binding international commitment without the full consent of the congress. not the oversight that they are offering in this bill although i would say i think he s made quite an accomplishment by getting this bill through the committee in the form it is you think it needs approval as if it were a treaty. specific approval. i said this when the bush administration was putting together the strategic framework agreement together in iraq in 08. i said it when president obama said he was going to have a binding legal arrangement with respect to climate change. you cannot do that without the specific consent of the congress. and secondly with respect to iran itself we need to look at this region. as you know there are three major power centers in the region. israel saudi arabia and iran. and since our invasion of iraq iran has gained a much stronger foothold in terms of that balance of power. so we don t want to be sending signals into this region that we are acquiescing to the situati
the prime minister himself. it was not considered he would talk to him. you don t? i don t think so. when you start acquiescing to demands like that, it said clearly there was no escape plan intended by this individual. that this was going to be a suicide mission. again he never asked for any kind of transportation from what we know at least of what knowledge i have now. no demands for prisoner releases, anything like that. it seemed it was a side mission from the start which added to the gravity of the situation on the law enforcement front. and compressed the lime tine significantly. as i was watching this unfold i kept thinking what if this was happening in dupont circle or in some coffee shop in times square. do you think we would have seen a similar response tactically whether it s d.c. or new york. brooke i m so glad you brought that up. one of the topics we need to start addressing in the united states and take very seriously,
severe penalty that the church can impose. francis is the first pope to do it. and he did it in mafia territory. would have been different if he had just written from his desk, a declaration from rome. no, he went down to an open air mass, 200,000 people watching and listening and in the middle of it says, by the way, mafia are excommunicated. that is important, carol, because the mafia in these regions have always tried to portray themselves as religious men. if you ve ever seen the processions, religious procession, go along the small streets in italian towns, they often stopped at the houses of mafia bosses in some kind of homage. the pope saying this weekend that is ending. he s saying it to the mafia, saying it to any priests who are collaborating or acquiescing to the mafia, but mostly to the local community who lives every day with mafia intimidation. very important words this weekend from the pope, carol. is this risky for the pope? it is. it is a risky move for the pope
because so many sunnis are acquiescing to them and falling to them because they ve lost all confidence in maliki. many sunni leaders and tribal leaders inside iraq that are giving way to isis are those that are normal iraqis. so the depiction of this just being this outside group coming in and taking all of this territory is inaccurate. you have a lot of iraqis that support it as a way to get maliki off their back. that s the problem in indiscriminately going after various sunni leaders in this process. there s another facet that we needed to touch on. while the united states is weighing its options, iran seems to be positioning itself for the action. the commander was spotted in baghdad with elite troops that have been deployed to some degree. these are the same forces that we are essentially fighting against in syria, the same ones who attacked and killed many americans during that war. how do you feel about being
the u.s. perspective? if the release of jonathan pollard would induce the prime minister of israel to fundamentally change positions on jerusalem borders, security and refugees so-called final status issues. well, absolutely. wolf, it won t. and you remember in the fall of 2010, the administration, in order to secure a two-month extension of the settlements freeze, wouldn t etch give the israelis f-35s and a lot of other military equipment for a two-month extension. this, wolf, is a tactic in search of a stratstrategy. pollard is like a fallen soldier to them. they abandoned him. as you know, you wrote the book on it. they abandoned him. their asking is not the problem. the issue is why are we acquiescing, and to buy time for a process that is fundamentally impaired. it s not a done deal yet. it sure isn t. we ll see what happens. i remember the y river talks.