RUSH: Now the Paris Climate Accord, treaty, whatever you want to call it. For the longest time people have believed that it’s really toothless, that it’s ceremonial. The Paris agreement’s an offshoot of the United Nations international planetary communal BS climate change organization, whatever they call it. There are 197 potential signatories, nations, to this. And we’ve been told that it’s really just a handshake, that there’s no mandate. There’s nothing binding. It actually is more just a statement of attitude, more like a promise to commit to caring about the effects of man-made climate change and a promise to work with other community nations in dealing with it.

It’s far, far from that. It is indeed hideous, and it is deceptive, and those practicing the deception — weaving this intricate web of deceit — are also Americans, as well as others from around the world who are united in their belief that the United States represents the singular target that must be cut down to size in order to further the concept of global community. The Paris climate agreement… I’m being assisted here by a piece written by Andrew McCarthy at PJMedia.com. His column is entitled, “Don’t Stop with Paris.”

Let me give you some pull quotes here. The column starts thus: “It is welcome news that President Trump will pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement.” I don’t think that’s happened yet, which is why I’m so focused on this today. He hasn’t done it. All we’ve had is leaks from the White House saying that he’s going to, that the decision’s gonna be announced soon. But there was another obvious leak from the White House in the last couple hours, ’cause Fox has been running a graphic saying the president has not reached a decision on this yet.

We know that there are people in his administration, on his staff, in the White House who are in favor of this tomfoolery and are trying to influence him that he’s wrong in his instinctive feelings about climate change and ought to sign on to this. And there are others who are trying to get him to remain true to his statements, his instincts, and his promises during the campaign. So Andy begins, “It is welcome news that President Trump will pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement.

“The [agreement] promises to damage the economy while surrendering American sovereignty over climate policy to yet another international, largely anti-American enterprise.” That is inarguable, my friends. There’s no debate about this. American sovereignty will be surrendered, and we will cease being a separate and distinct nation. We will cease to have our superpower status, and our climate policy — which incorporates health and economic policy — will be mandated by the terms of this agreement, if we sign it.

There’s literally no common-sense reason to sign it. There’s no scientific reason to sign it for sure. There is no good-vibe reason to sign this. There isn’t a good reason at all to sign this. There is not one even tiny upside to signing this, Mr. President. Some pull quotes: “The Paris climate agreement is a treaty. We are not talking here about a bob-and-weave farce like the Iran nuclear deal. That arrangement, the ‘Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,’ was shrewdly packaged as an ‘unsigned understanding’ — concurrently spun, depending on its apologists’ need of the moment, as a non-treaty…”

Now, the reason that they’re telling us that the Paris Accord is a nontreaty is because that evades the requirements of the Constitution to ratify it. The Iran deal has never been ratified. The Senate wouldn’t do it. The Iran deal… That’s why it’s not a treaty. This is not a treaty. A treaty must be ratified by the Senate. This treaty would never… Obama wouldn’t even present the Paris Accord to the Senate because there is not a senate that would sign on to this. Even when the Democrats ran the Senate, they would not sign on to this.

It is that horrible. Certainly, this Senate would not sign on to it. It’s two-thirds, by the way, folks, of the Senate that must sign to ratify. So they present this as “a binding international commitment” in order to timid the Trump administration into staying in it. Hey, it’s not a treaty! You don’t have to get the Senate involved. You don’t have to go up to Capitol Hill to argue to those knuckleheads. It’s not a treaty; we don’t need to go the constitutional route. You can sign it, Mr. President, and commit us to nothing.

“Under Article 18 of the treaty on treaties…” Did you know such a thing existed? I didn’t, either. There is a treaty that we signed on treaties. It would be like a driving license manual on driving licenses. There’s a treaty on treaties. “Under Article 18 of the treaty on treaties, once a nation signs a treaty — or merely does something that could be interpreted as ‘express[ing] its consent to be bound by the treaty’ — that nation is ‘obliged to refrain from acts which would defeat the object and purpose of the treaty.'”

Let me translate: “Under Article 18 of the treaty on treaties, once a nation … does something that could be interpreted as ‘express[ing] its consent to be bound by the treaty,'” that is essentially signing and ratifying a treaty. Real-world example: The Paris climate accords are being talked about and Trump says, “You know, I can see where this thing might have some value. We, the United States, are not willing to sign this, but we’re willing to work with nations on it.”

That would be the same… That’s the equivalent of signing the treaty. All you have to do is express your agreement to be bound by it. A handshake. It’s a trick! It’s a trick in order to get a nation to commit to a treaty without having to go to the Senate to get two-thirds of them to vote for it. Our own treaty on treaties binds us to a treaty when all we’ve done is said we support the elements. It takes the Constitution totally out of the mix!

In other words, the Constitution notwithstanding, once an administration signs or otherwise signals its agreement to the terms of any international agreement, the United States must consider itself duly bound. All it has to do is sign something that’s not a treaty or signal in diplomatic channels that we assent to the terms, that becomes the equivalent of a treaty having been signed, even though the Senate has not approved it, even though it has not been ratified.

And that’s the trick. And that is what’s happening here with the Paris Accord. The reason why this is important beyond the obvious, if a subsequent president wants to get the United States out from under the Paris Accord, it’s not enough to refrain from submitting the treaty to the Senate. The later president must take an affirmative action that withdraws the prior president’s assent. That is why Trump can’t just ignore the agreement.

He needs to openly and notoriously pull out of it He cannot say he likes it. He cannot say he understands it. He cannot say that he agrees with it in principle but isn’t gonna sign it. He can’t say any of that. If he commits to it just verbally by signaling that he understands, that he’s willing to pledge the United States assistance, even though he says he’s not gonna sign it, he doesn’t have to because of the treaty on treaties.

And the reason it’s important that it’s a treaty is that it just can’t be undone with an executive order by a new president. Once it is a treaty, then there is a convoluted process to withdraw from a treaty that does involve going to the Senate and getting two-thirds of a vote and dealing with the international body with whom the treaty is made. It is a mess. It’s also designed as such so as to make it much more difficult to get out of this than it ever was to get into it.

So in summary, the Paris Accord is not a treaty, but yet it could end up being enforced as one because of our own law called the treaty on treaties, which simply says that if we announce support in principle, that if we sign an ancillary document promising to do what we can, that is the same thing as the Senate ratifying it with two-thirds of the Senate voting. It is a trick by globalists to get the United States to sign a treaty — by the way — well, I say trick. The people that voted for this understood exactly what they were doing. Nobody was tricked here except the American people.

I don’t mean to imply that members of Congress or the Senate were tricked. They knew exactly what they were doing. This is like hiring a blue ribbon commission to close military bases so they get the blame for it rather than you in the House of Representatives or Senate actually being on a committee and announcing the base closures. “I didn’t close the base, Mabel, I didn’t do it. I know your son, your family have been working there 20 years and they lost their job, but the blue ribbon panel did it. I did everything I could.” Same thing here. “I didn’t sign that treaty. Don’t blame me.” That got done by hook and crook. It’s nothing more than a mechanism to avoid the Constitution.

It is a mechanism to commit the United States to things that are drastically, horribly detrimental to us without going through the constitutional process that ratifies such treaties. It substitutes verbal consent of agreement in principle, say, as the equivalent of a signature and two-thirds of the Senate voting to affirm. The American people are being told, “It’s toothless.” In fact, here’s the message that’s being used by the media to try to convince Trump to sign this.

“Look, there’s no real commitment here. This thing is just a piece of paper. There’s no force of law. It has no binding agreement. In fact, Trump could probably –” this is the kicker. They’re trying to say Trump could actually gain some ground with people that don’t support him by signing on to this ’cause it isn’t gonna hurt him. “It’s not gonna bother his own fans because his voters are gonna understand it’s a nothing burger. So Trump can really score some points with people that oppose him by signing on to this thing and not harm and not break a promise.”

And that is not true. If he signs on to this, it is a huge promise broken. It is a huge violation of trust. It may be something insurmountable for the president and his base to sign on to this. It is not harmless. If you want to get the details of what happens in this thing, we’ll link to it at RushLimbaugh.com. It’s kind of heavy reading and I’ll summarize it here if I have time in the remaining moments of the program, but it’s a direct assault on the U.S. economy disguised as something else.

It penalizes all these things I talked about in the last half hour, penalizes economic growth, targets improved standards of living as evidence of climate change, evidence of planetary destruction. It’s hideous. The president has no business even thinking about signing this. And anybody in his administration urging him to sign this has a death wish for him. Promise you that.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Hey, folks, I committed a small faux error in my most recent monologue about the Paris agreement. The issue is not whether President Trump signs it. That was the wrong approach. Obama already has signed it. The task before President Trump is to literally pull us out of it. Obama has already signed the Paris Accord. The Senate would not ratify it. Which is why the treaty on treaties treats it as a treaty, because the president already signed it. The treaty on treaties is the equivalent of Senate ratification. Obama’s signature is what triggers the treaty on treaties obligation to follow it, even though it hasn’t been ratified.

So the question is whether Trump will pull us out of it. He must make the affirmative step of literally pulling us out of it. If he does nothing, we are still bound not to do anything to undermine it. If he doesn’t do anything, if Trump comes out and says he’s committing to it, Obama’s already done that for us. Obama’s already committed the United States to this.

Trump must pull us out of it. If he doesn’t, if Trump says, “I’m not gonna sign it,” then he’s fooling us because it’s already signed, it’s already in place. And if Trump does nothing we are still bound not to undermine it as a nation. We must make every effort to accede to it. Trump needs to formally announce that he is withdrawing Obama’s consent.

Now, to withdraw, the president just needs to take an affirmative, “We withdraw Obama’s signature.” He doesn’t have to go to the Senate because we didn’t go to the Senate to have it ratified. If the Senate had ratified it, then we would have had to go unratify it, so to speak. Even with a treaty that is ratified after Senate approval, the president can withdraw us without having to go back to the Senate.

Bush 43 did this unilaterally, withdrew us from the ABM treaty with Russia in 2002 on the ground that the party we made the treaty, the USSR, Soviet Union, no longer existed. The left blew up at that. But Trump has to pull us out. It takes an affirmative, you might want to look at it as a negative — it is an affirmative action. He must withdraw, take us out, deny, and cancel Obama’s signature on this thing.

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RUSH: Now, this treaty on treaties that you’ve never heard of? Do you know that it hasn’t even been ratified? There’s so much unconstitutional or extraconstitutional stuff that has gone on over the years designed to weaken, to deteriorate, to extinguish the uniqueness, greatness the United States of America before all of these global organizations and bodies — led, of course, by United Nations. It’s been a long-standing objective to chop the United States down to size, to eliminate the whole concept of American exceptionalism, America as a superpower. By law.

They can’t do it economically. Nobody can outcompete us, outproduce us. But by law they can penalize us and restrict us, and the treaty on treaties — which effectively allows treaties to be ratified without the Senate, meaning it’s extra- or unconstitutional? Not even that treaty on treaties has been ratified! So here’s the bottom line with all of this: The Paris climate agreement is a treaty because of the way the treaty on treaties treats these kinds of agreements. Obama signed it; that makes it a treaty, even though the Senate never ratified it.

Once a presidential administration signs or otherwise signals assent to the terms of the agreement, like this Paris thing, the U.S. is bound. Even though the Senate has not approved it, even though it’s not been ratified. If the subsequent president, like Trump, wants to get the U.S. out from under this, it’s not enough merely to refrain from submitting the treaty to the Senate. In other words, Trump just can’t send it up to the Senate and have them de-ratify it since they haven’t been ratified it in the first place.

The president must take an affirmative action that withdraws the prior president’s assent via signature, in this case Obama. Trump cannot just ignore it. It’s not a case of where, “Well, if we don’t do anything, we’re not committed to it.” We’re already committed to this. Which is why they’re trying to calm everybody’s fears by telling them, “It’s not a treaty. It has no teeth. There’s nothing binding! It’s just a statement of goodwill and good intentions by member nations.” It’s not.

It is a hard-and-fast agreement that targets the United States as the primary culprit and requires the United States to carry the primary burden in fixing what isn’t broken, in stopping what isn’t happening: Man-made climate change. So Donald Trump must affirmatively announce we are withdrawing. He can’t say, “We’re not signing it.” If he says, “I’ve chosen not to sign it,” he’s fooling us. It’s already signed. He has to withdraw from it — and I’m here to tell you: The pressure on him inside his own White House must be intense.

You know the names of the people that are reported to be the globalists, the Gary Cohn guy and… Why do I have trouble remembering this woman’s name? Dina Powell. There’s some… I guess… See, I think it’s Nina something or other. Dina Powell and maybe Jared Kushner might form the triumvirate that wants this to remain in force. There’s a lot of money to be made on this, by the way. Look how much money Algore’s made. Look how much Tom Steyer’s made. Look how much these leftist globalists make. Look how wealthy they are.

In addition to the ideological component here, folks, there are trillions of dollars. They talk about the military-industrial complex? The climate complex dwarfs it. It is incredible the amount of money here. Algore is just one example of how it can be made, trading carbon credits, pollution credits. Those are just two of a myriad number of… It means it’s also a cash grab. As I said the other day: Washington, D.C. is the wealthiest city in the world.

Every year, $3.5 trillion pours in there, and it’s the most powerful city in the world, and everybody in the world is trying to influence what happens there, and everybody in the world is trying to get as much money out of that town every year as they can. And the people that have the least access to it are the citizens of this country, because they’re the ones paying for it! They’re the ones who are putting the $3.5 trillion in that pot every year!

And everybody else in the world’s trying to get their grubby hands on it, in addition to American leftists and liberals who’d rather try to siphon a portion of it rather than work. (They probably consider it work.) It’s hideous. Trump must actively take us out. The pressure on him has got to be intense. But to me, this is a no-brainer. Mr. President, if you don’t take us out of this, there is no way you can make America great again. America cannot be great in the ways you define it and the ways you have targeted for rebirth and remaking.

You can’t do it if we’re signatories to this thing, because we become the targets. We become the blame. We become the source of the problem. We must bear the burden, financial, economic, of supposedly addressing this nonexistent issue: Man-made planetary destruction. Don’t forget, it’s not even man-made climate change. What they’re trying to tell everybody is we’re destroying the planet, folks, and they sadly convinced a whole bunch of young people it’s actually in progress and happening. Just take us out! If you want to make America great again, you can’t do it with the United States maintaining its current position in the Paris Accord.

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RUSH: You have all heard the name Elon Musk. You know who Elon Musk is? Elon Musk is the founder of Tesla. He’s one of most subsidized Americans out there. Well, I mean, if you look at subsidizes as welfare. I mean, if he hadn’t gotten the subsidies, there wouldn’t be any Tesla. Let’s just put it that way. What is it, how many billions in subsidies has Tesla received? It’s significant.

Anyway, he’s on one of Trump’s scientific or technological advisory committees. Well, Elon Musk, he’s been under pressure from Silicon Valley to get out of that because they hate Trump, and they think Musk is a traitor. They can’t understand why Musk ever signed on to Trump’s committees, so they’ve been razzing him ever since it happened. I guess they finally got to him ’cause Elon Musk has tweeted that he will leave the Donald Trump advisory committees on technology and whatever if Trump withdraws from the Paris Climate Accord or treaty.

I say, “See ya in the rearview mirror, Elon.” So we’ll see. Trump is gonna be under intense pressure on this ’cause this is ball game for the left. This is salvation city. Not to mention the whole Goldman Sachs crowd, I mean, the money to be made here. These people don’t care about the things you and I do when it comes to the state of the nation, the state of freedom and liberty. Those are so old-fashioned and quaint, so beneath us. There’s money to be made here. There’s power to be achieved. There’s a global infrastructure to build and run. Good Lord, you’re worried about freedom? Get with it, man, is what they would say to me.

And that’s the intense pressure Trump’s gonna be under. And in the Elon Musk story here they’re saying: “The pressure being brought to bear on President Trump by his voters, who routinely do not believe in science and who think that there’s no scientific basis for the –” just mock them, make fun of them, bunch of idiots, and that’s who Trump’s loyalties are with, ’cause Trump’s an idiot, too, you see. So this is how they’re trying to pressure him.