Like Kristol, Cotton has a huge hard on for going to war with Iran. When iran and the P5+1 made their first step nuclear agreement in Geneva, Cotton called it a “humiliating defeat” for the U.S. and a “total victory” for Iran. He's also pushed for more sanctions which would lead to war with Iran. Also, Cotton tried to push this bill through the House:Weekly Standard editor and neoconservative leader Bill Kristol is fed up with America’s loss of appetite for war and he wants Rep. Tom Cotton (R-AR) — who is running for the U.S. Senate in Arkansas — to help him out.“American war-weariness isn’t new,” Kristol wrote in a piece published on Monday. “Using it as an excuse to avoid maintaining our defenses or shouldering our responsibilities isn’t new, either. But that doesn’t make it admirable.”
On this anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, which Kristol and his friends whole-heartedly championed, he called on Republicans to rally Americans into believing that using military action to solve the country’s problems can be acceptable again. “A war-weary public can be awakened and rallied. Indeed, events are right now doing the awakening. All that’s needed is the rallying. And the turnaround can be fast,” he implored.
Exactly one year ago, Kristol published what is essentially the exact same plea he made this week. “The task of GOP political leaders is to educate the public about the dangers of the world and to inspire people to rise above their [war] weariness,” he wrote in a March 18, 2003 Weekly Standard article.
The man for the job? Tom Cotton. “He’s not stale or moss-covered,” Kristol said at the time. “A combat veteran, he understands real war weariness. But he also understands it needs to be resisted and overcome.”
It’s no secret that Kristol prefers the military option in dealing with Iran’s nuclear program. Perhaps that’s why he’s re-launching his war-isn’t-so-bad campaign: the U.S. and its international partners (the P5+1) are closer to resolving the nuclear stand-off with Iran diplomatically than they were a year ago and polling continues to show that Americans prefer diplomacy over war with Iran. - Think Progress, 3/19/14
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
Scary shit, right? No wonder Kristol loves this guy. Now I admit that I'm not a big fan of Senator Mark Pryor (D. AR) but I would rather keep him in the Senate than have Cotton on an sort of Senate Committee. He's a real threat to Pryor's re-election bid and that's why Democrats are hitting him hard:Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) on Wednesday offered legislative language that would "automatically" punish family members of people who violate U.S. sanctions against Iran, levying sentences of up to 20 years in prison.The provision was introduced as an amendment to the Nuclear Iran Prevention Act of 2013, which lays out strong penalties for people who violate human rights, engage in censorship, or commit other abuses associated with the Iranian government.
Cotton also seeks to punish any family member of those people, "to include a spouse and any relative to the third degree," including, "parents, children, aunts, uncles, nephews, nieces, grandparents, great grandparents, grandkids, great grandkids," Cotton said.
"There would be no investigation," Cotton said during Wednesday's markup hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee. "If the prime malefactor of the family is identified as on the list for sanctions, then everyone within their family would automatically come within the sanctions regime as well. It'd be very hard to demonstrate and investigate to conclusive proof."
The amendment immediately sparked objections from several members of the Foreign Affairs Committee, who noted that the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees due process rights to anyone charged with a crime under American law. - Huffington Post, 5/22/13
If you want to get involved or donate to Pryor's campaign, you can do so here:The latest ad, backed by a $150,000 TV buy from the pro-Democratic super-PAC Patriot Majority, attacks Cotton as a pawn of Wall Street.
"The real Tom Cotton? Just scratch the surface," the ad's narrator says as Cotton's face is shown on a scratch-off lottery ticket. "Cotton made hundreds of thousands of dollars working for corporate interests. In Congress he takes their campaign cash, luxury trips around the country, and then backs their schemes: Privatizing social security, gambling it on Wall Street, pledging to keep tax breaks that ship jobs overseas. The real Tom Cotton? A politician we just can't trust." - The Hill, 3/19/14
