OBAMA A TRAITOR AND WAR CRIMINAL – WHERE’S CONGRESS?

By J.B. Williams

March 21, 2011
NewsWithViews.com

On the eighth anniversary of the day President George W. Bush ordered US troops into Iraq in 2003, with the full support of the US Congress and majority support from the UN Security Council, Barack Obama launched a Tomahawk missile assault on the sovereign nation of Libya with no majority support in the UN and without even consulting congress.

Acting alone while congress was away on recess, solely at the command of the United Nations and without constitutional authority, Barack Obama dropped over $70 million worth of Tomahawk missiles on the sovereign nation of Libya in a dictatorial maneuver to force regime change of a foreign land.

He launched a military assault on Libya under what authority? To be certain, Gadhafi is no prize, but what Obama just did is far worse. Acting all alone in a truly imperialistic fashion, Obama violated his Oath of Office, Article I and II of the US Constitution and The War Powers Act all in one mindless kneejerk decision.

Article II – Section II of the US Constitution identifies the US President as the civilian oversight of the US Military and Commander-in-Chief. But it gives the US President no authority to use military might to enforce its political will upon foreign nations.

Article I – Section VIII of the US Constitution rests the power to declare war solely with the US Congress. It requires both the Commander-in-Chief and Congress to commit US troops to combat, without which the act is wholly unconstitutional.

Even the Washington Times managed to get this one right in its editorial – Obama’s Illegal War.

The 1973 War Powers Act was put in place to prevent a US President from doing exactly what Barack Obama just did.

SEC. 2. (a) It is the purpose of this joint resolution to fulfill the intent of the framers of the Constitution of the United States and insure that the collective judgment of both the Congress and the President will apply to the introduction of United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, and to the continued use of such forces in hostilities or in such situations.

A US Commander-in-Chief can order use of military force in only three specific conditions…

(1) a declaration of war,
(2) specific statutory authorization, or
(3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.

The US Congress has not declared war against a foreign nation since WWII. But when George W. Bush sent troops into Afghanistan and Iraq following the September 11, 2001 attacks on US soil, he not only consulted congress in advance, he sought and received specific statutory authorization from congress before ordering troops into combat. Bush complied with the constitution and War Powers Act under conditions (2) and (3). He also had a broad coalition of UN partners backed by years of Iraqi broken UN resolutions.


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