Some things have become oh-so-predictable with this President. The headline in the Wall St. Journal “Obama Rebukes Critics of Iran Deal” reminds us all, once again, that here is a man with virtually no credibility when it comes to honest dealings with domestic critics — in Congress and the public. Instead, he believes the Mullahs of Iran are trustworthy, summarily announcing he will veto any bill that prevents his Iran deal from being implemented. So much for“advice and consent”.

Since 2006, the U.N. Security Council has passed more than six resolutions designed to stop or reverse Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons technology, in one form or another: Resolutions 1696, 1737, 1747, 1803, 1835, and 1929 as of late 2010. More have passed since then that are redundant reinforcements of these earlier ones. Iran has either refused to comply with, evaded, obfuscated responses to, or outright cheated on all of these resolutions. Well, that seems like a worthy regime to trust, wouldn’t you say? Susan? Chellie? Angus?

The primary inspection agency of the UN is the International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA. As early as 2003, the IAEA had determined that Iran had for the previous 18 years (at least) been secretly pursuing and developing technologies used to produce highly enriched uranium, were on a path to nuclear weapons, and had not revealed the existence of several nuclear related activities and facilities. All this is in violation of the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

In late 2002, an Iranian dissident group had revealed to the world the existence of several secret nuclear facilities in Iran that were clear evidence of the regime’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, according to an episode of the PBS series Frontline.

Iran’s government did not care that they had been exposed as liars and cheats; they simply carried on and denied the UN had any authority to restrict their use of nuclear technology “for peaceful purposes.” All the while chanting, “Death to America,” and supplying weaponry to Hamas, Hezbollah, and Syria’s Bashar Assad.

Erroneously, the US National Intelligence Estimate in December 2007 concluded with “high confidence” that Iran’s nuclear program had been suspended in the fall of 2003. Keep that date in mind. That would be ten years before the false moderate, Hassan Rouhani, would be elected Iran’s next president in 2013, during which time many thousands of advanced centrifuges would be built, installed, and actively enriching uranium, deep underground at Fordow; all in defiance of previous UN resolutions.

In 2013, it was reported that Obama adviser, Valerie Jarret, was negotiating in secret with Iran, before the P5+1 group in Geneva convened, according to The Times of Israel. The White House, of course, denied this report as “100 percent inaccurate.” Naturally, we believed them, right?

June 2015, Secretary of State John Kerry claims, “We know what they did. We have no doubt. We have absolute knowledge with respect to the certain military activities they were engaged in. What we’re concerned about is going forward.” Apparently the façade of legacy building was more important than due diligence. Secretary Kerry’s response is either deliberately untruthful, or woefully naive. Only weeks before, Yukiya Amano, the head of the IAEA, in referring to the unknowns in Iran said, “We don’t know whether they have undeclared activities or something else .We don’t know what they did in the past. So, we know a part of their activities, but we cannot say we know all their activities. And that is why we cannot say that all the activities in Iran (are for) peaceful purposes.”

It is implausible that a valid agreement could be made if we have no idea of the baseline of violations and the technologies involved. To allow the Iranians to dictate who inspects and where, that they will provide soil samples, etc. without any outside inspectors to verify validity is the fox living in the hen house. To this day, even after more than five years of trying, the Iranian regime has refused to allow the IAEA to interview Mohsen Fakhrizadeh-Mahabadi, the Iranian military officer believed to have supervised weaponization work through 2003.

In truth, the JCPOA is flawed in so many basic ways that for the President to claim it is the best deal — or a path towards a safer world — is preposterous fantasizing. So is his claim that there is no alternative other than war. One has to wonder at the larger, long-term implications of the abdication of American alliances that Obama’s foreign policies seem designed to foster.

The claim of “snap-back sanctions” as a credible method of ensuring Iranian compliance.

JCPOA Paragraphs 26 & 27: “If sanctions are reinstated in whole or in part, Iran will treat that as grounds to cease performing its commitments … in whole or in part.” In other words, give us the 150-plus billion dollars now, if we feel like cheating, we will, if you re-impose sanctions for any reason, we will disavow the deal and walk away. The snap-back sanctions claim is false to begin with, and they know it.

The claim that the Iran deal depends on verification, not trust— that IAEA inspections will be intrusive and anywhere they want to be, at any time (after a 24 day notice period!) is equally false.

It was revealed last week that Senators Tom Cotton and Mike Pompeo traveled to Vienna, met with IAEA officials, and learned that there were at least two “secret side deals” made with Iran by the IAEA, and perhaps others, according to commentary in The Wall Street Journal. Astoundingly, the Obama administration claimed to have A) not fully reviewed these deals, B) admitted they had not revealed their existence to Congress, and worse, C) would not even push the Iranians to provide the text in full.

July 31, on Al-Jazeera TV, Ali Akar Velayati, senior adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, when questioned about U.N. inspections of Iran’s military sites, responded this way: (MEMRI translation) “Regardless of how the P5+1 countries interpret the nuclear agreement, their entry into our military sites is absolutely forbidden .The entry of any foreigner, including IAEA inspectors or any other inspector, to the sensitive military sites of the Islamic Republic is forbidden, no matter what.”

Interviewer: “That’s final?”

Ali Akar Velayati: “Yes, final.”

President Obama’s pre- emptive request to the UN Security Council for a vote first, in an attempt to checkmate Congress, and box them in by implying vote-against-me-and-youare betraying-the UN Security Council, demonstrates dishonesty in his dealings with Congress and an attempt to make the Constitution of the United States meaningless.

Considering the above, Congress must bypass the bill known as The Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act as irrelevant. This act of Congress, S615, does not address several of the critical giveaways in (what is known to date) the agreement, and provides a flawed mechanism for creating a vetoproof majority.

Congress should pass a joint resolution declaring this Iran “ agreement” to be, in fact, a treaty, and proceed to schedule a vote in the Senate within 30 days. This is a crisis vote. When even staunch Democrats as Sen. Charles Schumer, and noted liberal attorney Alan Dershowitz vehemently oppose this deal as they do, one must realize that the bipartisan opposition ought to be recognized as a red flag.

No deal is better than this terrible deal.

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Another View, a Maine Press Association award-winning column, is written on a rotating basis by a member of a group of Mid-coast citizens that meet to discuss issues they think are of public interest.