Update: A Washington Post article is there–read it all.
A NY Times article is now there.
A Statement says the House will consider the measure on Syrian military action the week of Sept. 9–check it out.
Final Update: the full text is now available–read it all.
I wasn’t expecting the President to break into live US Open Tennis coverage. Interesting.
Bush went to Congress knowing he had an international coalition. This feckless leader goes to Congress knowing he has no international support. So he can blame Congress for inaction. Gad, has the country ever seen such a pathetic leader.
I for one think this is a very skillful political move. And I say that as someone who is not a fan of this president, at all. He boxed himself in with his careless bravado about “red lines” and such. And then got goaded into taking a hard line by Britain and France. Now everyone is saying his credibility is on the line (which to some degree is true). But I really think he wants to find a face saving way out of this mess. He is getting intel and warnings from up and down the chain of command that any attack is going to be problematic in terms of objectives and likely results. And it could seriously add to the instability in the region. The only people who want an attack right now are are the ones trying to isolate Iran, namely Israel Turkey Lebanon and to some degree Britain. The British have of course their own issues.
So if Zero wants some kind of way out of this, where he can lay the blame elsewhere, this is a brilliant move. It also has the added advantage (with Obama a pure coincidence to be sure) of being the constitutionally correct course of action.
“International coalition?” The British House of Commons nixed the UK’s participation in an attack on Syria, so that leaves the French and the Turks, whose abilities to do anything except provide bases are very limited. In any case, Obama is a fool.
Please, no one look at that lady claiming the fifth. Look at the bad guys. The bad guys aren’t us. They are not the NSA looking at everything you have ever typed. The bad guys are the Muslims. Nevermind Benghazi. Those guys didn’t count. What counts is Muslims killing Muslims…not Muslims killing Americans. Nevermind that those Americans were sending surface to air missiles to al Queda. You look at the ones we see you need to see us killing now. (Yeah, just said that) read it again three times slow.
Nevermind the lady pleading the 5th when her office was attacking civilians that pay taxes. Nevermind that stuff like that happened in the REVOLUTION!
I understand why Americans were ready to elect a black President when President Obama was elected … but … Oh, how I wish we had elected Colin Powell instead of Barack Obama.
I hope Congress votes his proposal down.
Too bad that his wife wouldn’t let him run for the office. Maybe she knew something.
Well, we now know where Chicago-style thug community organizing tactics DON’T work. On the stage of international war: when your enemy [ies] are perfectly content to be far more ruthless than you are capable of being. Because they don’t care that you are black, they don’t care that you passed Obamacare, they don’t care that you are doing it all for the children, they don’t care that women need contraceptives 24/7, and they certainly don’t care about green-energy initiatives. All they care about is winning and destroying you. And that trumps Chicago community organizing every day of the week. Faculty lounge utopia meets a warrior and blinks, turns tail, and looks to someone else to blame it on.
[i] The elves urge restraint in comments. [/i].
It was abundantly obvious to anyone mature enough to pay attention to look past his façade that Obama had no idea what he was doing in 2008. He had no comprehension of the Office or why he wanted to seek election, beyond how “cool” it would be. It certainly didn’t help that McCain/Palin was not a great ticket. I was not overly worried about a 4-year reign as I assumed that the US would see him for the immature buffoon that he is. But we did not. We now are saddled with a leader with no compass or rudder, he heaves to and fro like a broken juggernaut even doing the very things for which he loudly criticized his predecessor. He has trashed our reputation in almost every corner of the globe and now he wants to drag us into a conflict that will almost certainly be a disaster for the nation – if not the world. How terrifyingly ironic that we are approaching the 100th anniversary of the murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand!
Seeking congressional approval is good. Seeking a formal declaration of war would be best.
If Assad’s use of chemical weapons is a threat to the United States, then DOD should be issuing the citizens of this country protective masks and chemical protective equipment. Absent this there is no threat to this country and no need for the US to go to war with Syria. Congress should vote NO!
Gen. Colin Powell is a great American and a true hero who would have executed the Office of the Presidency with more skill than Pres. Obama. However, he is pro-choice, pro-gun control, and pro-gay marriage. So no disrespect to the man, but he’s wrong on the issues.
As to Syria, I couldn’t listen to Sec. Kerry without thinking of Gen. Powell making a case for the invasion of Iraq. The issue remaining, for me at least, is why Syria and why now? Didn’t Saddam gas the Kurds 15 years before we invaded Iraq? We did nothing then. As noted above, we did nothing as hundreds of thousands of Tutsi people were slaughtered in Rwanda.
Why Syria? Why now?
[i]It was abundantly obvious to anyone mature enough to pay attention to look past his façade that Obama had no idea what he was doing in 2008[/i]
Let’s see if I can re-make my main point. Candidate Obama’s main job experience was as a Chicago, radical community organizer. The enemies he is facing today [and causing us to face] don’t care about any of that.
His community organizing bravado cowers congress, the media, and most other opponents in the US. It does not and will not cower the extremists in the middle east nor Iran, nor Putin.
In a phrase, what he is good at is worthless in the current world political, military situation.
I have to say I have been in two minds over this – on the one hand appalled by the use of chemical weapons and their indiscriminate effects on people and particularly children which have just been sickening, not something which can be allowed to be repeated.
On the other hand I am unconvinced that pounding ministries and missile silos in Damascas with warheads, perhaps using depleted uranium with its generational genetic impact is the answer.
In some ways what has happened is a blessing because there is now a window of perhaps a week. The threat to the Assad regime remains so pressure is maintained. Even the Russians have been pretty appalled and less than supportive of Assad’s use of these weapons so it gives time for them to apply pressure to him, whatever they may be saying for Western consumption.
In the West it gives time for Washington, Paris [apparently the US’s oldest partner] and London [reinstated in the last day or so as apparently the US’s closest partner] to really think about what the aims of any action are and to apply diplomatic pressure on all sides.
However, and for us as Christians, it is also an opportunity for us to get involved in deep prayer and fasting. Jesus told us that the Merciful and the Peacemakers are blessed. We have heard from the leaders of Christians in Syria about their concerns about the devastating kickback on them which there will be by any use of force by the West, and like Egypt, I think we have to listen to their voices as they are hanging on by their fingernails. It also has to be said that is some elements in the Syrian opposition who have been persecuting, kidnapping and murdering them.
It would be good for us to pray in this time which has suddenly opened up, with fasting if we can, for we have a powerful God, who often moves more powerfully in these dangerous situations. That is how the mustard seed of faith grows, which can move mountains [Matthew 17:18-21]
Why Syria? Why now?
IRS lady pleading the fifth.
NSA keeping all of us, everyone of us under tabs.
Benghazi and the shipments of arms to the rebels (al Qaeda) in Syria.
Anything to keep us as a nation from drawing our vision to any of those three.
I don’t see any sign of a strategic or tactical purpose to whatever sort of raid on Syria the administration is proposing. While the use of chemical weapons is appalling, there are apparently still some questions about just precisely who was responsible and why it was done. We should not use our military when there is not a clear purpose and a clear understanding of what “success” is and when we are done.
Apparently Obama reserved the right to order action in Syria even if Congress refuses, so I’m not sure how he will then blame Congress if it refuses — although logic doesn’t stop him too often.
#15,
Could be. But the media have done a pretty good job at distracting attention from these events that would be scandals under another administration. I’m not sure the president needs to make war.
I am with you, Charles! The way the media has been with this president is an abomination. I am way past beginning to think it may be deeper than the president and more along the military industrial establishment where the NSA is concerned. What the IRS did should have the media up in arms…along with the administration attacking a fellow journalist. Yet, they are so in line idealogically with the prez, they could care less. And these are the types,also, at the top of TEc. When does revolution become a topic of conversation?
Another way of looking at what is going on:
Being civilized…does this negate ones desire for revolution in the peaceful environment of the US that one finds ones self?
OR
Do the powers that be find a new enhanced opportunity and role with which to abuse those under their supposed control?
When do the sheep of civilization begin to say that something isn’t quite right with the way the pasture is being operated?
Manifest destiny…not of the land, but of the area of thought that is our individual mind. I really take offense when all but one national media outlet marches to the single drumbeat of liberalism.
Oh God, give us eyes and ears and hearts of liberty in You! Amen!