After he was busted for operating a scam PAC and fully flopping on his 1992 Garage Door Pledge, Wisconsinites have learned the hard way that "consistency" and "Senator Russ Feingold" are mutually exclusive terms – except when it comes to his ardent defense of Barack Obama’s failed foreign policy.
Just days after Iran held ten American sailors at gunpoint – and just days before Iran announced its intentions to begin construction on two new nuclear power plants, Wisconsin Watchdog reports that Senator Feingold was back on the airwaves praising President Obama for his leadership on the deal with the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism:
"[Obama’s] helped us avoid a war with Iran by having this nuclear deal that hopefully will work and prevent us from being in a situation with a country where we’ve had a very, very bad situation for like 40 or 50 years." –Senator Russ Feingold, 1/15/16
FLASHBACK:
Russ Feingold: “I think [Obama’s] foreign policy record overall has been very good.”
Unlike his blind support for President Obama, Senator Feingold has yet to share with Wisconsinites and Californians if he feels the Bern or supports Hillary Clinton – the candidate who once screamed at him "’you’re not living in the real world."
Yet, when it comes to discussing foreign policy and the escalating conflicts around the world, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, and Martin O’Malley each took a page from the Russ Feingold playbook. As Politico reported following Sunday’s debate, "Democrats leave terrorism, foreign policy out of top priorities":
Last week’s Republican debate started with fireworks over national security and terrorism and returned to the theme throughout the evening. But the three Democratic candidates debating tonight made no reference to those threats when asked to detail what their top three priorities would be in their first 100 days in the White House.
FLASHBACK:
WLUK-TV on seeking information regarding Russ Feingold’s national security positions: "[Russ Feingold’s] campaign directed FOX 11 to an opinion piece Feingold wrote in a local paper…"
Feingold all in on Obama nuclear deal with Iran
Wisconsin Watchdog | M.D. Kittle
January 19, 2016
Former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold spent part of his first interview of the election year defending President Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran — a deal most Americans are leery about, to say the least.
The Democrat, who is running against U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson to reclaim the seat he lost in the 2010 Republican revolution, said it’s only right to talk about the “great things the president has done.”
“He has accomplished some foreign policy goals we have had for a very long time,” Feingold told Sherwin Hughes, host of “The Forum,” Friday on Milwaukee’s 860 AM, WNOV.
Chief among those accomplishments, Feingold asserts, is what he believes to be Obama administration-led détente between the United States and its long-time enemy Iran.
“He’s helped us avoid a war with Iran by having this nuclear deal that hopefully will work and prevent us from having a situation with a country where we have had a very bad situation for, like, 40 or 50 years,” the Democrat said.
The nuclear agreement, opposed by Republicans and some Democrats, lifts economic sanctions against Iran in exchange for Iran agreeing to give up its nuclear weapons program. There are no guarantees, however, that a nation that has declared “death to America” will abide by the terms of the agreement, despite more oversight granted to international inspectors.
Obama administration officials argue the deal already is paying peace dividends, and that the amelioration of tensions between the two nations was on display following last week’s release of 10 U.S. Navy sailors captured and held briefly by Iran.
But footage of the sailors being captured, on their knees with their hands behind their heads, doesn’t sit well with many Americans and their lawmakers. CNN reported Friday that, according to a well-connected U.S. defense official, the sailors were told by their captors to “act happy” while they were being videotaped during their detention.
The sailors were held at gunpoint, according to new information released Monday by the U.S. military.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the Obama administration wasn’t willing to hold Iran accountable because it is too invested in the nuclear deal.
“The administration is pretending as if nothing out of the ordinary has occurred,” he said in a statement. It “places our Navy and Coast Guard vessels and the men and women who sail them at increased risk in the future.”
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Most Americans have opposed the nuclear agreement with the United States’ longtime enemy from the start. Just before the deal survived Congress, just 21 percent of respondents in a Pew Polls survey said they approved.
In December, a Pew Research Center poll found 62 percent of Americans (79 percent of Republicans, 60 percent of independents and 52 percent of Democrats) believe Iran’s nuclear program is a major threat to the United States, up from 59 percent in a similar poll from August 2014 — more than a year before the Obama-led nuclear deal was saved by congressional Democrats.
Feingold, based on his comments to the Milwaukee radio show, is all-in on the Obama deal.
The godfather of campaign finance reform has been less-than-Russ-Feingold in his latest campaign, breaking with his past pledges to avoid special interest donations, out-of-state cash and big bundlers.
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Johnson campaign spokesman Brian Reisinger said Feingold is so liberal his foreign policy is “downright dangerous.”
“His support for President Obama’s reckless Iran deal is another example of how Senator Feingold’s far-out ideology would put our nation at risk,” Reisinger said. “Senator Feingold’s decision to take gobs of money from a special interest group that lobbied for the Iran deal like J-Street proves he’s even traded in his principles on campaign finance too.”
Feingold’s campaign has not returned several requests for comment.