The editors of the Chicago Tribune want Congress to authorize more sweeping powers to President Obama and future presidents to wage war on DAESH than the president’s asking for:
We’re on record saying that while President Barack Obama wants permission to engage — this after 2,000 airstrikes, and with 2,600 U.S. troops on the ground — he also wants lawmakers to tie his hands. He’s asking Congress to sign off on a plan to fight a limited war that excludes “enduring offensive ground combat operations.” He also would tie the hands of a future president by setting a three-year expiration on the resolution.
We’ve instead urged Congress to give this president not the limited authority he seeks but the broader authority that he and future presidents may well need.
Before Congress grants such an authorization I would like President Obama to articulate his reasons for wanting authority to wage war on DAESH that does include defending U. S. interests but doesn’t include slippery slope arguments, appeals to pity, or considerations of the interests of our frenemies in the Middle East or elsewhere. I think we have interests in opposing DAESH but they’re almost entirely right here within our borders by looking more critically on mosques that are financed with foreign money, imams that preach hatred, and our absurdly lax policies on travel and student visas.
As Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota pointed out yesterday on ABC’s This Week, Muslims practice their religion more freely in the United States than practically anywhere else in the world. That’s one of the reasons radicalization is a harder sell here in the United States than it is in, say, France. While Americans have gone to fight with DAESH, their numbers are extremely small. DAESH can’t replenish its numbers by recruiting in the United States. You can recruit 150 people to do just about anything in the United States.; The number of young French Muslims who’ve gone to joing DAESH is at least 1,000. My point is that France’s interests in opposing DAESH are clearly stronger than ours. France’s onions are in the fire where ours aren’t.
My point is that France’s interests in opposing DAESH are clearly stronger than ours. France’s onions are in the fire where ours aren’t.
Similarly w.r.t. the crisis with the Ukraine. I wonder if the French are still selling arms to Russia?
Maybe I’m hypercritical. This morning I read a post over at RealClearWorld on how we should totally risk thermonuclear war by not just arming Ukraine but admitting the country to NATO. The only part I couldn’t figure out was why.
Maybe I’m hypercritical. This morning I read a post over at RealClearWorld on how we should totally risk thermonuclear war by not just arming Ukraine but admitting the country to NATO.
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The only part I couldn’t figure out was why.
I keep asking supporters of arming the Ukraine why that wouldn’t be a belligerent act against Russia? Especially given that they especially are making the case that this isn’t a battle of separatists against the Kiev government. (I happen to agree with them on that point, at least partially.) They can’t answer that.
Then they tell me that big wars always start when major powers ignore small crises until they become big crises. I point out that WWI started exactly when the major powers decided to butt-in on a matter between two other belligerents and they ignore me.
I ask what the US’s particular interests are in Ukraine, and they tell me that no other nation benefits more from a stable world order than the US. This claim is so ridiculous that I can’t even respond. Western Europe clearly benefits more from the current world order than the US, both by the peace being kept on the most violent continent on the planet, and by NOT HAVING TO PAY FOR IT.
Not to mention that WWI worked out pretty well for the US until we got dragged into it, and even then we ended up coming out of it in better shape than anyone else. Thus the British propaganda efforts (successful) to get the US to disarm itself unilaterally. For that matter, we came out of WWII in pretty good shape, too.
And as mentioned before, they can’t answer why the US should get involved when our European allies won’t.
So I guess I’ve got the hypercritical disease, too.