In First Real Sign of Trouble for Iran Deal, Schumer Announces His Opposition
I didn't think this would happen, so yes, you have permission to call me too cynical. Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the most influential Jewish voice in Congress, said Thursday night that he will oppose President Obama's deal to limit Iran's nuclear program. "Advocates on both sides have strong cases for their point of view that cannot simply be dismissed," Mr. Schumer said in a lengthy statement. "This has made evaluating the agreement a difficult and deliberate endeavor, and after deep study, careful thought and considerable soul-searching, I have decided I must oppose the agreement and will vote yes on a motion of disapproval." With his decision, Mr. Schumer — who has spent the last several weeks meeting with Mr. Obama and other officials and experts like Wendy R. Sherman, the deal's chief negotiator, and the former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger, and carrying a dog-eared copy of the agreement in his briefcase — paves the way for other Democrats on the fence to join Republicans in showing their disapproval. "There are some who believe that I can force my colleagues to vote my way," Mr. Schumer said. "While I will certainly share my view and try to persuade them that the vote to disapprove is the right one, in my experience with matters of conscience and great consequence like this, each member ultimately comes to their own conclusion." Then there's this: "Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., came out against the deal shortly afterward. He is the ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Relations Committee." Now . . . does this mean that Democrats lose another 12 senators? I'm still skeptical. This is going to kick the White House arm-twisting into overdrive. On the other hand, if you're a Democratic senator and not a blind Obama loyalist . . . maybe you start having real worries that the critics are right, and at some point you get remembered as one of history's biggest, most naïve fools. One NR cruise-goer predicted with great certainty that Schumer didn't want to be remembered as part of the group that allowed Iran to get a nuclear weapon, and would oppose Obama's deal. The Main Event: Welcome to Thunderdome, Mr. Mogul For what it's worth, Frank Luntz's focus group came away deeply disappointed with Donald Trump. They found him obnoxious, rude, loud, and completely lacking in detailed answers. This is odd, because they seemed genuinely surprised. It's as if they had never seen the man speak before. Ali Akbar manned the stopwatch, and the results are mostly predictable: 
It did not "feel" like Huckabee or Cruz got as much time as the stopwatch indicates, and it didn't feel like Christie, Walker, or Paul were snubbed quite so much. It was recognizable that Ben Carson didn't get a question for a long, long stretch. Last night, I wrote . . . Donald Trump brought the circus to town. Credit where it's due; when confronted with past name-calling, he killed with that "Only Rosie O'Donnell" line. He makes everyone else look boring; he also makes everyone else look like responsible, polite, and grown-up. There was a bit of cattiness in his first exchange with Megyn Kelly, and his refusal to declare that he would support the GOP nominee was revealing. In the light of morning, I think Trump's visible irritation with Kelly -- obviously a popular figure among Fox News viewers! -- is going to hurt him. This morning he called in to Morning Joe to Donald Trump to complain that the moderators weren't fair to him. Yes, the guy who tells us he's going to look China, ISIS, OPEC and everyone else in the eye and stare them down is whining about debate moderators. I stick by my assessment of last night . . . Trump alters the way the rest of the field is viewed. Remember when the fear was that Ben Carson was too undisciplined and inexperienced to be the GOP standard-bearer? He comes across as a comparable statesman now -- and had a good night, with a particularly good answer on race and some good funny lines at the end. ("I've removed a half a brain; I could understand if you walk around Washington and feel like somebody beat me to it.") Remember when Ted Cruz was the bomb-thrower on the right? Now he's the guy talking about his legislative work to punish sanctuary cities. He's a guy who seemed to get lost in the shuffle at times -- but again, compared with Trump's over-the-top bombast, he comes across as serious and knowledgeable. Remember when Chris Christie was going to be the loud, boisterous voice in this field? He showed flashes of that, and really went after Rand Paul on the Patriot Act and domestic surveillance; "when you're sitting in a subcommittee, you can blow hot air like that." The thing is, if this is a preeminent issue to you, you were probably already supporting either Rand Paul or Christie on this. Marco Rubio was really, really good tonight. Shining. I thought it was interesting that he pointed out the majority of illegal immigrants no longer come from Mexico; they come from Central America, and he took some air out of the "build a fence" applause line by pointing out that "El Chapo can just dig a tunnel under the fence." He finessed what could have been a difficult question on abortions in cases of rape or incest. Heading into tonight, I thought he may offer the single most appealing contrast with Hillary Clinton, and tonight Rand Paul gets points for being the first to go after Trump, and that pugnaciousness carried over to a fiery exchange with Christie, completely with barely-hidden eye-rolling. "I know you want to give him a hug!" He lived up to his self-description as "a different kind of Republican." He came through relatively unscathed, I think. Scott Walker won with "I defunded Planned Parenthood long before any of these videos came out." In his closing statement, he described himself as "aggressively normal." He really does seem unflappable, no matter the question or the arena; to some people, that might come across as boring. But if our tastes have changed to the point where we dismiss Walker because he's not flashy enough, we're throwing out a lot of good talent. You know who was pretty boring? Jeb Bush. He was better than in the previous candidate forum, but he still has a Fred Thompson-esque sense of moseying for president, not running for president. Also, if you walked into this with a nagging sense that he's a squish, and that he'll try to sound more conservative than he is, I don't think anything he said tonight dispelled your fears. I was going to say Huckabee looked and sounded tired, but he perked up a bit discussing Planned Parenthood scandal and fetal parts "sold off for parts like Buicks." He had a good joke at the end, but he does seem like he's past his prime moment on the national stage. Luntz's group really liked Huckabee, so maybe there's some appeal there that I'm just not seeing. Again, after the pyrotechnics of Trump, maybe Huckabee comes across as a calming, kind, grandfatherly figure. John Kasich enjoyed a pretty significant home-crowd advantage, and avoided any mistakes. He's got a different style, and I don't think he needed to remind us about his dad being a mailman twice. If you're wary about his citing God in defending his decision to expand Medicaid, I don't know if his answer on that topic assured you of his fiscal conservative instincts. The Undercard Debate: A Star Is Born After a night to digest the results, I think I underestimated how much good Carly Fiorina did herself last night. Keep in mind, I thought she did really well. It's just that the post-debate analysis seemed to generate a momentum of its own -- and smacking around Chris Matthews on MSNBC immediately afterwards probably helped as well. Maybe Thursday night was a star-making moment for her. I was initially seriously underwhelmed with the "undercard" debate. Moderators Bill Hemmer and Martha MacCallum began with a series of semi-insulting "Why are you here?" questions. As oddly hostile as those questions were, Jim Gilmore and George Pataki didn't exactly dispel the skepticism greeting their bids. Apparently Pataki believes his work with a law firm after leaving office is just that extra bit of experience he needed before running for the Oval Office. Then we did a round of "What do you think of Donald Trump?" questions that seemed to be a heavy-handed effort to set off some fireworks. To her credit, Carly Fiorina swung hard and hit it far: "I didn't get a phone call from Bill Clinton before I jumped in the race. Did any of you get a phone call from Bill Clinton? I didn't. Maybe it's because I hadn't given money to the foundation or donated to his wife's Senate campaign." But again, this is the first chance these candidates get to address a national audience, and within the first 20 minutes, they're all asked to talk about another guy. Time limits make sense for a crowded stage, but with seven candidates, was there really a need to limit candidates to one-minute answers, with a little game-show bell ringing after 60 seconds? The debate is more than an hour! Then again, as usual, several of the candidates felt the need to shoehorn their slogans, talking points, and other pre-rehearsed lines into their answers, whether or not they were pertinent to the question. Oh, and the occasional laugh lines without laughter and applause lines without applause were because there was no audience. It made for awkward visuals for those of us at home and it felt like the energy and pacing for the candidates was off-key. According to Perry adviser Avik Roy, that was the GOP's decision (presumably meaning the Republican National Committee). Why? The policy questions were better. We learned President Bobby Jindal would instruct the Department of Justice and Internal Revenue Service to investigate Planned Parenthood. We learned that Lindsey Graham would send troops to Iraq again. But "Can you inspire a nation?" is not a good question. Do we expect any candidate to say, "No, no I can't. Thank you, and good night"? "What words would you use to describe Hillary?" was another fairly useless question; I know it will surprise you that all of the candidates offered harsh criticism. Last night I wrote, "It's silly to declare anyone the 'winner' of this, but since Republicans are probably least familiar with Carly Fiorina, and she certainly came across as crisp and poised, she probably did herself the most good." Probably an understatement; look for her to get a fundraising pop out of this. I get the feeling if Perry had been on the 9 p.m. debate stage, he would have gone Bruce Banner on Trump and we would have seen real fireworks. My man Bobby Jindal was himself — which I like, but apparently only a few percentage points' worth of other Republicans find most appealing. Santorum handled it all like an old pro, which I guess you could say he is. Lindsey Graham seemed strangely lacking in energy, but he continued his policy-heavy, effective campaign to be America's next secretary of defense. If Pataki and Gilmore's invitations to the next debate got lost in the mail, I don't think a lot of tears would be shed. ADDENDA: This week's pop-culture podcast: What to do when your childhood favorites get rebooted; whether people who don't live around wild animals understand them at all; summer books and Brad Thor's shift in tone; the strange ritual of coverage of celebrity breakups; and bizarre additions to vodka in China. | 
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