Of course her “right” to it is imaginary. All rights are imaginary. They are, like you say, social, moral, and legal conventions. If society changes, this woman’s “right” to collect her social security check without getting bonked over the head may also change.
I have no idea if we had some form of Congressional approval for the actions in Kosovo, Panama, Somalia, Lebanon, Libya, Grenada, Haiti, the Boxer Rebellion and et al. Those were outside the scope of this debate. It was my assumption we were working from the reasonable argument that the President should not be able to entangle us in a major military operation without Congressional approval. (In the case of Korea it is a well known fact that Truman received Congressional approval–although after the fact.)
If the debate is “the President should not be able to use military force whatsoever without prior Congressional approval” then I view this as a pointless debate. It is settled fact that the President can, should, and must have the power to use the military without prior Congressional approval in some circumstances.
Some of the very men who helped frame our Constitution (and thus knew exactly what powers they intended the President to have) used military force without explicit congressional approval. Even in the 18th and 19th centuries political thinkers recognized there was a fundamental difference from “low-level uses of military force” and outright state-versus-state warfare necessitating a declaration of war.
There is a reason I was very careful in using the term “major wars” or “lengthy wars” in my posts. That being, the President must have some power over the military to enable certain low level uses of force. Some types of military action that quite simply need to happen can’t wait for Congressional approval (as an extreme example, defending the country against an invasion, or in a lesser example, approving a naval vessel attack a pirate ship.) However, since any major war needs funding well in addition to the regular budget given to the military, the President is essentially going to require specific legislation giving him said funding.
Cite for this? Early Presidents (including those who actually helped create the Constitution) used military force without explicit Congressional approval.
It’s also utterly without support in the facts at hand. All that is needed to stop any war is a majority of Congress refusing to fund the war. The President, to repeat, cannot effectively counter a denial of funding with a veto. If you’ve followed politics you’re aware that the Iraq war is being funded by periodic legislation that Congress passes specifically funding the war. All of these pieces of legislation eventually expire and Bush has to come back to Congress for more money, like a child coming to daddy for an allowance. If Congress refuses to give Bush more money (and this only means a simple majority refuses) then Bush can’t get anymore, period. Congress has sole power of the purse. Furthermore, the initial decision to fund said war also came from Congress. If Bush invaded Iraq without funding the war would not have even gotten off the ground in the first place. Again, Bush can’t counteract this with a veto. If Congress refuses to pass new legislation then that’s it, no more money. There isn’t even any legislation TO veto. If Congress passes legislation saying they won’t give him any more money for the Iraq venture, except to spend towards withdrawing troops, he could veto that. However, the only thing that would lead to is, again, there being no funding bill for the war, funding would run out, and Bush would be without money. The veto power of the President can’t create funding, all it can do is reject legislation, but because of the way funding for wars is set up, the President is not in a position in which he can wield veto power as a means to stop the Congress from defunding his war.
Where does it say that Congress has to approve any use of force? I don’t consider Grenada, Kosovo, Somalia, Lebanon et cetera to be instances of United States wars. They were low level uses of force from our perspective–to other participants it was certainly war, but I don’t feel they constituted war from the perspective of the United States. I don’t buy into the view that any martial clashing is by its very nature a war–nor do I think the Founder’s felt that way. I focused on major and/or lengthy wars because these are the “ones that count.” Requiring Congressional approval for every bombing run or every ship boarding would essentially make the United States unable to act in the world at large.
This is basically a pointlessly long post which attempts to assert that “facts aren’t really facts” No, whatever reasons Congress had for approving force, force was approved. That is fact. What you’re working on here is an entirely separate debate (“Was Congress duped in authorizing the use of force in Iraq?”) Whether or not they were duped is irrelevant to this discussion.
It’s akin to saying that, if someone is convicted of a crime based on false testimony and then executed, that they weren’t actually executed. That just isn’t the case, what’s done is done and the fact of the matter is force was authorized. The reasons behind it are a wholly separate issue and do not in any way alter the fact that the President engaged in war against Iraq with full Congressional approval.
Land isn’t of great value any longer. In the 20th century wealth isn’t tied strictly to how large your country is. SO no, in the context of the 20th century we would be foolish to try to gain wealth by force (primarily because the use of force has become so expensive it is almost impossible to profit in this way.)
But in the context of the 19th century we’d have been fools not to have displaced the Indians, we’d have been fools not to take Mexico’s land. If we had it to do over again, what are you advocating? That California, Texas, hell, all of America remain in the hands of natives or the Spanish?
That’s ludicrous.
Korea was most definitely authorized. Your argument is akin to a mob lawyer arguing his client didn’t actually order a contract killing despite him paying for it and the killing taking place. Yes, Korea was approved after the fact, but that doesn’t change the fact it was approved (FDR started working against the Axis powers the second he heard about Pearl Harbor, he didn’t ask the Congress to Declare War on Japan he asked them to recognize that a state of war exists.)
Because it isn’t always proper to allow Congress time to debate such a thing. It’s only proper that we require Congress recognize a State of war (through a legitimate DoW or a similar form of authorization) at some point or otherwise put a stop to the action.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Martin Hyde
The Mexican-American War was one of the most important wars in American history, and I think many Americans fail to appreciate that. It was naked aggression, but it won us so much land that there’s no way a reasonable person could be anything but happy that we started and won that war.
It’s like with the extermination/displacement of the Indians: The guilt of the crime is on our ancestors while we enjoy the fruits. No (white) American can fail to be happy with the result, but neither could any one seriously, credibly argue we should do the same if we had it to do over again – nor that we should ever again take an opportunity, however ripe and rich, to collectively win great wealth by force.
This is like saying I’m glad I wasn’t aborted. Never makes any sense to me.
It’s beyond the scope, I guess, but that’s not ludicrous at all. Manifest destiny, indeed.
Meh. The Bill looks like feel-good crap in which Congress tries to distance itself from an unpopular President and which will have no effect whatsoever. Just as the Americans haven’t had a formal “war” since 1945, future hotspots will be described with various euphemisms like “conflict” or “military operation” or “stabilization effort” or whatnot and Congress’ support will be determined not by the necessity or morality of American involvement, but by a cynical calculation of how close the next election is and how popular the war is. If Congress can’t or won’t apply the power it already has, this empty display of piety won’t change a damn thing.
"Korea was most definitely authorized. Your argument is akin to a mob lawyer arguing his client didn’t actually order a contract killing despite him paying for it and the killing taking place. Yes, Korea was approved after the fact…"
Then it’s not akin. For one thing, the client would have had to have been told by the killer “hey, I just started killing this person, you wanna pay for it? if you don’t, it’s gonna cause you some hurtin’ cuz your peoples are already involved…” Presumably, that’s not how the hit works in that analogy; and it’s for that very reason that it’s such a debate in terms of the actual issue in the OP.
As for Congress stopping funding, I honestly think the legislation is an admission of the ineffectualness of Congress to get a majority to agree on something; and that, if that’s the case, they’d rather fail to get a majority to agree to go to war then to fail to get a majority to stop a war on the premise that it’s better to err on the side of not going to war.
Whether or not it’s best to err in that directions is obviously debatable.
Biden, when asked about why he voted to fund while being opposed, said that he wasn’t willing “to play politics” with the lives of the soldiers.
I found that to be an interesting defense; the premise, it seems, is that even if I vote no the war will go on anyway and they just won’t have the tools they need and that even with no tools and no money Bush will keep the war going anyway by hook or by crook. I don’t know if that’s a reasonable premise to operate on, or if in fact it’s the premise Biden operates on, but calling up the Guard, extending duties beyond those initially agreed to, etc. may all be very much within the rights of the president but it’s not hard to imagine why some could feel that he’ll go beyond the pale to persist in something by any means conceivable.
An obviously ridiculous result if taken to its logical extreme, but as a practical matter I found it telling: if it’s clear that your vote isn’t going to change the fact of being at war but only affect what equipment the soldiers have while at war – which your vote can’t predictably and reliably be counted on to stop – then it becomes playing games with their lives.
I don’t know how I feel about that; it sort of reminds me of not feeling there’s any point in voting if you’re in a state that’s overwhelmingly red or blue.
LOL I have to agree. 
So cite me the resolution that Congress approved.
It isn’t proper to allow Congress to debate a war of choice? The problem here is that you’re giving the President unchecked authority to start a war of indeterminate length based only on the view of the President that it won’t be a “major” war. I view the president as the commander in chief, not the artiber of war and peace.
Again, this discussion isn’t about Iraq, but you have put forth a shockingly naive view of what it takes to stop a war by cutting off funding, so I must address it.
Not passing appropriations for the war will stop the ability of the military to fight, but it will not bring them home. Without money, the troops will have no fuel, electricity, bullets, or other essential equipment. They cannot fight without it. However, if Congress simply decides not to pass another dime to fund the war, there will be 160,000 troops just sitting in Iraq with zero means to get home. It is going to take billions of dollars to transport troops and their equipment home, and if Congress cannot provide the money with the proviso that the funds are only for the return of our troops, because of a presidential veto on the basis of that provision, then Congress needs a supermajority to fund the withdrawal of troops, or a supermajority to withdraw the authorization for military force.
In the case of cutting off appropriations, there are two instances that I’m aware Congress has cut off funding: 1975 in Vietnam when all but a handful of our troops were no longer there, and 1993 in Somalia. In the case of Somalia, funding was cut off for everything but protection of the US Embassy, UN forces, self-defense, and the withdrawal of troops. Clinton signed it, of course.
Congress cannot force US troops home by not approving funds for a war. It doesn’t work that way. If Congress has ineffective remedies for ending a war began solely at the discretion of the President (again not talking specifically about Iraq) with the power of the purse, then it is essential that Congress approve of wars of choice.
Good points; I hadn’t even considered the cost of bringing troops home as part of the funding for ‘war’ but of course I guess it would have to be.