Things like this will happen, and continue to happen, when there is little to no oversight of the President’s use of extra-judicial killing. While what Trump may have differed in the complete lack of evidence presented, the immediacy of necessary actions, and the wisdom of the strike (although, in Trump’s defense, at least the dead guy wasn’t a US citizen), it is not horribly different from the actions Obama took in the extra-judicial killing of Anwar al-Awlaki or Bush did for many others. The unfettered power of the President to murder anyone in the world as long as he pretends to have a reason has now been given to a narcissistic, bullying moron. Maybe now some grownups will find a spine and try to limit, or at least get some judicial oversight, over extra-judicial killing.
He also exemplifies a confusing mindset common to far too many Americans of late:
He lists three major factors behind Iran’s current position, but then piously declares “nothing justifies their military action”. Except if anyone had tried to do even a portion of that to the US, there’d be no doubt that the Americans would consider military force justified.
Yes, but one would hope that a US Senator could come up with an answer that managed to both not support attacks on US troops, and not contain such a blatant bit of hypocrisy.
Maybe Nancy can add this to the articles of impeachment. I don’t see any Constitutional impediment to adding “killing terrorists without permission” to the list of high crimes and misdemeanors.
Rand Paul’s analysis is on the money, he clearly has a better grasp pf the dynamics of the Middle East and of diplomacy than Trump. The killing of Soliemani was dumb dumb dumb, and Trump, the US and perhaps her allies will pay a price.
It is very significant that both of the most important military allies of the US, the UK and Israel, are tiptoeing away as quickly as possible from this debacle, all the while making it clear that this was Trump’s call alone.
:dubious: How does “going to war without permission” strike you?
Terrorists = non-state actors. Hostis humani generis, as they used to say, like pirates. Hard to say AlQaida isn’t an “enemy of humankind generally” and hunting AlQuaida clearly falls under Congress’s Authorization for Use of Military Force resolution.
Killing a high-ranking official of another nation-state: act of war. The power to bring the U.S. to war lies with Congress, not the President.
Yes, but it’s no less patriotic and faithful to his constitutional civic duty to introduce reason into an important public debate, which he did in challenging the rationale for Trump’s whacking of a foreign official. He shouldn’t be afraid to point out that our perpetual tendency to apply double standards feeds into our self-destructive illusion of American exceptionalism.
You mean like Obama did when he ordered hundreds of drone strikes without congressional approval, including targeting American civilians? Or perhaps the wars in Libya and Syria which were carried out without congressional authorization? As Obama himself said, “It turns out I’m really good at killing people.” Not so good at getting Congress to approve it.
Or maybe you mean the Iran ‘deal’, which was clearly a treaty but the word was never used to avoid the pesky constitutional requirement of having Congress vote on it?
Or maybe you mean DACA, which Obama passed by executive order after spending years telling people he couldn’t do exactly that because the constitution forbade it?
If Obama had killed Soleimani, Democrats would be cheering and the Republicans would be complaining about oversight. Because that’s the way we roll now,