There’s been a lot of good opining around the blogosphere today about how it’s important for the Senate to get serious on New START now that the midterm elections are behind us. Actually, it was important before the midterms too, but such is life – Senate life in 2010, that is. Here’s a sampling:
Via the State Department: The New START Treaty: It’s Time for the Senate to Vote
Highlight: “Prepared and Ready. The Senate has been provided extensive information – 18 hearings, dozens of briefings and meetings, answers to over 900 questions for the
record, and hundreds of pages of reports, analysis and testimony.”
Via the Council for a Livable Word: Council for a Livable World’s 2010 Senate Election Analysis
Highlight: “We hope that in the next coming weeks, the Senate will give its advice and consent to the New START nuclear reductions treaty. That would be one way to advance American national security interests in what will be a significantly difficult political environment.”
Via the Union of Concerned Scientists: New Senate, New START on Track
Highlight: “Yesterday’s election results do not alter the chances for the Senate to provide its advice and consent to the New START arms control agreement. In fact, the treaty provides an excellent test case for whether the Senate will listen to the small minority of “anti-any treaty” arms control opponents, or to the overwhelming advice of the country’s military leadership and intelligence community in favor of New START. It should be a no-brainer.”
Via the Arms Control Association: New START After the Mid-Term Election
Highlight: “Senate leaders now need to put a tough campaign behind them and put U.S. national security first by acting to approve New START this year and not delaying it until next year.”
Via Laura Rozen: Kerry urges START ratification by end of year
Highlight: “It will take a week or so to sort out the pieces, but prospects for Senate approval of the New START treaty still look good,” said arms control proponent Joe Cirincione of the Plougshares Fund. “This could be the first real test of whether the Republican Party is willing to govern responsibly.”
So will it happen before the end of the year? To borrow a famous phrase: It’s too soon to tell.
