*sigh* -- won't they just make this official?

[acroyear]

I no longer mad at the Pres. There's nothing more we can do. My current problem is Congress. The Constitution clearly dictates that only Congress can declare war on another country. They have not done so. The point of that clause was to make sure that the Pres didn't do exactly what he's doing now: abusing his power over the military against a foreign power without the authorized consent of the people through their legislative representatives.

That individual rights over the last year and a half have been trampled on by the current government is one thing, but now a major clause in the original constitution has been (or will be, if they don't consider a "surgical strike" an act of War) severely violated.

On top of that, even Democratic leadership in Congress is using the word War in describing this situation, whether pro or against (and many seem pro), so why they hell don't they just make it official to SOMEBODY (we know the UN won't make it official) and make the formal declaration vote and stop putting the ENTIRE government in contempt of the Constitution we're so vehemently defending.

Comments

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

Nam, I was too young, and hindsight is 20/20. Any current opinion of the conflict is jaded (in both directions) by the knowledge of how the conflict ended and what its effects would be, both on our soldiers and on the neighboring countries (Cambodia, particularly). It is also jaded by my father's experiences that I know of, and his attitudes to "the Red Menace" (a very real thing to him in those days, and one I couldn't help but have been influenced by at the time, though I have grown to make my own decisions).

The Gulf War, like Korea, was done under mostly the U.N. and/or NATO banners, and also under standing treaties with Kuwait itself (and the implication that Hussein's actions would also threaten Saudi Arabia and Israel, with whom we have treaties), thus the President's actions were reinforcing already agreed upon treaties voted on by the people through the Senate (including the one that defined the U.S.'s membership in the UN, which has clauses specifically for providing armed forces at need).

This current situation is neither a U.N./NATO action, nor a proper War. It is a foreign policy action that may have the consent of Congress, but it does not have constitutional authority as far as my understanding of the constitution goes.

As I said, this is a congressional problem, not a presidential one. I feel that Congress giving up its constitutional authority is unconstitutional (as my example of the limited line-item veto shows), as the Constitution makes no clause for it, including "emergencies". If they want to ammend the constitution to allow congress to suspend it, fine, then these resolutions would be, in my opinion, constitutional...however, that kind of clause would be ripe for other abuses and would need to be limited. E.g., Congress could defer its own powers in certain circumstances, but not those of making laws, nor allow the President to take any action that violates the bill of rights items.