He doesn't waste any time

Would not any treaty have to be ratified by the Senate?

When does he impose the Stupid Import Bans which are not part of an Treaty though.

Why do you think he thinks that Senate ratification matters in the least? He'll just implement it via executive order, and Reid will deem it passed.

While the Senate won't ratify a gun ban at this time, even some Republicans support registration and background checks for transfers, so if that is in the treaty it may be ratified by the Senate. Registration greatly increases the temptation for confiscation. You also have to watch out for expensive little harassment like fees, taxes, endless paperwork with extreme penalties for the slightest mistake, elaborate training or testing requirements, etc.

Also, even if the treaty isn't ratified now, it will be waiting and ready whenever the Democrats can get the numbers they need in the Senate. After the Democrats open us up for massive Democratic immigration, they may finally get the super majority they need.

Ratification needs a 2/3 super-majority in the Senate. But, my copy of the Constitution says "...provided two thirds of the Senators PRESENT concur...". (emphasis mine).

Look for them to set up a situation where they have enough to make a quorum and get their 2/3.

Note that such a treaty is not "self-executing". It doesn't matter what it requires the US to do in terms of e.g. a national registration regime, unless the Congress passes laws overturning the current prohibition on establishing one it can't legally happen or be required.

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And if they moderate their demands, we might be OK. Remains to be seen. In the meanwhile, our market is so healthy more and more foreign companies are setting up US operations, so I don't think we'd suffer that much.

The missing paragraph from above after tweaking to get past spam filter:

It could be bad for importing foreign ammo and the world-wide sourcing of parts for the manufacture of guns in the US (the Executive can already ban import based on the GCA of '68, as G. H. W. Bush did for semi-auto assault rifles and building or modifying one in the US with too many foreign components, something we're still living with)....

And the final bit:

... but the extremes demanded by the usual suspects (read the article, where one guy seems to be very upset the Syrian rebels can get guns and ammo) are what killed the last one, and may well the next and so on.

I am worried about his nascent odious Executive Order Import Bans.

Marcus Poulin: so am I; I'm into the current SIG Sauer 55x ecosystem, so an import ban could more than inconvenience me. Sort of like the people who bought civilian versions of the Daewoo K2 rifle, which is supposed to be very good, but after the G. H. W. Bush executive import ban became unserviceable. No doubt for political reasons and the relatively low sales at the time the South Koreans didn't attempt to set up anything in the US to get around this.

A lot more SIG 55x's have been sold here, but I gather some critical parts are only made in Europe and it would be pretty to very expensive to completely manufacture everything here, and if they view regime risk as too high.... E.g. they could in theory move their tooling here, but if the US is acting insane about this again I can see them sticking with their current German manufacturing setup. While the German arms export regime is limiting, I gather it's a lot more stable (and note they're partnering in Germany because of Swiss export restrictions).

Once it is signed, the US is duty bound to support the treaty internationally.

Treaties HAVE to meet constitutional muster. The power is to make treaties "UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF THE UNITED STATES". That ENTIRE authority is restricted to the powers of the Constitution AND those powers are circumscribed by the Amendments. Thus any treaty must conform to the 2nd amendment in order to be legitimate. Still, the feds have bigger guns and are willing to use them.

Let me expand. The Constitution is a single document. No clause can be properly read or understood without scrutiny of the rest of the document. The effects and affects of every interlocking clause must be evaluated. Most often the Constitution is read like the Bible or like most news using sound bites.

Take the "general Welfare" clause for instance. 99% of the folks out there ignore the prepositional clause that follows and restricts the "general Welfare".

Treaties that meet constitutional scrutiny become the law of the land but treaties cannot be above the constitution and cannot alter the constitution because without the constitution, there is no treaty power. Congress and everything else federal is subordinate to the Constitution, and that includes treaties.

FWB, while I agree with you in principle, the reality is that the Constitution is ignored when convenient (e.g. the 10th Amendment). An unconstitutional treaty can easily become the law of the land.

Even if someone could challenge it and (a decade later) be heard before the Supreme Court, the actual text of the Constitution is just a minor annoyance that the justices must "interpret" to support their ideology.