{"id":3426,"date":"2013-09-01T00:10:09","date_gmt":"2013-09-01T00:10:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/?p=3426"},"modified":"2013-09-01T00:10:09","modified_gmt":"2013-09-01T00:10:09","slug":"obama-to-seek-congressional-permission-on-syria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=3426","title":{"rendered":"Obama to seek congressional permission on Syria"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n<p>U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz recently called President Obama &#8220;imperial&#8221; and &#8220;lawless.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The junior U.S. senator from Texas, of course, is fond of tossing out pejorative terms, often recklessly.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m curious now whether he feels that way about the Obama administration as it seeks congressional approval to strike at Syria in response to the Syrian government&#8217;s use of chemical weapons on civilians, including women and children.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.realclearpolitics.com\/articles\/2013\/08\/31\/obama_seeks_congress_ok_to_strike_syria_119792.html\">http:\/\/www.realclearpolitics.com\/articles\/2013\/08\/31\/obama_seeks_congress_ok_to_strike_syria_119792.html<\/a><\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m quite certain Cruz would vote &#8220;no&#8221; on a congressional resolution. But in the grand scheme, seeking congressional approval for a strike is both wise politically and from a policy standpoint.<\/p>\n<p>Politically, a &#8220;no&#8221; vote from the House and Senate puts the monkey on lawmakers&#8217; backs for failing to punish Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad for gassing innocent victims. The president has made a compelling case that Assad&#8217;s military machine needs to be punished severely for this horrifying action. Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, two former senators with extensive foreign policy experience &#8212; not to mention actual military combat experience &#8212; have declared their outrage over the chemical weapons attack.<\/p>\n<p>Obama now seems willing to ask Congress for is approval. He is willing to wait for House members and senators to return from their month-long recess before taking the issue up with them. He&#8217;s consulted heavily with congressional leaders along with our allies to line them up in support of whatever action might occur.<\/p>\n<p>Is there a lesson to be learned from the British Parliament&#8217;s rejection of a use-of-force resolution? That remains to be seen. For now, any U.S. action likely will be done solely with our military might.<\/p>\n<p>The Navy is standing by, as are all available forces that would be deployed against the Syrians.<\/p>\n<p>All the president needs &#8212; and it&#8217;s no small task &#8212; is an approval by the rest of the country&#8217;s elected representatives.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll weigh in with this: Congress should approve a limited, but decisive, strike against the Syrian military. However, if it says &#8220;no&#8221; to such an action, the president would be wise to heed Congress&#8217;s &#8220;advice and consent&#8221; on this critical matter.<\/p>\n<p>As for some of the loudmouths who serve on Capitol Hill, they ought to put a lid on the nasty name-calling and give the president credit for asking their permission to act.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz recently called President Obama &#8220;imperial&#8221; and &#8220;lawless.&#8221; The junior U.S. senator from Texas, of course, is fond of tossing out pejorative terms, often recklessly. I&#8217;m curious now whether he feels that way about the Obama administration as it seeks congressional approval to strike at Syria in response to the Syrian government&#8217;s &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=3426\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Obama to seek congressional permission on Syria<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[540,942,2183,4195,4489,4537,5014],"class_list":["post-3426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-barack-obama","tag-chemical-weapons","tag-house-of-representatives","tag-senate","tag-syria","tag-ted-cruz","tag-united-nations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3426\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}