JUNE 21, 2011
BRUCE A. BRENNAN BLOG FROM THE WORLD AND MY MIND
The news as I see it and the views as I want them.
June 21 is …Cuckoo Warning Day
Summer begins at 12:16 p. m. CDT today.
Remember what day it is when reading the rest of this column. What Cuckoo does not think the bombing of Libya with United States weapons, money and expertise is not “hostilities” under the War Powers Resolution. President Barack Obama for one thinks that and his conclusion are being reinforced by the stooges surrounding him.
The War Powers Resolution has been a bone of contention ever since it was enacted. Most legal scholars believe it is unconstitutional but no one has ever had the proper standing to challenge it in Court. Most Presidents have had reservations about the legality of the law but use it when it is in their best interest, not always the countries best interest. The Constitution says Congress can declare war, not the President. The law is being used by the Obama Administration to justify the costly and futile efforts in Libya. Once again this country has started a war it will not finish. The War Powers Resolution is causing disagreements within the Obama regime. President Barack Obama overruled top lawyers from the Justice Department and the Pentagon and decided he has the legal authority to continue the air war in Libya without congressional approval, the New York Times reported Friday night.
Jeh C. Johnson, the Pentagon general counsel, and Caroline D. Krass, the acting head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, had told the White House that they believed that the United States military’s activities in the NATO-led air war amounted to “hostilities.” Under the War Powers Resolution, that would have required Mr. Obama to terminate or scale back the mission after May 20. But Mr. Obama decided instead to adopt the legal analysis of several other senior members of his legal team -- including the White House counsel, Robert Bauer, and the State Department legal adviser, Harold H. Koh -- who argued that the United States military’s activities fell short of “hostilities.” Under that view, Mr. Obama needed no permission from Congress to continue the mission unchanged.
Glenn Greenwald points out that when lawyers in the Bush administration faced a similar conflict in 2007 over the NSA's warrantless wiretapping program; they threatened to resign en masse. The threat was not taken too seriously and no one resigned. Bush decided to reject the legal conclusions of his top lawyers and ordered the NSA eavesdropping program to continue anyway, even though he had been told it was illegal (like Obama now, Bush pointed to the fact that his own White House counsel (Gonzales), along with Dick Cheney's top lawyer, David Addington, agreed the NSA program was legal). In response, Ashcroft, Comey, Goldsmith, and FBI Director Robert Mueller all threatened to resign en masse if Bush continued with this illegal spying, and Bush -- wanting to avoid that kind of scandal in an election year -- agreed to "re-fashion" the program into something those DOJ lawyers could approve (the "re-fashioned" program was the still-illegal NSA program revealed in 2005 by The New York Times; to date, we still do not know what Bush was doing before that that was so illegal as to prompt resignation threats from these right-wing lawyers).
That George Bush would knowingly order an eavesdropping program to continue which his own top lawyers were telling him was illegal was, of course, a major controversy, at least in many progressive circles. Now we have Barack Obama not merely eavesdropping in a way that his own top lawyers are telling him is illegal, but waging war in that manner (though, notably, there is no indication that these Obama lawyers have the situational integrity those Bush lawyers had [and which Archibald Cox, Eliot Richardson and William Ruckelshaus had before them] by threatening to resign if the lawlessness continues).
Last week, the White House issued a report to Congress detailing its justification for not seeking lawmakers' approval for military operations in Libya. In it, the Obama administration said the conflict does not rise to the level of a war because the U.S. is only playing a support role in the NATO-led operation -- that is, no U.S. troops on the ground and no potential for casualties -- and only plans to be involved for a short time. The report has not lessened lawmakers' displeasure at the Obama administration. House Majority Leader John Boehner announced late Friday that he plans to hold votes this week aimed at challenging Obama's authority to carry out U.S. military operations in Libya without congressional consent.
"From the outset of this operation, Members of the House have demonstrated respect for the authority granted to the Commander-in-Chief," Boehner said in a statement. "Unfortunately, the President has not exhibited a similar appreciation for Congress' important job of providing oversight and accountability. Even worse, he has failed to communicate to the American people why continuing this mission is critical to our national security."
Either bomb Libya into surrender or get out. Two wars at a time seem to be more than we can handle so three is really be a mistake. The constant talk of winding down the Afghanistan and Iraq wars has been going on for five years. If you keep talking about something and it eventually come to fruition you get to say “I told you so.” Even if we get out of the Afghan War, that has been going on over twice as long as WW II, and Iraq, the money we save should be saved or spent at home not spent to continue a war we started for no reason. The excuse of Libyan leaders’ plans to slaughter their own people we had to stop was a lie unless the slaughtered masses are hidden next to Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and the killer of OJ Simpson’s wife and friend.
Just a couple of thoughts I had and you should too.
BRUCE A. BRENNAN
DEKALB, IL 60115
COPYRIGHT 2011
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www.ebookmall.com (Do search by my name or book Title)
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Book Titles:
Holmes the Ripper
A Revengeful Mix of Short Fiction
"I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act." - Gilbert Keith Chesterton
