Becket Adams
The Blaze
9/3/2013
…“If we do not say that the Constitution applies, if we do not say explicitly that we will abide by this vote,” the senator lectured, “you’re making a joke of us. You’re making us into theater. And so we play Constitutional theater for the president.”
Secretary Kerry became visibly agitated.
“If this real, you will abide by the verdict of Congress,” Paul said.
“Senator,” Kerry said, “I assure you there’s nothing meaningless and there’s everything real.”
“Only if you adhere to what we vote on,” Paul responded. “Only if our vote makes a difference.”
“And I will leave to the man who was elected to be the President of the United States the responsibility for telling you what his decision is if and when that moment came,” Kerry said. “But the president intends to win this vote and he’s not going to make prior announcements.”…
The complete article is at The Blaze.
“We don’t believe we are going to war in the classic sense,” Kerry said. “The president is not asking you to go to war.”
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Related: Obama uses his Republican lapdogs on Syria
…No doubt many Republicans in Congress will support military action. Those who are hawkish never saw a war or a military operation they didn’t like. But this is not the conservative-libertarian perspective. Constitutionalists support war only when there is a direct threat to the U.S. homeland or our allies with whom we have binding mutual defense treaties. We have no such treaty at play in Syria. This is a civil war with Syrians fighting Syrians. And the nation has not in any way remotely suggested any threat to the United States whatsoever.
What, then, is the Constitutional justification for going to war or conducting a military strike?
In the Syrian case, there isn’t one. Thus, what Obama proposes, and what Republicans McCain, Graham, Boehner, and Cantor support, is entirely illegal.
Kerry, Hagel claim inaction on Syria ‘dangerous’ for US; skeptics warn of ‘war’
Kerry ‘Thinking Out Loud’ About Putting Boots on the Ground in Syria
Or telling us they’re already there?
An outright ban on ground troops sought by Republicans was left out of the resolution.
Dem Congresswoman: ‘Only Reason’ I’d Vote to Strike Syria Would Be ‘Loyalty’ to Obama
The District of Columbia’s non-voting delegate to Congress says that because of her uncertainty about striking Syria, the only reason she would see herself voting to authorize military action would be out of “loyalty” to a fellow Democrat in President Obama…
Bodansky: What If Bashar Didn’t Do It?
…”What if Al-Qaeda is setting off their own chemical weapons on their own people, if the rebels are nerve gassing their own people to create exactly what is happening, us mobilizing to get rid of Bashar because they can’t for some reason.” So they use chemical weapons on their people, it gets blamed on Bashar, we go in and take Bashar out or do something and end up on the same side as “the rebels,” in this case Al-Qaeda.
What if Bashar is being framed?
What if Bashar didn’t do it?…
…do you remember when the Syrian rebels overran and controlled a government base that had chemical weapons last summer? Even Leon Panetta admitted that chemical weapons may have fallen into their hands. This was last summer. I doubt that you remembered this. I doubt that anybody remembers it. Even people who keep up with the news every day, I doubt that anybody remembers that, so I want to remind you.
Syrian rebels — the same rebels that we’re talking about today — overran and controlled a government base, a Bashar Assad base, admittedly, that had chemical weapons last summer. And even Leon Panetta admitted that chemical weapons may have fallen into the hands of the opposition last summer. Now meanwhile, John Kerry and the regime and the media have used as their main argument the rebels have never had access to these chemical weapons…
Update: Wacko Birds vs. Angry Birds: This Time it’s War The Syria vote marks a key gut check in the GOP’s—and America’s—conflict of visions
…”Between Ted [Cruz] and [Utah Sen.] Mike [Lee] and I, that nucleus, I think, is becoming less the Wacko Bird conference, and more the future of the party,” Paul told me. Or as [Congressman Justin] Amash Tweeted yesterday, “GWB-era foreign policy is nearly extinct among GOP grassroots. Some Rs in DC either didn’t get the memo or haven’t been home in a while.”…
Update 2: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Dempsey, Pulls the Rug Out From Under SoS Kerry
