The Cable’s Josh Rogin has added an important update to his February 24 story on the allegedly bleak prospects for a Senate ratification vote on New START in 2010. According to a spokesperson for Senate majority leader Harry Reid,
Senator Reid has long been expecting to receive and consider the START treaty during the 2010 calendar year. We have seen nothing to this point that would alter this expectation. Arms control treaties have always been handled in a bipartisan manner and, once the Senate receives all the details on this particular treaty, Senator Reid is confident this tradition, which is critical to our national security, will continue.
Clearly the longer it takes for the U.S. and Russia to actually complete New START, the more difficult it will be to get a ratification vote in 2010. But Reid’s statement demonstrates that the judgment expressed by Rogin’s “multiple Hill sources” was premature and that these sources may have come from only one side of the aisle.
