the UN. The same applies to Islamic Jihad and the PLO before them.
Had there been no PLO, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad and others, the Palestinians would have had their state decades ago, IMO. The world would have forced it. Now that the curtain has been dropped on the Israeli right-wing agenda, one that is likely to continue and grow under Netanyahu for the next six years, the PA will have their best chance to force change in Israel they have had for some time.
The irony is that given the margin of his victory, Netanyahu probably didn't need to show his real face but he panicked and he did. Now the excuses are gone.
There is no doubt the PA will pursue the course it has set for itself with the international community. Hopefully, Hamas will not ruin the effort. 135 countries recognize Palestine as a state. I expect that to grow. The pressure will continue on Israel and Israel will continue to resist. Eventually, there will be a settlement (doubtful) or Israel will lose all pretense to democracy and become just another typical ME country.
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It could be that Netanyahu achieved his gains at the expense of those further to the right of him and thus will continue to have trouble forming a government - well that is a hope anyway but, I agree, that further entrenching of the 'right' in Israel does not bode well for peace in the region. Hopefully the US will find a way to try to keep out of the mess but I am not hopeful in that regard especially in light of the opinions expressed by the likes of Rufus, Jack, and Bob.
DeleteThere is no doubt the PA will pursue the course it has set for itself with the international community. Hopefully, Hamas will not ruin the effort. 135 countries recognize Palestine as a state. I expect that to grow. The pressure will continue on Israel and Israel will continue to resist. Eventually, there will be a settlement (doubtful) or Israel will lose all pretense to democracy and become just another typical ME country.
DeleteThe Palestinians can have a state. Either by unilateral declaration or by compromise.
Right now?
The Palestinians are on the path of unilateralism, which voids ALL concessions from Israel.
The merger with hamas showed the palestinians true colors, as their honoring suicide bombers as heroes.
Incitement to murder the citizens of Israel is a direct violation of all requirements to being a peace partner.
BOTH Israel and the Palestinians have been building in the west bank, only israel has given up developments for peace. (yes even in the west bank)
But tomorrow, the Palestinians will have to grow up, no longer claim to be occupied and also be an independent nation.
IF they choose independence and war? Partnership with Iran?
then war will come to the west bank.
Hamas has already declared it's self ready for another war, it's been restocked by iran and it's tunnels have been reconstructed.
Bring it on.
Bibi's pronouncement that the 2 state solution was dead was not intransigence but rather a honest opinion about the nature of the Palestinians.. BTW< hear about the upcoming elections in gaza and the west bank?
NO?
LOL
well you won't…
and why would that be? because Israel and the US refused to honor the last set maybe?
Delete.
DeleteThe Palestinians are on the path of unilateralism, which voids ALL concessions from Israel.
Concessions?
:o)
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DeleteBibi's pronouncement that the 2 state solution was dead was not intransigence but rather a honest opinion about the nature of the Palestinians..
Any one who has followed Bibi knows thus was his stance right along. As for an honest opinion, I agree. The 'dishonesty' comes from years of denying this was actually his 'honest opinion'.
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I would say the 'opinion' is not about his assessment of the Palestinians but rather his opinion of what he wants for Israel.
Delete.
DeleteThe merger with hamas showed the palestinians true colors, as their honoring suicide bombers as heroes.
You can't have it both ways. Before the PA and Hamas signed the reconciliation agreement one of Bibi's main talking points to Kerry in rejecting negotiations on a peace process was that the PA didn't represent all the Palestinian people. As soon as they agreed to reconcile, Bibi went batshit crazy and launched the Gaza intervention. It's his MO. Israel and the Palestinians had been 'negotiating' for 40 years before Bibi brought up the issue of recognition of Israel as a Jewish state as a prerequisite, another bullshit demand intended to prevent any kind of settlement.
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Quirk,
DeleteThe Palestinians can and will have their unilateral declared state.
Then it's up to them if they choose to live in peace or go to war over borders.
It's really simple.
So far the palestinians have chosen war… and lost..
i guess it's time allow the evil frankenstein called ISIS of the west bank and gaza to be born…
Israel has chosen to LIVE.
ReplyDeleteThe palestinians have chosen to go to war, again.
But the interesting real story?
The ARAB world is done with the nonsense of the Palestinians.
ole Allen wasn't too keen on Bibi - I wonder what his thoughts on the recent vote results is...
ReplyDeleteThe franchise industry went to war against Seattle’s new $15 wage. Seattle won.
ReplyDeleteIn June of last year, Seattle became the first city in the United States to boost its minimum wage to $15. But not all at once: "Small" businesses, defined as those with fewer than 500 employees, will have until 2021 to get there.
Some cities treat franchisees like small businesses, too. But under the Seattle law, the neighborhood McDonald's won't qualify. Even if it's technically owned by a local and the business only has 30 employees, for the purposes of the new law, it's considered to be as big as McDonald's worldwide.
That's why the franchise industry has been the biggest opponent of Seattle's law, and brought all of its substantial resources to bear in opposition -- in the press, in the political arena, and when all that failed, in the courts. The International Franchise Association drafted former U.S. solicitor general Paul Clement to build the case against treating franchisees like large businesses, asking for an injunction on the new rules, which go into effect April 1.
Tuesday, a federal judge threw out their objections, removing the last obstacle to implementation of the measure -- as well as clearing the way for cities across the country to do the same -- and adding ammunition to the argument that franchisees are solely responsible for the people they employ.
Now, the judge didn't decide definitively that franchisees are fundamentally different from independent small businesses of comparable size. Rather, weighing expert evidence and franchise agreements submitted by the plaintiffs -- owners of a Holiday Inn, a Brightstar Care and an AlphaGraphics -- he found that there was a reasonable basis for the determination that franchisees receive enough help from their relationships with franchisors to allow them to pay the higher wage. If that's all cities have to do in order to make franchisees raise their wages as quickly as large businesses, then they don't have to worry too much about being sued over it (the district court's decision isn't binding on other courts throughout the rest of the country, but may be referenced).
But the decision has relevance for another reason: the ongoing argument over how closely franchisees are tied to their franchisor, and therefore whether the franchisor should be held liable for their franchisees' conduct. The judge found that franchisors have enough of a hand in their franchisees' operations that the two could plausibly be treated as one and the same. Right now, business interests are fighting hard against the National Labor Relations Board, which has signaled it may move in the same direction by treating franchisors as "joint employers" when their franchisees commit labor violations.
DeleteThat could have massive implications for how easy it is to unionize -- or at least how much care the franchisors take in making sure employees are treated lawfully.
A Win
Target just followed Walmart, and TJ Maxx to $9.00.
DeleteBibi went batshit crazy and launched the Gaza intervention
ReplyDeleteHamas ROCKETS and HAMAS KIDNAPPING of Israelis LAUNCHED the Gaza war.
As for that apartheid ME country that just had an election: Fuck'em, they're dead to me.
ReplyDeleteWhat you actually are is dead to yourself, you brainless grubbered bozo.
DeleteRufus: the guy that will fall for anything.
BAGHDAD — Iraqi planes dropped hundreds of thousands of leaflets over Mosul overnight Wednesday urging civilians to collaborate against the Islamic State ahead of a military push, the Defense Ministry said.
ReplyDeleteAddressed to “the people of Mosul,” the flier, copies of which were circulated online, promised that the city would be liberated soon. Qais Karim of the Defense Ministry’s media office said the air force’s C-130 Hercules planes made the drops to “mobilize the people.”
The move came despite military operations stalling farther east in Tikrit, where Iraqi forces’ largest offensive to date against the Islamic State extremist group has paused amid heavy casualties.
“Mosul is your city, Iraq is your Iraq,” the flier read. “Your armed forces are very close to you.”
It went on to urge civilians to make a note of those working with the extremists.
“Watch their bases, record their infidel actions. Point out those who cooperate with them to destroy your ancient civilization,” it said.
There are signs of disagreement among the security forces over the timeline for a Mosul offensive, with some officials arguing that the western province of Anbar is a more critical priority.
Karim said that there was no timeline for a Mosul offensive but that the city would be the next target after operations in Tikrit and the surrounding province of Salahuddin end.
Iraqi officials earlier had publicly pushed back against a U.S. official’s comments that an offensive could . . . . . .
Dead Men in the Queue
>>>>Karim said that there was no timeline for a Mosul offensive<<<<
DeleteThe way things are going to the south there may be no Mosul offensive at all, ever.
Ha !
ReplyDeleteBwabwa....ha !
The Buffalo Breath Bar at an upscale motel in MIssoula, Montana erupted in cheers and applause and mutual hugs and kisses among the boys and girls patrons there when the news first came over Fox that David hath slain Goliath.
Congratulations to Bibi and Likud !
O'bozo's overt and bully intervening in the political affairs of another country did not work this time around, might even have hurt.
I thought something was up when Livni said she wouldn't insist on the rotating power sharing deal......
Missoula, Montana, home to real Americans.
DeleteStockholm (AFP) - Sweden's central bank took its key interest rate further into negative territory Wednesday in a surprise move aimed at supporting a return to inflation.
ReplyDeleteThe Riksbank cut its repo rate by 0.15 percentage points to -0.25 percent and said it was buying government bonds worth 30 billion kronor ($3.4 billion, 3.2 billion euros) to prevent an appreciating krona from hindering an uptick in inflation.
"The executive board of the Riksbank assesses that an even more expansionary monetary policy is needed to support the upturn in inflation and ensure that long-term inflation expectations are in line with the inflation target," the bank said in a statement.
Sweden is a member of the European Union but not of the eurozone and so retains control, via its central bank, of monetary policy and interest rates.
Inflation has been close to zero in Sweden since late 2012 and in February it was at 0.1 percent, far below the target of 2.0 percent.
The bank said the weakening trend had bottomed out and inflation was beginning to rise but that the rising krona -- up 5.0 percent against the euro over the past month -- could halt the increase.
"The central bank had decided to keep the krona weak and is not satisfied with the resulting inflation increase," Thorbjoern Isaksson, an economist at Nordea bank told news agency TT.
European central bankers have been battling to end the trend of falling prices.
Although lower prices sound like they should be positive for consumers and the economy, economists fear that they could touch off deflation in which shoppers put off purchases in the belief that prices could fall further.
This leads to a spiral of ever weaker demand, slowing the economy and pushing up unemployment.
Sweden's repo rate serves as . . . . . . . . .
YIKES
The usual suspects among the Islamo-fascists around must be having a bad, sad day.
ReplyDeleteO'bozo's 'Democratic political operatives' and suitcases of the cash of American taxpayers didn't get the job done.
Israel is not Chicago.
White House sulking, refuses to congratulate Netanyahu on victory \
DeleteMarch 18, 2015
Did anyone ever expect President Obama to be gracious in defeat?
More
March 18, 2015
White House sulking, refuses to congratulate Netanyahu on victory
By Thomas Lifson
Did anyone ever expect President Obama to be gracious in defeat? If such a person exists, she would be very disappointed at the extremely visible sulking underway. Daniel Halper reports in The Weekly Standard:
On CNN this morning, White House aide David Simas avoided congratulating Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the Israeli elections. Instead, he would only congratulate the Israeli people on having an election.
All of Obama’s allies’ money, electoral expertise, and organizing prowess were for naught. Once again, David slew Goliath.
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/03/white_house_sulking_refuses_to_congratulate_netanyahu_on_victory_.html#ixzz3UmZ8D8Nk
The vast majority of Democrats are just gangsters in suits, and very very ill behaved gangsters at that.
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ReplyDeleteHamas ROCKETS and HAMAS KIDNAPPING of Israelis LAUNCHED the Gaza war.
Reply
Nonsense. Anyone who followed the sequence of events there would know that the Gaza intervention was a carefully orchestrated false flag concocted by Bibi.
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This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteQuirkWed Mar 18, 07:14:00 PM EDT
ReplyDelete.
Hamas ROCKETS and HAMAS KIDNAPPING of Israelis LAUNCHED the Gaza war.
Reply
Nonsense. Anyone who followed the sequence of events there would know that the Gaza intervention was a carefully orchestrated false flag concocted by Bibi.
Spoken like a moron.
Hamas butchers Israel kids, launches rockets that they had spent 1 billion on preparing, spent 1 billion on tunnels into israel, refused the arab league cease fire and you call it a "false flag"
You are now an official member of the Elephant blog's Jew haters society.
Wear it proud.
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DeleteI'll move the discussion to the next blog where I have room to expand.
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