Thread: US launches military action against Libya

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/2011/03/30/86083

The soldiers fight, and the kings are heroes.
--Yiddish Proverb

Sometime they'll give a war and nobody will come.
--Carl Sandburg

Where's the outrage?

What Happened to the American Declaration of War?

March 29, 2011

By George Friedman

In my book “The Next Decade,” I spend a good deal of time considering the relation of the American Empire to the American Republic and the threat the empire poses to the republic. If there is a single point where these matters converge, it is in the constitutional requirement that Congress approve wars through a declaration of war and in the abandonment of this requirement since World War II. This is the point where the burdens and interests of the United States as a global empire collide with the principles and rights of the United States as a republic.

World War II was the last war the United States fought with a formal declaration of war. The wars fought since have had congressional approval, both in the sense that resolutions were passed and that Congress appropriated funds, but the Constitution is explicit in requiring a formal declaration. It does so for two reasons, I think. The first is to prevent the president from taking the country to war without the consent of the governed, as represented by Congress. Second, by providing for a specific path to war, it provides the president power and legitimacy he would not have without that declaration; it both restrains the president and empowers him. Not only does it make his position as commander in chief unassailable by authorizing military action, it creates shared responsibility for war. A declaration of war informs the public of the burdens they will have to bear by leaving no doubt that Congress has decided on a new order — war — with how each member of Congress voted made known to the public.

Almost all Americans have heard Franklin Roosevelt’s speech to Congress on Dec. 8, 1941: “Yesterday, Dec. 7, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan … I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, Dec. 7, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire.”
It was a moment of majesty and sobriety, and with Congress’ affirmation, represented the unquestioned will of the republic. There was no going back, and there was no question that the burden would be borne. True, the Japanese had attacked the United States, making getting the declaration easier. But that’s what the founders intended: Going to war should be difficult; once at war, the commander in chief’s authority should be unquestionable.

Forgoing the Declaration

It is odd, therefore, that presidents who need that authorization badly should forgo pursuing it. Not doing so has led to seriously failed presidencies: Harry Truman in Korea, unable to seek another term; Lyndon Johnson in Vietnam, also unable to seek a new term; George W. Bush in Afghanistan and Iraq, completing his terms but enormously unpopular. There was more to this than undeclared wars, but that the legitimacy of each war was questioned and became a contentious political issue certainly is rooted in the failure to follow constitutional pathways.

In understanding how war and constitutional norms became separated, we must begin with the first major undeclared war in American history (the Civil War was not a foreign war), Korea. When North Korea invaded South Korea, Truman took recourse to the new U.N. Security Council. He wanted international sanction for the war and was able to get it because the Soviet representatives happened to be boycotting the Security Council over other issues at the time.

Truman’s view was that U.N. sanction for the war superseded the requirement for a declaration of war in two ways. First, it was not a war in the strict sense, he argued, but a “police action” under the U.N. Charter. Second, the U.N. Charter constituted a treaty, therefore implicitly binding the United States to go to war if the United Nations so ordered. Whether Congress’ authorization to join the United Nations both obligated the United States to wage war at U.N. behest, obviating the need for declarations of war because Congress had already authorized police actions, is an interesting question. Whatever the answer, Truman set a precedent that wars could be waged without congressional declarations of war and that other actions — from treaties to resolutions to budgetary authorizations — mooted declarations of war.

If this was the founding precedent, the deepest argument for the irrelevancy of the declaration of war is to be found in nuclear weapons. Starting in the 1950s, paralleling the Korean War, was the increasing risk of nuclear war. It was understood that if nuclear war occurred, either through an attack by the Soviets or a first strike by the United States, time and secrecy made a prior declaration of war by Congress impossible. In the expected scenario of a Soviet first strike, there would be only minutes for the president to authorize counterstrikes and no time for constitutional niceties. In that sense, it was argued fairly persuasively that the Constitution had become irrelevant to the military realities facing the republic.

Nuclear war was seen as the most realistic war-fighting scenario, with all other forms of war trivial in comparison. Just as nuclear weapons came to be called “strategic weapons” with other weapons of war occupying a lesser space, nuclear war became identical with war in general. If that was so, then constitutional procedures that could not be applied to nuclear war were simply no longer relevant.

Paradoxically, if nuclear warfare represented the highest level of warfare, there developed at the lowest level covert operations. Apart from the nuclear confrontation with the Soviets, there was an intense covert war, from back alleys in Europe to the Congo, Indochina to Latin America. Indeed, it was waged everywhere precisely because the threat of nuclear war was so terrible: Covert warfare became a prudent alternative. All of these operations had to be deniable. An attempt to assassinate a Soviet agent or raise a secret army to face a Soviet secret army could not be validated with a declaration of war. The Cold War was a series of interconnected but discrete operations, fought with secret forces whose very principle was deniability. How could declarations of war be expected in operations so small in size that had to be kept secret from Congress anyway?

There was then the need to support allies, particularly in sending advisers to train their armies. These advisers were not there to engage in combat but to advise those who did. In many cases, this became an artificial distinction: The advisers accompanied their students on missions, and some died. But this was not war in any conventional sense of the term. And therefore, the declaration of war didn’t apply.

By the time Vietnam came up, the transition from military assistance to advisers to advisers in combat to U.S. forces at war was so subtle that there was no moment to which you could point that said that we were now in a state of war where previously we weren’t. Rather than ask for a declaration of war, Johnson used an incident in the Tonkin Gulf to get a congressional resolution that he interpreted as being the equivalent of war. The problem here was that it was not clear that had he asked for a formal declaration of war he would have gotten one. Johnson didn’t take that chance.

What Johnson did was use Cold War precedents, from the Korean War, to nuclear warfare, to covert operations to the subtle distinctions of contemporary warfare in order to wage a substantial and extended war based on the Tonkin Gulf resolution — which Congress clearly didn’t see as a declaration of war — instead of asking for a formal declaration. And this represented the breakpoint. In Vietnam, the issue was not some legal or practical justification for not asking for a declaration. Rather, it was a political consideration.

Johnson did not know that he could get a declaration; the public might not be prepared to go to war. For this reason, rather than ask for a declaration, he used all the prior precedents to simply go to war without a declaration. In my view, that was the moment the declaration of war as a constitutional imperative collapsed. And in my view, so did the Johnson presidency. In hindsight, he needed a declaration badly, and if he could not get it, Vietnam would have been lost, and so may have been his presidency. Since Vietnam was lost anyway from lack of public consensus, his decision was a mistake. But it set the stage for everything that came after — war by resolution rather than by formal constitutional process.

After the war, Congress created the War Powers Act in recognition that wars might commence before congressional approval could be given. However, rather than returning to the constitutional method of the Declaration of War, which can be given after the commencement of war if necessary (consider World War II) Congress chose to bypass declarations of war in favor of resolutions allowing wars. Their reason was the same as the president’s: It was politically safer to authorize a war already under way than to invoke declarations of war.

All of this arose within the assertion that the president’s powers as commander in chief authorized him to engage in warfare without a congressional declaration of war, an idea that came in full force in the context of nuclear war and then was extended to the broader idea that all wars were at the discretion of the president. From my simple reading, the Constitution is fairly clear on the subject: Congress is given the power to declare war. At that moment, the president as commander in chief is free to prosecute the war as he thinks best. But constitutional law and the language of the Constitution seem to have diverged. It is a complex field of study, obviously.

An Increasing Tempo of Operations

All of this came just before the United States emerged as the world’s single global power — a global empire — that by definition would be waging war at an increased tempo, from Kuwait, to Haiti, to Kosovo, to Afghanistan, to Iraq, and so on in an ever-increasing number of operations. And now in Libya, we have reached the point that even resolutions are no longer needed.

It is said that there is no precedent for fighting al Qaeda, for example, because it is not a nation but a subnational group. Therefore, Bush could not reasonably have been expected to ask for a declaration of war. But there is precedent: Thomas Jefferson asked for and received a declaration of war against the Barbary pirates. This authorized Jefferson to wage war against a subnational group of pirates as if they were a nation.

Had Bush requested a declaration of war on al Qaeda on Sept. 12, 2001, I suspect it would have been granted overwhelmingly, and the public would have understood that the United States was now at war for as long as the president thought wise. The president would have been free to carry out operations as he saw fit. Roosevelt did not have to ask for special permission to invade Guadalcanal, send troops to India, or invade North Africa. In the course of fighting Japan, Germany and Italy, it was understood that he was free to wage war as he thought fit. In the same sense, a declaration of war on Sept. 12 would have freed him to fight al Qaeda wherever they were or to move to block them wherever the president saw fit.

Leaving aside the military wisdom of Afghanistan or Iraq, the legal and moral foundations would have been clear — so long as the president as commander in chief saw an action as needed to defeat al Qaeda, it could be taken. Similarly, as commander in chief, Roosevelt usurped constitutional rights for citizens in many ways, from censorship to internment camps for Japanese-Americans. Prisoners of war not adhering to the Geneva Conventions were shot by military tribunal — or without. In a state of war, different laws and expectations exist than during peace. Many of the arguments against Bush-era intrusions on privacy also could have been made against Roosevelt. But Roosevelt had a declaration of war and full authority as commander in chief during war. Bush did not. He worked in twilight between war and peace.

One of the dilemmas that could have been avoided was the massive confusion of whether the United States was engaged in hunting down a criminal conspiracy or waging war on a foreign enemy. If the former, then the goal is to punish the guilty. If the latter, then the goal is to destroy the enemy. Imagine that after Pearl Harbor, FDR had promised to hunt down every pilot who attacked Pearl Harbor and bring them to justice, rather than calling for a declaration of war against a hostile nation and all who bore arms on its behalf regardless of what they had done. The goal in war is to prevent the other side from acting, not to punish the actors.

The Importance of the Declaration

A declaration of war, I am arguing, is an essential aspect of war fighting particularly for the republic when engaged in frequent wars. It achieves a number of things. First, it holds both Congress and the president equally responsible for the decision, and does so unambiguously. Second, it affirms to the people that their lives have now changed and that they will be bearing burdens. Third, it gives the president the political and moral authority he needs to wage war on their behalf and forces everyone to share in the moral responsibility of war. And finally, by submitting it to a political process, many wars might be avoided. When we look at some of our wars after World War II it is not clear they had to be fought in the national interest, nor is it clear that the presidents would not have been better remembered if they had been restrained. A declaration of war both frees and restrains the president, as it was meant to do.

I began by talking about the American empire. I won’t make the argument on that here, but simply assert it. What is most important is that the republic not be overwhelmed in the course of pursuing imperial goals. The declaration of war is precisely the point at which imperial interests can overwhelm republican prerogatives.

There are enormous complexities here. Nuclear war has not been abolished. The United States has treaty obligations to the United Nations and other countries. Covert operations are essential, as is military assistance, both of which can lead to war. I am not making the argument that constant accommodation to reality does not have to be made. I am making the argument that the suspension of Section 8 of Article I as if it is possible to amend the Constitution with a wink and nod represents a mortal threat to the republic. If this can be done, what can’t be done?

My readers will know that I am far from squeamish about war. I have questions about Libya, for example, but I am open to the idea that it is a low-cost, politically appropriate measure. But I am not open to the possibility that quickly after the commencement of hostilities the president need not receive authority to wage war from Congress. And I am arguing that neither the Congress nor the president has the authority to substitute resolutions for declarations of war. Nor should either want to. Politically, this has too often led to disaster for presidents. Morally, committing the lives of citizens to waging war requires meticulous attention to the law and proprieties.

As our international power and interests surge, it would seem reasonable that our commitment to republican principles would surge. These commitments appear inconvenient. They are meant to be. War is a serious matter, and presidents and particularly Congresses should be inconvenienced on the road to war. Members of Congress should not be able to hide behind ambiguous resolutions only to turn on the president during difficult times, claiming that they did not mean what they voted for. A vote on a declaration of war ends that. It also prevents a president from acting as king by default. Above all, it prevents the public from pretending to be victims when their leaders take them to war. The possibility of war will concentrate the mind of a distracted public like nothing else. It turns voting into a life-or-death matter, a tonic for our adolescent body politic.

http://ce.investorsinsight.com/CT003...zMDkyOQAA.html

Slaughter in Libya's Misurata: Is this Obama's 'Rwanda'?
By The Monitor's Editorial Board – Wed Apr 20, 1:14 pm ET

President Obama was rightly praised for using US forces last month to prevent a civilian massacre in the Libyan city of Benghazi. Now he and US allies must decide whether to stop an ongoing slaughter in Misurata, a port city of 500,000 people.

Hundreds of civilians in Libya’s third-largest city have been killed – including dozens of children – by pro-Qaddafi fighters. Hospitals are overwhelmed as snipers pick off people trying to survive in a city with little food and water. Entire families are being wiped out as devastating types of bombs are used indiscriminately on homes. Thousands are trying to flee by ship, the only way out for them.

NATO commanders admit they are helpless against the urban-guerrilla tactics now being used by Muammar Qaddafi’s forces. Air power alone cannot strike at soldiers in pickup trucks – indistinguishable from rebels – with mortar rockets or at snipers on tops of buildings. The ragtag rebel groups have few arms.

As a Canadian officer told German media: “It’s a knife fight in a phone booth and it’s very difficult to get in the middle of that.”

The UN mandate for foreign forces to prevent a humanitarian disaster in Libya didn’t anticipate the type of killing in Misurata. “What we have perhaps underestimated is Muammar Qaddafi’s capacity to adapt,” admits Alain Juppe, the French foreign minister.

Only half or less of Libya’s military equipment and headquarters facilities has been destroyed, despite nearly two months and thousands of airstrikes by the United States and other NATO aircraft.

This week, the horrific crisis in the besieged city of Misurata compelled Britain, Italy, and France to decide to send military advisers to the rebel leaders in Benghazi. The Europeans will assist the rebels in organizing their forces better. And a group of French lawmakers wants to send noncombat military specialists to Misurata to help rebels identify targets for NATO air attacks.

But such steps may not be enough as Qaddafi forces quickly make inroads in Misurata, ready to kill civilians who want an end to the Libyan leader’s rule. The rebels there are pleading for on-the-ground help from NATO.

But Mr. Obama opposes deploying either US combat forces or the kind of aircraft designed for close-in strikes on urban areas. The administration claims the US has limited resources and little strategic interest in Libya compared with Egypt, Syria, Bahrain, and Yemen.

America’s humanitarian impulse to prevent massacres does indeed have a checkered history. President Clinton, for instance, failed to act against Rwanda’s genocide but he did save lives in Bosnia and Kosovo. The US attempt to feed the starving in Somalia ended with US troops being killed in 1993.

Will Misurata become Obama’s Rwanda, a humanitarian stain on his presidential legacy.

The president is in the midst of a campaign to cut defense spending, and wants to limit American leadership in the world. The US has so far spent more than $600 million in the Libyan effort. But then the US did prevent a civilian slaughter in Benghazi with powerful US airstrikes.

Hillary Rodham Clinton, now Obama’s secretary of State, has offered some guidance on what to do in such situations. In 1994, the then-first lady gave a speech after accepting the Elie Wiesel Humanitarian Award. She spoke of a young Jewish girl in Nazi Germany whose writings had awakened “us to the folly of indifference and the terrible toll it takes on our young.

“She wrote: ‘until all mankind, without exception, undergoes a great change, everything will be destroyed and disfigured, after which mankind will have to begin all over again.’

"Those were Anne Frank's words. Those were the words of another child caught up in another ... war. But they are the words that you could hear throughout the decades, and that if we listen we can hear today. It is not enough that we sympathize with the plight of children here and around the world. Sympathy is important, but empathy is even more important, and action is essential.”


http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20110420/cm_csm/378327


comments

Saudi Arabia has a modern airforce and a well-equiped army, plus trillions of surplus dollars in the sale of oil. Why don't they lift a finger to prevent a massacre?

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obama is a killer either way no better than bush..Egypt is his muslim brothers not lybia..He will turn his back on something he actuallt started and could careless of the little children being mascred..If you start something finish it one way or the other..You dont turn away from babies being killed for no aparent reason but what you and your muslim brother percieve and tell the world..How can anybody trust a man they knew nothing about and still dont..someon who spent mill of dollars to cover his past so people dont know what hes done..How can you trust someone so secret? maybe you acorn followers know what im talking about this is your man..He wont tie his campaining with a war..No way are you kidding people would compare him to bush..We already do..lmao..Obama good at that starts something and never finishes it walks away with a smog look ..He is so transparent more and more and these fools keep praising him..They work for acorn or to young and dumb to know any better..wait till they have to make a real living and the IRS is knocking at their doors with their hands out..More you make more you pay..Sure get rich that way..Take the power from the rich thru taxation..soacialistic way..And his sheep actually believe it will profit them..

The real robin hood America..Right? Good luck with the change you think will happen the peaceful non corrupt nation and the world..With the UN in control..ya thats what I want for my grandkids..Communism who tells who lives and dies just as they doing now playing war games with peoples lives cause they thisnk they are right..No better than Bush.,War monger killer of innocent families..At least bush had the balls to give the people warnings to get out before we got there.

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Praised by who? The idiot Obama did'nt get congressional approval to murder all those Libyans in the 110 cruise missle attacks and thousands of rockets and bombs afterward; instead he went to the U.N. Obama killed thousands of innocent Libyans, speculated to be more than all Iraquis killed in Iraq. Obama is a muslim terrorist; he used this strike to get rid of the muslims he doesn't like kind of like Suni and Shiite !! Obama is a KILLER of Babies and innocents !!!

Rebecca Hamilton – Tue May 3, 11:28 am ET

New York – “Why does the world care about Libyans and not about us?” I was asked during a phone interview with a Darfuri leader recently. He told me that the displaced people in the camp he was speaking to me from had been listening to radio reports about how swiftly the world had moved to protect civilians from Muammar Qaddafi.

The quick and easy answer to why Libya and not Darfur – the western province of Sudan where people continue to suffer after years of atrocities that have left an estimated 300,000 dead – boils down to two factors. First, oil. Libya has it, Darfur does not – Sudan’s oil lies in the south of the country. Second, proximity to continental Europe. Libya is close enough to make the Europeans jittery about the consequences of instability. But neither of these factors would have been enough to get France stepping up to lead the enforcement of a no-fly zone without prior authorization from the UN Security Council. And this is where the story gets interesting.

Pushing against the BRICSOn Libya, the Arab League’s request that the UN Security Council enforce a no-fly zone provided political cover to enable Western powers to push for action, helping them fend off analogies to Iraq. But the Arab League’s greatest impact was on the emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, now known as the BRICS bloc.

BRICS nations, who are all currently on the 15-member UN Security Council, comprise almost three billion of the world’s nearly seven billion people. And their combined economies are set to surpass the US in terms of GDP by 2014. In short, they are the group that is on track to hold the center of gravity in terms of global decision-making in the decade to come.

As a bloc, the BRICS tend to eschew calls to universalist human rights claims, and oppose forceful intervention. However, they also show deference to regional players, which is why the Arab League’s request made it very difficult for them to stand in the way of action.

IN PICTURES: Libya conflict

Of all the BRICS nations, China is generally the most opposed to intervention of any kind. But in addition to China’s general deference to regional players, defying the wishes of the Arab League would have been particularly risky given that China depends on key members of that body to fuel its growth.

Oil dependencyChina currently imports 4.7 million barrels of oil per day, and the International Energy Agency predicts that by 2025, China will have overtaken the US to become the world’s largest importer of oil. Arab League member, Saudi Arabia, is the largest source of that oil, accounting for more than 20 percent of China’s imports. And other Arab League members in attendance at the no-fly zone meeting (Libya was excluded) account for almost a further 20 percent. So while none of the Arab League’s 22 member states have a veto on the UN Security Council, China’s oil dependency makes the Arab League a potential game-changer in UN voting patterns.

On Darfur, the Arab League never played that game-changing role. A significant part of the reason was that the Bush administration, pushed by US activists, got ahead of the rest of the world in condemning the atrocities. Against the backdrop of Iraq, this was spun in the Arab media as evidence of an American intent to invade another Muslim country. As a consequence, the Arab League stood firmly by the side of Sudanese president, Omar al-Bashir. This in turn meant that Beijing faced no cost in pursuing its default position of non-interference, and it did this by repeatedly threatening to use its veto on the UN Security Council to protect Khartoum from pressure.

The result was that every resolution proposed by the US was watered down, the Council rarely spoke with one voice, and al-Bashir read this (correctly) to mean he could get away with defying the UN. Had the Arab League condemned al-Bashir, then there’s every chance China would have allowed stronger resolutions to pass, since the oil China gets from Sudan is less than one-fifth of what it gets from the rest of the Arab League.

On Libya, Obama’s early reticence created space for the Arab League to take the lead. And high-level defections from Qaddafi’s inner circle sealed the deal.

ANOTHER VIEW: Libya intervention: US cannot afford to 'go in search of monsters to destroy'

This then allowed the discussion at the UN Security Council to shape up very differently from the way it had done on Darfur.

If we are to make sense of how it is the world moved so quickly to protect civilians in Libya and not in Darfur, then we would do well to look beyond the easy answers and place a decision taken, not in Washington or Paris, but at an Arab League meeting in Cairo, at the forefront of our thinking.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20110503/cm_csm/381223

White House defends legality of Libya mission
Julie Pace, Associated Press – 40 mins ago

WASHINGTON – Pushing back against congressional criticism, the White House said Wednesday that President Barack Obama has the authority to continue U.S. military action in Libya even without authorization from lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

In a detailed, 30-page report being sent to Congress, the administration will argue that the U.S. has a limited, support role in the NATO-led bombing campaign in Libya. Because U.S. forces are not engaged in sustained fighting and there are no troops on the ground there, the White House will say the president is within his constitutional rights to direct the mission on his own.

The administration's defense of the Libya mission comes in response to a non-binding House resolution passed earlier this month that chastised Obama for failing to provide a "compelling rationale" for U.S. involvement in Libya.

The resolution gave the administration until Friday to respond to a series of questions on the mission, including the scope of U.S. military activity, the cost of the mission, and its impact on other U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The report for lawmakers marks the first time administration officials have publically explained why they believe the president can keep U.S. forces involved in the Libya mission without violating the War Powers Resolution. That measure prohibits the military from being involved in actions for more than 60 days without congressional authorization, plus a 30-day extension.

Obama did not seek congressional consent for U.S. airstrikes against Moammar Gadhafi's forces, and House Speaker John Boehner sent Obama a letter this week stating that the 90-day window runs out on Sunday.

However, senior administration officials previewing the report Wednesday said U.S. forces are not involved in the kind of "hostilities" for which the War Powers Resolution says the commander in chief must get congressional approval.

While the U.S. led the initial airstrikes on Libya, NATO forces have since taken over the mission, which is in its third month. However, the U.S still plays a significant support role that includes aerial refueling of warplanes and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance work.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said the president expects congressional support for the Libya campaign will continue. With Gadhafi under pressure to leave power, he said now is not the time to send "mixed messages" about U.S. commitment to the campaign.

However, a bipartisan group of 10 lawmakers sued Obama Wednesday for taking military action against Libya without war authorization from Congress. The lawmakers said Obama violated the Constitution in bypassing Congress and using international organizations like the United Nations and NATO to authorize military force.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110615/...us/us_us_libya


House Republican leader Boehner warns Obama over Libya
Susan Cornwell – Tue Jun 14, 7:53 pm ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – House Speaker John Boehner warned President Barack Obama on Tuesday that he was skating on thin legal ice by keeping U.S. forces involved in Libya for nearly three months without the authorization of Congress.

The letter from the Republican leader of the House of Representatives to the Democratic president threatened to turn lawmakers' unease over the Libyan conflict into a clash between Congress and the White House over constitutional powers.

Boehner accused Obama of "a refusal to acknowledge and respect the role of Congress" in military operations and a "lack of clarity" about why the U.S. was still involved in Libya.

He asked Obama to explain the legal grounds for the war by Friday, adding that by Sunday Obama would be in violation of the 1973 War Powers Resolution if nothing changed.

The Constitution says that Congress declares war, while the president is commander-in-chief of the armed forces. The War Powers Resolution sought to resolve the tensions in these roles and was passed by Congress over a veto by President Richard Nixon.

[ For complete coverage of politics and policy, go to Yahoo! Politics ]


No sitting president has ever recognized the resolution, which prohibits U.S. armed forces from being involved in military actions for more than 60 days without congressional authorization, and includes a further 30-day withdrawal period. Boehner said the 90 days expires on Sunday.

"It would appear that in five days, the administration will be in violation of the War Powers Resolution unless it asks for and receives authorization from Congress or withdraws all U.S. troops and resources from the mission," Boehner said in the letter, which was released by his office.

"Have you ... conducted the legal analysis to justify your position?" he asked. "Given the gravity of the constitutional and statutory questions involved, I request your answer by Friday, June 17, 2011."

CONSULTATIONS

Obama notified Congress in March that the United States was taking part in a multinational operation conducting air strikes to protect Libyan civilians from by Muammar Gaddafi's forces. Obama did not ask for congressional authorization.

There are no U.S. troops on the ground in Libya, where NATO is leading the intervention with the United States providing logistical support and intelligence.

The White House says it has consulted regularly with lawmakers on the war and officials have suggested that the limited U.S. action might not meet the War Powers threshold.

White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said administration officials have testified at more than 10 hearings on Capitol Hill, which included substantial discussion of Libya. Officials also took part in more than 30 briefings with lawmakers and staff and would keep engaging with Congress, he said.

"We are in the final stages of preparing extensive information for the House and Senate that will address a whole host of issues about our ongoing efforts in Libya, including those raised in the House resolution as well as our legal analysis with regard to the War Powers Resolution," Vietor said.

If Obama did ask for congressional authorization, it is not clear he would get it. The Democratic-controlled Senate has not tried to pass a non-binding resolution supporting the war.

Two House lawmakers, Democrat Dennis Kucinich and Republican Walter Jones, said they would file a lawsuit in federal court concerning Obama and the Libyan war.

Earlier this month, a House majority passed a resolution accusing Obama of not having offered a "compelling rationale" for the Libyan war and demanding information about its costs and scope by Thursday June 16. Boehner's letter indicated that lawmakers are still waiting for answers.

That resolution noted that Congress has the authority to cut off funds for military operations, implying this might be considered if the Obama administration did not respond.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110614/...NlcmVwdWJsaQ--

NYT: Obama overruled top Pentagon, DOJ lawyers on Libya war powers
posted at 10:32 pm on June 17, 2011 by Allahpundit
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/06/1...ya-war-powers/


No “Quotes of the Day” post today. This is big enough that I don’t want anything new on the site distracting from it overnight. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/18/wo...pagewanted=all

The Times is treating it as the major story that it is, but under a Republican president (especially one named, say, George Bush) it would be a scandal of nuclear proportions. What they’re basically saying here, without actually saying it, is that the president’s own lawyers told him that the Libya war is illegal and he responded by looking around for other lawyers who’d tell him what he wanted to hear.

The congressional hearings begin on Monday, I hope.

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.

Presidents have the legal authority to override the legal conclusions of the Office of Legal Counsel and to act in a manner that is contrary to its advice, but it is extraordinarily rare for that to happen. Under normal circumstances, the office’s interpretation of the law is legally binding on the executive branch…

The administration followed an unusual process in developing its position. Traditionally, the Office of Legal Counsel solicits views from different agencies and then decides what the best interpretation of the law is. The attorney general or the president can overrule its views, but rarely do.

In this case, however, Ms. Krass was asked to submit the Office of Legal Counsel’s thoughts in a less formal way to the White House, along with the views of lawyers at other agencies. After several meetings and phone calls, the rival legal analyses were submitted to Mr. Obama, who is a constitutional lawyer, and he made the decision.

See what he did here? The OLC is typically called “the president’s law firm” because it’s tasked with advising him on what he can and can’t legally do with his office. They study the law and consult with relevant agencies, and then they make a formal determination to guide his actions. That’s what should have happened here — they likely would have determined that he was violating the War Powers Act, which in turn would have forced him to go to Congress and finally request formal authorization of the mission. (In fact, Johnson, the Pentagon’s counsel, reportedly told Obama he’d be on firmer ground if he stopped the drone strikes, at least. Obama refused.) This time, because he almost certainly knew that they’d tell him that he was in violation, he bypassed the normal procedures to avoid a binding ruling and treated the OLC as if it was just one lawyer among many. He rigged the game because he knew what the probable outcome would be if he didn’t. Disgraceful.
Ironically, Boehner’s now in almost as tough a position as Obama is. He’s the one who confronted O about the War Powers Act after Kucinich forced his hand; now he’ll have to figure out what the proper congressional response to this should be. Does the House hold hearings? Vote to defund the mission, citing Krass and Johnson for authority that it’s illegal? File suit in federal court charging Obama with violating the WPA, even though any court will almost certainly refuse to rule on it on “political question” grounds? And what happens to O’s supporters on Libya in Congress, especially among Democrats, now that his warmaking has been deemed renegade by his own core legal team? This doofus almost certainly could have gotten congressional authorization shortly after the mission began if he’d asked for it, but for reasons I still don’t understand, he refused. I guess he wants to maximize his presidential prerogative to use drones anywhere he likes, notwithstanding Johnson’s assessment that that’s enough to constitute “hostilities” under the WPA, in order to give himself a free hand in Yemen and beyond. Good work, champ — you’ve now forced a high stakes, politically risky separation-of-powers confrontation with Congress over a conflict to which virtually no one has paid attention for weeks.

Here’s Harry Reid insisting that the War Powers Act doesn’t apply here, and even if it did, “this thing’s going to be over before you know it anyway.” Which is basically what Obama himself said — three months ago. Remember “days, not weeks”? Exit question: That’s going to be one awkward round of golf, huh?

comments

ObaMao shopped around until he secured the vague weasel-wording of the international-law pimp Koh. Stanley Kurtz says that O’s declaration is a “gift to Samantha Power.” I would add that this kowtowing to the UN falls into line with the open-borders, no-nation-is-sovereign philosophy of O’s puppetmaster, George Soros.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner...-stanley-kurtz

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So he did commit a “High Crime” after all and his own legal team told him so. Tome for an impeachment for that and “Gun Runner”

Oh wait, the law doesn’t apply to dems anymore.

I agree, AP if a Republican acted this way the LSM would be screaming to the rafters, but all we hear on this for Failbama is crickets.

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He’s the One. He is above the law and doesn’t have to answer to you peons.

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Was this news just another part of a Friday afternoon dump that is supposed to go down the memory hole? Will the Sunday squawk shows spend meaningful discussion time on the ramifications of O’s misuse of power?

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The War Powers Act the far-left Dems who controlled congress and over-rode a Nixon Veto in 1973 is an Unconstitutional Law.

So Obama is defying a law, but not the Constitution. This is the position all Presidents since 1973 have agreed on basically.

The only true Constitutional grounds Congress has with Lybia is they could vote to Defund the mission at anytime.

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In the name of Equal Opportunity, Osama Obama, the “historic first” President, should be treated like any other President, especially those eeeeeevil Repub Presidents: Congress should go into session Monday and offer up at least one impeachment resolution (preferably one for each of his unconstitutional and illegal acts during the last two-plus years). They should then follow through and throw the Traitor-in-Chief’s America-hating butt out of office.

Instead, they’ll hem and haw, make excuses, and the punditocracy will play along, out of “fairness” to the poor, overworked guy.

He’s the One. He is above the law and doesn’t have to answer to you peons.

Can't recall the exact verbage, but wasn't it...."I won, I trump"?

Here ya go.....

The president added, "I won. So I think on that one, I trump you."

'I Won:' President Obama Works to Be Bipartisan But Shows There Are Clear Limits

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpu...president.html

Farrakhan : The White Man Made Obama Bomb Libya
Larry Elder – Thu Jun 23, 3:00 am ET

Creators Syndicate – The White Man made him do it.

Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan recently unmasked the reason for President Barack Obama's unpopular, non-congressionally authorized, War Powers Resolution-violating decision to bomb Libya, a country that poses no imminent threat to the United States. "We voted for our brother, Barack," said Farrakhan, "a beautiful human being with a sweet heart, and now he's an assassin. They've turned him into them."

"Them," of course, refers to the evil, racist, manipulative, all-powerful White Man, who as in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," seized Obama's mind, body and soul, and changed him into an enemy of the poor, the downtrodden, the black.

Don't snicker. Farrakhan may be on to something.

Here's what presidential candidate Obama said about use of force: "The president does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation." Congress passed the War Powers Resolution in 1973 to restrain the president in non-imminent threat situations. Obama, however, disagrees that it applies to Libya. This humanitarian mission, Obama argues, does not involve "hostilities," a condition that triggers the WPR's application.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, however, before Obama made his Libya decision, told Congress what a "no-fly zone" over Libya required: "Let's just call a spade a spade. A no-fly zone begins with an attack on Libya to destroy the air defenses ... and then you can fly planes around the country and not worry about our guys being shot down." Sounds a lot like "hostilities." And Americans, by a two-to-one ratio, oppose military involvement in Libya.

The White Man, says Farrakhan, forced Obama to bomb Libya for the oil. Obama's alleged humanitarian intent, he said, is merely a "noble motive to hide (America's) wicked agenda!"

Farrakhan's analysis also explains Obama's job-killing domestic economic policies — the disastrous effect of which disproportionately hurts blacks. The White Man, after President Ronald Reagan, vowed, "Never again!"

Reagan, in the early '80s, faced an even tougher economy, with higher unemployment, higher inflation and higher interest rates. Reagan cut taxes, slowed the rate of domestic spending and decreased regulation on businesses.

Reagan, from The White Man's perspective, was catastrophic: Black adult unemployment fell faster than white adult unemployment, black teen unemployment fell faster that white teen unemployment, black businesses were created at a rate faster than white businesses, and the revenues of black businesses grew faster than those of white businesses. Egads!

Sociologist Charles Murray, in one of the most important books on public policy in the last 50 years, "Losing Ground," explained how welfare dependency increased the number of black out-of-wedlock births. The Welfare Reform Act of 1996 resulted in a dramatic decline in the welfare rolls, without a corresponding increase in abortion. Welfare recipients, a large percentage of whom are minorities, found jobs and became self-sufficient.

The White Man discovered an inexperienced, left-wing, collectivist, spread-the-wealth, tax-the-rich black senator from Illinois who had not read Murray's book or, if he had, did not believe it. In fact, then-Illinois State Senator Obama spoke out against the Welfare Reform Act.

Determined not to repeat the Reagan mistake, The White Man hatched a plan.

Obama would be The One.

The White Man engineered his election, then programmed the charismatic Obama to enact policies guaranteed to have the opposite effect of Reagan's policies:

The White Man made Obama sign costly "health care reform," which causes employers to drop coverage, premiums to increase and health care quality to decline.

The White Man made Obama raise the minimum wage. This increases unemployment for those with the lowest skills, a disproportionate percentage of whom are black.

The White Man made Obama sign laws to rein in "Wall Street greed," but left untouched the real reasons behind the housing meltdown: Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, the FHA and the Community Reinvestment Act, all of which induced the otherwise non-creditworthy — a disproportionate percentage of whom are racial minorities — to take on mortgages they could not afford.

The White Man made Obama oppose choice in education, including the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program that, by lottery, gave vouchers to inner-city Washington, D.C., children and saw high school graduation rates increase from 70 percent for applicants not offered a scholarship to 82 percent for the scholarship recipients.

The White Man made Obama support a nearly trillion-dollar "stimulus" package — largely giving money to state workers and other supporters of the Democratic Party. It neither "saved or created" 3.5 million jobs nor prevented unemployment from reaching 8 percent. Unemployment actually rose to 10.2 percent, and now stands at 9.1 percent.

The results have exceeded The White Man's expectations. Black teen unemployment is nearly 41 percent. The unemployment rate for black adult males is 17.5 percent. Yes, Obama's war for Big Oil and his anti-black economic polices mean lots of whites get trampled in the process. Collateral damage. Friendly fire. Addition by subtraction.

The White Man, as Farrakhan duly notes, is back.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/uc/20110623/...Jha2hhbnRoZQ--


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Malcolm X realized the fraud behind the Nation of Islam and sought to expose it in order to no longer mislead congregants who'd faithfully followed, as did he, Elijah Mohammed, founder of NofI. Malcolm X's denouncement of EM ultimately led to his (X) assasination. Louis Farrakhan, in his undying hatred for whites, continues to deceive black youth today which, is sad.

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Farrakan has always been un- american. His only point has ever been to blame Whitey.
He is offended by the attack on Libya because he and Quaddafi are lunatics.

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Wow, when do I get my "Evil Whitey" mind contol powers?
I could really use them.

Gadhafi's 'suicidal plan': Would he really blow up Tripoli?
The Week – 12 hrs ago

A Russian diplomat says the Libyan leader might turn his missile stockpile on his own capital before letting rebels overtake it

According to Russia's special envoy to Libya, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi has a "suicidal plan" to blow up his country's capital, Tripoli, if it falls into rebel hands. "The Libyan premier told me: If the rebels take over the city, we will cover it with missiles and blow it up," says Mikhail Margelov, as quoted Thursday in the Russian newspaper Izvestia. Libyan government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said the claim was "absolutely unfounded, untrue." Would Gadhafi really destroy Tripoli before he would surrender it?

Gadhafi just might go that far: The Libyan leader's back is against the wall, says Neave Barker at Al Jazeera. He's running out of everything from fuel to shells for his tanks. But he hasn't used any of his surface-to-surface missiles, and Margelov is convinced Gadhafi is ready to use them on Tripoli if it comes to that. "Hardly reassuring words from the man Russia's put in charge of mediating the conflict."

No. He just wants us to think he would: Gadhafi is playing a crafty game, say Flavia Krause-Jackson and Caroline Alexander at Bloomberg. By "flitting between conciliatory overtures and threats," he's keeping NATO and the rebels guessing about whether he'll accept exile, or fight to the death. The distractions have helped him prolong the armed conflict, and his ability to manipulate the situation will only grow as European leaders focus less on Libya, and more on their mounting debt crisis.
"Gadhafi lives up to wily reputation as allies yet to oust him"

The endless speculation is meaningless: It's certainly unsettling to hear that Gadhafi has missiles and isn't afraid to use them on his own capital city, says Jeff Neumann at Gawker. But don't worry, for every scary report about his bloodlust, there's a rosy prediction that victory and democracy are just around the corner. "There will probably be another 'Col. Gadhafi is definitely leaving today" report out within the next few hours to calm everyone's nerves."

http://news.yahoo.com/gadhafis-suici...105400025.html