The point is that if the president acts while Congress has their fucking thumb up their ass, the president gets blamed, but if the president does nothing while Congress has their fucking thumb up their ass, the president also gets blamed.
No, my point is that our legislature is fucked and that calling up the White House lawyers and seeing what options for action are available while Congress struggles to pass even basic fucking funding bills is perfectly legitimate.
Especially in light of the fact that you're going to be accused of either violating your Constitutional limits or abrogating your Constitutional duties regardless of whether you choose to act or not.
The President should be able to make decisions that are legal to do lawful things. If Congress doesn't want the President to be able to act outside of approval of Congress, then they are free to pass a law forbidding it but instead they passed the War Powers Act that allows the President to do what they're doing without their explicit consent for 90 days (60 days of military action and 30 of withdrawal).
The legislative branch has been busted for so long that they literally ceded power to go to war to the executive for the good of the nation. Y’all can feel free to undo that at any time once you’re not completely broken.
Are they suggesting to allow US Navy ships to be attacked without retaliation? It’s been going on for like 2 months now. Are they willing to have that on their voting record?
No, it wouldn’t. A straight repeal of the War Powers Act also opens us up to another Vietnam. And amending it such that any use of force requires congressional approval would put us in an international straight jacket. From defending our shipping interests to protecting allies. In the event of China deciding it would rather just take existing islands to make it’s “nine dashed line” a reality, we’d be arguing about immigration instead of deploying the Navy. And we would instantly lose the trade access we have to the entirety of the SEA region.
Some progressives need to put down the flowers and smoke some bad guys now and then. Conservatives need to cram their sabers up their own asses and die.
I’ll take soft progressives over the other any day of the week, but demanding Congressional approval is fucking absurd right now. It’ll take 8 months and be filled with unrelated laws, financial packages for Ohio and Texas, and pro-oil deregulation.
No, but have the power to make quick action against small threats via airstrike and missile strikes shouldn’t need the end endless hem and haw from a bunch of clowns.
Not to mention, having foreseen exactly this problem previous representatives passed the War Powers Act. Biden absolutely has the authority to blow shit up. He can do it without any reason or other authority for 60 days. Then he has 30 days to remove American troops from that area. (Or return force levels to where they were)
Oh yeah the infighting is getting bad. Get ready for an absolute terrible election season for the Democrats.
I’m seeing “leftists” using the same vocabulary as Q-anon style crazy morons. The vitriol is being spat like no matter what their isn’t a right answer and it’s not made better by the fact that we as a country are still basically pushing for all the worse aspects of ourselves because it’s what feels normal.
People are all gonna join in to help burn it down and think they will be the kings of the ashes but largest organized group is gonna be the real victor and it’s for sure as hell not the self hating left.
Maybe I will be wrong and the vote against method will work again but if it does we need to make some hard turns to get things actually getting better and get some companionship happening or it will just be a bloodbath between factions that wanted their scoop of the ashes.
It is interesting/sad just how hard Biden is sticking to the old ways of doing things even though most people seem to have moved on from that way of thinking.
It’s because these “leftists” are right wing trolls. Full stop. This “Genocide Joe” shit in particular is so fucking transparently a trump-style attack it’s laughable. Leftist spaces on the internet are so far up their own reactionary assholes they are now actively protecting far right propagandists and calling it left unity.
Yeah I actually got banned from a “leftist” sub (r/latestagecapitalism on Reddit) because I called out a literal right wing propaganda post from a literal maga mouthpiece that was a lie.
And the mod responded with:
We don’t work with the Demo-kkk-rats
Like a literal fascist response because it makes their dick hard to feel like they are standing up to the bad guys while supporting the end of democracy. Neat. Not a leftist.
Limited war is always a tricky topic. Where do you draw the line between a full on war and making the seas safe for trade,
Luckily, the aftermath of the Vietnam War gave us an answer. The War Powers Act. Which gives the president authority to use the military in situations exactly like this. If he tries to turn it into a big thing, then it has to go in front of Congress.
That’s not what they’re doing. They’re firing at any ship they believe even has a Western financial stake in it. No matter where it’s going or what it’s carrying. It could be taking Italian tractors to Somalia to encourage local farming as part of an aid program and they would fire at it.
The Houthis took up arms because of Iranian backing and Yemeni local politics. The Western countries aren’t solving that any time soon. And they’re already receiving HA.
Isn’t fighting piracy like legal for everyone? Like a private citizen or any country’s military could go out there and hunt pirates. I remember that from when the somali pirates got yeeted.
None of these representatives objected to us sinking boats involved in piracy operations. They’re objecting to attacks on land against a group that is pretty close to a government. There’s some point at which on-land operations turn from being defending against piracy to regime change. Which may be warranted, but should be decided by Congress.
Ha I see why you might think so but I was referring to “neighborhood rules” for kids’ games like Tag. We’d often designate a light pole or a car as “home base” and you couldn’t be tagged as “It” if you were touching it.
I hope you play tag in Europe or else this didn’t make sense either lol
The last war declared by Congress was Korea in the early 1950s in WW2. Dark Brandon doesn’t have time for this foolishness. Yemen was warned again and again. They’ve now entered the find out stage.
The Wikipedia entry for the Korean War mentions Congress allocating money for the war effort within the month after US got involved. That certainly appears to be Congressional approval.
And the US response was after a UN resolution calling for it, giving some legitimacy
The last war by US Congress was declared in June 1942, against Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania. US Congress has not made a formal declaration of war since then.
Right but they pass laws granting authorization of military use of force, AUMF. That’s the Congressional authority to declare war under the War Powers Clause of the Constitution.
If you read the annotations to that clause you will see that the framers intent, traditional interpretation, and certainly modern interpretation are in agreement that the Constitution does not foreclose executive initiated use of force in what would be considered self defense, and that would certainly include the measured and limited destruction of an enemy’s ability to carry out further attacks on US interests, and would certainly cover such defensive measures when done in agreement and in concert with a broad coalition of allies.
Yes, we call those “blank checks” to the executive branch. The Germans even have a word for it. We did it with Vietnam and it did not go well. One would have thought the generation in Congress would have learned their lesson given most of them lived through that shitshow.
It goes without saying that military resources can defend themselves when fired upon, there’s plenty of precedent going back well before the formation of the US. The AUMFs were not that. They were very clearly blank checks to wage literal wars anywhere the executive desired while providing the flimsiest of evidence - and Shrub did just that. See: Iraq.
Merely an overly large check. There are limits, and we need the executive branch to be able to respond to urgent threats - the War Powers Act seems to do that.
the 1973 War Powers Resolution, which further requires that presidents not only report to Congress within 48 hours when they deploy U.S. armed forces into hostilities without congressional authorization but also end U.S. participation in those hostilities within 60 to 90 days if Congress does not authorize it after the fact.
Then people here are complaining about A U Military Force but I only see such a thing specifying Iraq. Iraq can’t be pulled into every possibility yeah, I agree Congress needs to get its shit together and constrain or repeal - the Iraq conflict that was created for is done.
Meanwhile, the response to the Houthi terrorism/piracy seems exactly what these regulations provide for
And the “terrorism” one is actually textually targeted at the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks. It’s not even itself overly broad, it’s just been twisted into a global war on terror because the executives want to do that and no one stopped them.
Oh fuck off with this tired propaganda line. After Korea we did Vietnam as a “police action” and then Congress filled in the semantic loop hole with the War Powers Act. Which governs how we go to war now. If we need to fight an actual war then Congress has to pass an AUMF, Authorization to Use Military Force.
Every action since Vietnam has either fallen into the 60 day period presidents are allowed for emergencies or an AUMF. Congress has absolutely been exercising it’s war powers. This stupid fucking lie gets trotted out by the far left and the far right for different uses and I’m done hearing it.
Yemen has been getting bombed by Saudi Arabia with the full backing of the US for almost a decade now, creating one of the worst humanitarian crises still ongoing. You’re right about the brain worms, but it’s not because you goofed up the last war declared by congress. Dumb Brandon is not cool for continuing the status quo with the military industrial complex.
Congress signed over the rights to just do war crimes whenever you feel like it back under Reagan.
Now the President can do the thing, Congress can call a hearing to complain about it, elections happen, power changes hands, and the only people who suffer are the ones getting bombed.
Targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, mass arrests and forced removal of native populations, and indiscriminate use of chemical weapons are all war crimes. Hell, use of cluster bombs and mines have been recognized as war crimes since the mid-90s, and yet the US is the world’s largest manufacturer and distributor of both.
Of course someone should be held responsible. So fling a few bombs up in the air and declare anyone they land on “enemy combatants” and then we can say justice was served.
So, nobody should be held accountable for the US eagerly aiding Israel in its quest of genocide? Also, the US has been helping Saudi Arabia bomb the Houthis for almost a decade now and have created a humanitarian crisis in Yemen.
Shooting at international shipping isn’t holding anyone accountable unless you hate shipping corporations. And yeah if you shoot at the military (any military) don’t be surprised when they shoot back.
It’s clearly made the US take notice (since they care more about trade than people’s lives), so mission accomplished. How else do you propose they do it, given the limited resources they have? Take it up with the UN, where the US vetoes any resolution against israel?
I suggest they pressure Egypt to allow all aid into Gaza no matter what Israel wants.
I suggest they donate to the IRC.
I suggest they go join the people they see as comrades and fight Israel.
I do not suggest that they declare war on the entire world’s shipping. Which is responsible, in part, for delivering their own Humanitarian Aid. And transferring food and energy the world over. Furthermore effectiveness at getting attention does not equal moral. I don’t get to shoot at random cars on the freeway because I don’t like how the next state over handles homeless people. And they don’t get shoot at random ships.
I suggest they pressure Egypt to allow all aid into Gaza no matter what Israel wants.
Shutting down the Suez traffic does this.
I suggest they donate to the IRC.
“Okay, yes, you’ve had an enormous impact on geopolitics with a few warning shots, but have you considered starting a GoFundMe?”
I do not suggest that they declare war on the entire world’s shipping.
Hardly the whole world. They’re very clearly targeting traffic through the Red Sea. Nightmarish news for all those Israeli shipping magnets and major ports on the back end of the Mediterranean. Amazing news for ports along the southern coast of Africa. The Houthis have, with a few hundred dollars in military hardware, done what amounts to a direct cash transfer of billions of dollars from the Israeli Zionists to pro-Palestinian South Africans.
What could they possibly do that would be more effective for their allies in Gaza than this?
It’s not that shutting down Suez traffic doesn’t do this. It’s that it’s an act of war against any country moving cargo through there. It’s entirely too broad.
And they haven’t had an impact. Not beyond discussing it here and lining themselves up for NATO ground mission (If not a UN one). We already have a military UN mission keeping the Suez Canal open and it has been the subject of wars before. It really is that important as a logistical route. And the IRC is hardly a GoFundMe.
They could go fight the Israelis directly. Because it’s not just Mediterranean. It’s literally the entirety of Europe from all point east of the canal. And Europe is not going to tolerate it. The most impactful thing they get is actually the first ever foreign deployment of an EU military force.
It’s that it’s an act of war against any country moving cargo through there.
If you consider the history of Yemen and the decade-long struggle of Houthi insurgents against a Saudi backed dictatorship, eh? They’ve been at war with a proxy of a proxy of the US for some time now. Might as well claim the Taliban is committing an act of war against countries moving cargo through Kabul.
And they haven’t had an impact.
95% of traffic routed from the Red Sea isn’t an impact?
They could go fight the Israelis directly.
They are. This is a direct attack on the Israeli economy. It is costing the state billions.
It is not a direct attack. That’s the entire problem. And if you define friendly countries as part of the war then you have defacto declared war on them. The only impact that’s going to have is in Yemen. Europe and North America aren’t going to just give up the suez canal. The Yemeni coast facing the straight is going to turn into an international occupied zone. It will cost a billion dollars a year and they’ll pay it happily to keep a trillion dollars a year flowing through the canal.
Then a year later, the only people who will even remember it’s an occupied zone are the same people who know there’s a UN mission in Sinai to keep the Suez Canal from being shut down by war again. That’s it. It’s not going to crash any economies. It’s not going to hurt Israel or anyone else for more than a month or two.
When you’ve got bombs dropping on your head, it doesn’t matter whether the US is doing it via their own Navy or six layers of proxies. The explosion still hurts the same, regardless.
if you define friendly countries as part of the war then you have defacto declared war on them
Absolutely. Which is why Israel declaring total war on Gaza was such a monumental misstep. You’ve got Palestinians in Jordan, Persians in Iran, Arabs in Iraq and Egypt and Lebanon and Syria, and now Houthis in Yemen all fighting mad.
The Red Sea is shut down entirely because the war in Gaza was recognized is increasingly seen as a war by Israel against all Muslims.
Europe and North America aren’t going to just give up the suez canal. The Yemeni coast facing the straight is going to turn into an international occupied zone.
Given how much trouble US and British troops have had moving in and around Somalia, how disastrously the war in Afghanistan and Iraq ended, and how inhospitable to modern western military hardware the Yemeni mountains have proven to be, I think the question is not whether EU/NA will give up the Suez but whether they can hang on to it.
the only people who will even remember it’s an occupied zone are the same people who know there’s a UN mission in Sinai to keep the Suez Canal from being shut down by war again
You’re only furthering my point. Americans and Europeans have completely neglected how fragile the region is, simply because of this period of relative stability. Given that the UN is fracturing in the face of Old West nations feuding with BRICS states, their ability to maintain control over the peninsula is eroding in turn.
And, again, it should be noted how crazy profitable this turn of events has been for South Africa. 90% of shipping traffic formerly passing through the Suez is now passing around the Horn. That’s brought a much-needed injection of cash and cargo into the region.
Similarly, the nascent BRI is seeing a flood of new commerce, as overland travel gains appeal relative to the hazardous Red Sea route.
From the standpoint of the BRICS states, this has been a windfall. They aren’t under any economic pressure to tag in with EU/NA on Yemen. If anything, it appears that the South Africans are leading a diplomatic charge in their defense.
The Houthis are not directly stacking Israel. Don’t twist my words. They were in response to your comment.
Given how much trouble US and British troops have had moving in and around Somalia, how disastrously the war in Afghanistan and Iraq ended, and how inhospitable to modern western military hardware the Yemeni mountains have proven to be, I think the question is not whether EU/NA will give up the Suez but whether they can hang on to it.
What you’re missing is it won’t be a peacekeeping mission or a nation building mission. They’re going to DMZ it. Anyone in area X not in a uniform, with a weapon, gets killed.
But you’re just using more and more propaganda lines so I’m going to stop here.
They are directly impacting the Israeli economy and security, by threatening a traffic lane vital for Israel’s continued existence.
What you’re missing is it won’t be a peacekeeping mission or a nation building mission. They’re going to DMZ it.
Getting your military advise from Douglas MacArthur? The man who threw up on the White House lawn when he found out he was heading up the war on the peninsula and suffered one of the most humiliating American military defeats since Lee surrendered at Appomattox?
Anyone in area X not in a uniform, with a weapon, gets killed.
Christ, its like you haven’t been paying attention to the last 50 years of US military history. Aerial bombardments have never successfully secured territory. All they’ve done is waste $10M ordinance on $100 targets.
The Saudis have been bombing Yemen for a full decade. They’re better at building tunnel networks than the fucking Gazans.
But you’re just using more and more propaganda lines
You are shitting out your doo-doo ass and refusing to acknowledge the smell.
Nobody said shit about it staying at aerial bombardments. Why do you think I’m so pissed? I know people who are going to end up there.
And it’s still not impacting Israel’s economy. So the ships had to go around, supply is already re-established. Nobody going through the straight is going to Israel anymore because insurance won’t let them. So now the Houthis decided it’s the entire Western world which is just stupid. Like pissing in the wind. They’re getting people killed for nothing.
And no. MacArthur is neither here nor there. He didn’t come up with the concept of a DMZ or militarized zone. I fully expect it to look like Eastern Turkey with a lot of stupid shit going on because some local dickhead though he could gain an ounce more street cred by attacking the West.
But the way, they have now explicitly attacked American cargo ships for being American. If you look at American history you know we don’t back down. We only ever escalate once our civilians are being shot at. And we certainly aren’t going to give up on global trade just because a random warlord decided he could control international water.
The Israeli economy has been damaged, too — and it is Israel more than Hamas that will decide when the shooting stops. Some economists compare the shock to the Israeli economy to the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. Others say it might be worse.
Gross domestic product will fall — from forecasts of 3 percent growth in 2023 to 1 percent in 2024, according to the Bank of Israel. Some economists predict contraction.
…
Tourism has flatlined. The Tel Aviv beaches and the Old City in Jerusalem are bereft of foreigners. Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank were canceled.
Construction, which ordinarily relies on Palestinian labor from the West Bank, has ground to a near-halt. Since Israel launched its assault to eradicate Hamas, it has suspended the work permits of more than 100,000 Palestinians.
Exports are down across the board. Israel’s gas fields in the Mediterranean Sea were shut down early in the war but are now partially operating.
The US no longer makes leave in place mines. They are all command detonated. That was a Clinton thing. The cluster bombs… We’re actually phasing them out of our arsenal. However the US maintains they’re legal as long as they’re not used in urban areas. Largely because Russia and China still use them and they’re very effective. We’d need to get them seriously on board to actually stop making cluster munitions.
The US no longer makes leave in place mines. They are all command detonated.
We continue to use them on the Korean divide, probably the most heavily mined place on earth. And while we’ve definitely updated our arsenal, I would not bet my life on the reliability of these ostensibly more advanced systems.
The cluster bombs… We’re actually phasing them out of our arsenal.
Sure. By selling them to our allies.
Largely because Russia and China still use them and they’re very effective.
Well, they’re cheap by tonnage, which is why the Russians love them. But they’re also unreliable, which is what makes them so dangerous. They don’t always detonate where they land, and that makes them function as land mines after the fact. They are only “effective” in the sense that they’re explosive devices that litter a large area.
As to China, when was the last time they bombed anyone? Like, at all? To my knowledge, the Chinese haven’t been involved in a war since they signed a peace deal with Vietnam in the 70s. The closest we’ve seen has been police actions along border territories (Xinjiang getting a bunch of jihadist spillover from Afghanistan, slap fights with Indian border guard counterparts, etc). Who have they been dropping cluster bombs on, in living memory even?
The DMZ landmines have been there for 70 years and de-mining that would come with serious risks of sniper attacks, ambushes, and nuclear war. Yeah it really ramps up that quick over there. All we need is for the Hermit King to think we’re clearing breach routes and Seoul goes up. So yeah we’re not removing those.
Even under the Trump administration we’re sticking to “non-permanent” landmines. The most prominent and widespread of which is the command activated claymore.
Most of our allies are also getting rid of cluster bombs. And when Ukraine specifically asked for them we hesitated to sell them. The reason we did so is because of parity in that war. And while they aren’t reliable enough to leave the area safe of UXO, they are extremely reliable at destroying military equipment.
China matters because they’re constantly threatening military action.
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