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Obamas war without congress approval
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By Shiva.Viciousss 2014-09-25 22:12:45
Ahhh I see! So when they find a terrorist cell in New York, It'll be perfectly Okay to bomb the hell out of it and won't be considered Obama bombing IN THE USA!
Because Terrorist!
Please find something tall to jump off of troll.
Dumbest post of the thread, accuses someone else of trolling. Classic altima.
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By Bloodrose 2014-09-25 22:17:01
People quite often confuse bombing terrorist cells in a country with bombing a country...
They're not the same thing people, unless that country is being run by said terrorist cells.
Ahhh I see! So when they find a terrorist cell in New York, It'll be perfectly Okay to bomb the hell out of it and won't be considered Obama bombing IN THE USA!
Because Terrorist!
Please find something tall to jump off of troll.
Your grammar is horrible as always.
Also: New York isn't a war zone.
Also, you can't read. I said there's a difference between "bombing a country" and "bombing a target in a country" it's a semantics argument, something I'm sure you wouldn't comprehend, but the implications and meanings are vastly different.
Wow straight to grammar AND semantics.. your not even trying anymore troll. you're*
Unless that was intentional, which I highly doubt.
By Altimaomega 2014-09-25 22:18:54
People quite often confuse bombing terrorist cells in a country with bombing a country...
They're not the same thing people, unless that country is being run by said terrorist cells.
Ahhh I see! So when they find a terrorist cell in New York, It'll be perfectly Okay to bomb the hell out of it and won't be considered Obama bombing IN THE USA!
Because Terrorist!
Please find something tall to jump off of troll.
Your grammar is horrible as always.
Also: New York isn't a war zone.
Also, you can't read. I said there's a difference between "bombing a country" and "bombing a target in a country" it's a semantics argument, something I'm sure you wouldn't comprehend, but the implications and meanings are vastly different.
Wow straight to grammar AND semantics.. your not even trying anymore troll. you're*
Unless that was intentional, which I highly doubt.
Shouldn't have to use sarcasm tags all the time.
By Jetackuu 2014-09-25 22:24:46
/chuckle
Bahamut.Ravael
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By Bahamut.Ravael 2014-09-25 23:07:11
Ah, I love how people how people are jumping on both sides are jumping the fence on the war issue now that our president is from a different party.
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By Shiva.Viciousss 2014-09-25 23:10:21
Yeah, its amazing how easy it is to get behind attacking the right people for the right reasons, hasn't happened in a while I know.
By Jetackuu 2014-09-25 23:16:17
Ah, I love how people how people are jumping on both sides are jumping the fence on the war issue now that our president is from a different party. You and your fence.
By fonewear 2014-09-28 09:11:09
Is the war over yet ? I'm bored.
Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2014-09-28 14:46:22
Is the war comprehensive and sustained counter-terrorism strategy to "degrade and destroy" ISIS that will take some period of time over yet ? I'm bored. ftfy
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By fonewear 2014-09-28 21:31:36
A war by any other name is still a war. Needs more bombs though.
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Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2014-09-28 22:54:28
A war by any other name is still a war. Needs more bombs though. That's deep.
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By Odin.Godofgods 2014-09-28 23:28:17
A war by any other name is still a war. Needs more bombs though.
Quote: Did you ever notice that about us? We love to declare war on things here in America. Anything we don’t like about ourselves, we declare war on it. We don’t do anything about it, we just declare war on it. It’s the only metaphor, the only metaphor we have in our public discourse for solving problems: declaring war.
We have to declare a war on everything; we have a war on crime, the war on poverty, the war on litter, the war on cancer, the war on drugs, but did you ever notice we got no war on homelessness? Huh? No war on homelessness... you know why? There’s no money in that problem! No money to be made off of the homeless. If you can find a solution to homelessness where the corporate swine and the politicians could steal a couple of million dollars each, you’ll see the streets of America begin to clear up pretty goddamn quick, I’ll guarantee you that! - George Carlin
Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2014-09-29 05:00:05
Time to bomb some civilians and their food already. That was quick. Sounds like war to me, even Reuters used that word.
Quote: U.S.-led air strikes hit grain silos and other targets in Islamic State-controlled territory in northern and eastern Syria overnight, killing civilians and wounding militants, a group monitoring the war said on Monday.
The aircraft may have mistaken the mills and grain storage areas in the northern Syrian town of Manbij for an Islamic State base, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. There was no immediate comment from Washington.
The United States has targeted Islamic State and other fighters in Syria since last week with the help of Arab allies, and in Iraq since last month. It aims to damage and destroy the bases, forces and supply lines of the al Qaeda offshoot which has captured large areas of both countries.
The strikes in Manbij appeared to have killed only civilians, not fighters, said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the Observatory which gathers information from sources in Syria.
"These were the workers at the silos. They provide food for the people," he said. He could not give a number of casualties and it was not immediately possible to verify the information. U.S-led raids hit grain silos in Syria, kill workers: monitor
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2014-09-29 06:52:43
Time to bomb some civilians and their food already. That was quick. Sounds like war to me, even Reuters used that word.
Quote: U.S.-led air strikes hit grain silos and other targets in Islamic State-controlled territory in northern and eastern Syria overnight, killing civilians and wounding militants, a group monitoring the war said on Monday.
The aircraft may have mistaken the mills and grain storage areas in the northern Syrian town of Manbij for an Islamic State base, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. There was no immediate comment from Washington.
The United States has targeted Islamic State and other fighters in Syria since last week with the help of Arab allies, and in Iraq since last month. It aims to damage and destroy the bases, forces and supply lines of the al Qaeda offshoot which has captured large areas of both countries.
The strikes in Manbij appeared to have killed only civilians, not fighters, said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the Observatory which gathers information from sources in Syria.
"These were the workers at the silos. They provide food for the people," he said. He could not give a number of casualties and it was not immediately possible to verify the information. U.S-led raids hit grain silos in Syria, kill workers: monitorObama can't declare war on anyone, that would go against the liberal agenda. See, according to liberal belief, war can only be declared by a Republican president, so the best way for a liberal to declare war is if war is declared for them.
It's much better for them to bomb nations and have them declare war on the US, that way it looks like (to the liberal) that they are just defending and not the aggressor, even though the liberals are the one's who attacked first!
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By Shiva.Viciousss 2014-09-29 08:55:54
Actually pretty much everyone knows that Presidents can't declare war. Nice troll attempt tho.
By fonewear 2014-09-29 09:02:03
Since when do you need Congressional approval for war...you have to remember Obama was a lawyer laws don't apply to him.
Just because he taught Constitutional law doesn't mean he has to follow it !
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2014-09-29 09:21:23
Actually pretty much everyone knows that Presidents can't declare war. Nice troll attempt tho. President's can't declare war, but they can cause them. They can also instigate them.
So, in essence, they can "declare" war without actually "declaring" them.
Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2014-10-07 23:19:14
Quote: Turkey's president said on Tuesday the Syrian Kurdish town of Kobani was "about to fall" as Islamic State fighters pressed home a three-week assault that has cost a reported 400 lives and forced thousands to flee their homes.
The prospect that the town could be captured by Islamic State, who are now within city limits, has increased pressure on Turkey to join an international coalition to fight against the jihadists.
Islamic State wants to take Kobani in order to strengthen its grip on the border area and consolidate the territorial gains it has made in Iraq and Syria in recent months. U.S.-led air strikes have so far failed to prevent its advance on Kobani.
Turkey said it was pressing Washington for more air strikes, although President Tayyip Erdogan said bombing was not enough to defeat Islamic State, and he set out Turkey's demands for additional measures before it could intervene.
"The problem of ISIS (Islamic State) ... cannot be solved via air bombardment. Right now ... Kobani is about to fall," he said during a visit to a camp for Syrian refugees.
"We had warned the West. We wanted three things. No-fly zone, a secure zone parallel to that, and the training of moderate Syrian rebels," he said.
He said Turkey would take action if there were threats to Turkish soldiers guarding a historic site in Syria that Ankara regards as its territory. But so far Turkey has made no move to get involved in the fighting across the border. Turkey says Syria town about to fall as Islamic State advances
Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2014-10-08 21:46:36
Quote: Islamic State fighters launched a renewed assault on the Syrian city of Kobani on Wednesday night, and at least 21 people were killed in riots in neighbouring Turkey where Kurds rose up against the government for doing nothing to protect their kin.
Heavily outgunned defenders said Islamic State militants had pushed into two districts of the mainly Kurdish border city late on Wednesday, despite U.S.-led air strikes that the Pentagon acknowledged would probably not be enough to safeguard the town.
In Turkey, street battles raged between Kurdish protesters and police across the mainly Kurdish southeast, in Istanbul and in Ankara, as fallout from war in Syria and Iraq threatened to unravel the NATO member's own delicate Kurdish peace process. The street violence was the worst Turkey had seen in years.
Washington said on Wednesday night that the U.S. military and partner nations carried out eight air strikes against Islamic State fighters near the embattled Syrian city of Kobani, which it said was still under the control of Kurdish militia.
"U.S. Central Command continues to monitor the situation in Kobani closely. Indications are that Kurdish militia there continue to control most of the city and are holding out against ISIL," the Pentagon statement said, using another acronym for Islamic State.
Central Command added that the strikes, in which Jordan took part, destroyed several Islamic State targets, including five armed vehicles, a supply depot, a command-and-control compound, a logistics compound and eight occupied barracks. The United States also launched three strikes against Islamic State in Iraq.
But Kobani remained under intense bombardment from Islamic State emplacements, within sight of Turkish tanks at the nearby frontier that have so far done nothing to help.
"Tonight, (Islamic State) has entered two districts with heavy weapons including tanks. Civilians may have died because there are very intense clashes," Asya Abdullah, co-chair of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the main Kurdish group defending the area, told Reuters from inside the town. Renewed assault on Kobani; 21 dead in Turkey as Kurds rise
Quote: A video released Tuesday by Islamic State militants purportedly shows the group fighting not only Kurdish militants in Kobane, but also forces loyal to President Bashar Assad, signaling the presence of an alliance between the Kurds and the Syrian military not seen in the entirety of the 3-year-old civil war.
Until now, the only forces known to fight ISIS in Kobane were Kurdish fighters with the People's Protections Units, the militia known by its Kurdish acronym YPG, who are battling the Sunni militant group on the ground, and U.S.-led coalition forces, which are bombing the group from the air.
Following the start of the U.S.-led air campaign in Syria in September, Syrian regime warplanes have focused most of their attacks south of Aleppo in Idlib, and around Damascus. Coalition air forces are focusing on targeting ISIS strongholds in the northeast of the country -- a region that holds the majority of the country's oil fields -- and have created a de-facto no-fly zone over most of the region, limiting the Syrian Air Force to the west.
"The coalition's airstrikes have been effective the last few days. They hit ISIS tanks and artilleries," Redur Xilil, the spokesman for the YPG, told International Business Times. Kobane has been close to falling to ISIS for days, but on Wednesday coalition airstrikes slowed the militants' advance.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, one of the few monitoring groups still operating within the country, has not confirmed the presence of Syrian regime forces in Kobane. But access to reliable information from inside the city is limited: Hundreds of thousands of people have left and fled to neighboring Turkey.
The group released a statement on its Facebook page Wednesday, saying that regime forces were involved in heavy fighting with Ahrar al-Sham, an opposition group not affiliated with ISIS, in Aleppo Province.
Although the Syrian regime is focusing on trying to take back Aleppo, the largest city in the country and the economic capital, it would also have reason to worry about areas around Kobane, known in Syria as Ayn al Arab, because it is on a road that leads to the country's biggest oil fields.
An alliance between Kurdish militants and the Assad regime would most likely come with a back room deal, possibly with the regime offering Kurds who live in Syria some degree of autonomy. Fight For Kobane May Have Created A New Alliance In Syria: Kurds And The Assad Regime
Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2014-10-09 05:32:04
Looks like Operation: Unnamed Conflict is a failure.
Quote: Islamic State fighters have seized more than a third of the Syrian border town of Kobani despite U.S.-led air strikes targeting them in and around the mainly Kurdish community, a monitoring group said on Thursday.
The commander of Kobani's heavily outgunned Kurdish defenders said Islamic State controlled a slightly smaller area. However, he acknowledged that the militants had made major gains in the culmination of a three-week battle that has also led to the worst streets clashes in years between police and Kurdish protesters across the frontier in southeast Turkey.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the country's civil war, said Islamic State - still widely known by its former acronym of ISIS - had pushed forward on Thursday.
"ISIS control more than a third of Kobani. All eastern areas, a small part of the northeast and an area in the southeast," the Observatory's head, Rami Abdulrahman, said.
Esmat al-Sheikh, head of the Kurdish militia forces in Kobani, said Islamic State fighters had seized about a quarter of the town in the east. "The clashes are ongoing - street battles," he told Reuters by telephone from the town.
An explosion was heard on Thursday on the western side of Kobani, with thick black smoke visible from the Turkish border a few kilometers (miles) away. Islamic State hoisted its black flag inside the town overnight and a stray projectile landed 3 km (2 miles) inside Turkey.
The sound of a jet flying overhead and sporadic gunfire from the besieged town was audible.
The United Nations says only a few hundred inhabitants remain in Kobani but the town's defenders say the battle will end in a massacre if Islamic State overruns the town, giving it a strategic garrison on the Turkish border.
They complain that the United States is giving only token support through the air strikes, while Turkish tanks sent to the frontier are looking on but doing nothing to defend the town.
Twenty-one people died in Istanbul, Ankara and the mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey on Wednesday in the clashes between security forces and Kurds demanding that the government do more to help Kobani.
In Washington, the Pentagon cautioned on Wednesday that there are limits to what the air strikes can do in Syria before Western-backed, moderate Syrian opposition forces are strong enough to repel Islamic State.
Islamic State has also seized large areas of territory in neighboring Iraq, where the United States has focused its air attacks on the militants.
President Barack Obama has ruled out sending American ground forces on a combat mission, and Secretary of State John Kerry offered little hope to Kobani's defenders on Wednesday. "As horrific as it is to watch in real time what is happening in Kobani ... you have to step back and understand the strategic objective," he said.
TURKISH UNREST
In Turkey, the fallout from the war in Syria and Iraq has threatened to unravel the NATO member's delicate peace process with its own Kurdish community.
Following Wednesday's violence in Turkey, streets have been calmer since curfews were imposed in five southeastern provinces, restrictions unseen since the 1990s when Kurdish PKK forces were fighting the Turkish military in the southeast.
Ankara has long been suspicious of any Kurdish assertiveness which puts itself in a tough position as it tries to end its own 30-year war with the outlawed PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party).
Kurdish leaders in Syria have asked Ankara to help establish a corridor which will allow aid and possibly arms and fighters to cross the border and reach Kobani, but Ankara has so far been reluctant to respond positively.
Saleh Muslim, co-chairman of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria, met Turkish officials last week, Kurdish sources said, but the meeting was not fruitful.
The PYD annoyed Turkey last year by setting up an interim administration in northeast Syria after Syrian President Bashar al-Assad lost control of the region. Ankara wants Kurdish leaders to abandon their self-declared autonomy.
PYD's co-chairwoman Asya Abdullah told Reuters earlier this week that this demand was not acceptable to Kurds. "We told Turkey that it is not possible for us to take a step back," she said by telephone from Kobani.
President Tayyip Erdogan says he also wants the U.S.-led alliance to enforce a "no-fly zone" to prevent Assad's air force flying over Syrian territory near the Turkish border and create a safe area for an estimated 1.5 million Syrian refugees in Turkey to return.
Turkey has also been unhappy with the Kurds' reluctance to join the wider opposition to Assad.
On the Turkish side of the frontier near Kobani, 21-year-old student Ferdi from the eastern Turkish province of Tunceli said if Kobani fell, the conflict would spread to Turkey.
"In fact it already has spread here," he said, standing with a group of several dozen people in fields watching the smoke rising from west Kobani.
Turkish police fired tear gas against protesters in the town of Suruç near the border overnight. A petrol bomb set fire to a house and the shutters on most shops in the town were kept shut in a traditional form of protest against state authorities.
Kurdish anger over Kobani has also revived long-standing grudges between the PKK sympathizers and Turkish Islamist groups that are linked to the Hezbollah movement in Lebanon and which now appear to be siding with Islamic State.
In Diyarbakir, Turkey's biggest Kurdish city, five people were killed in clashes on Monday and Tuesday between Islamist groups and PKK supporters, a senior police officer said. Islamic State seizes one third of Syrian town Kobani: monitor
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2014-10-09 11:21:56
So, half-assed attacks don't work.
Either use a bomb capable of killing a majority of the insurgency (nuke) or send troops to do basically the same thing.
Go for broke.
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By Lakshmi.Sparthosx 2014-10-09 11:27:11
You really did flunk history, didn't you?
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By Cerberus.Senkyuutai 2014-10-09 11:38:42
So, half-assed attacks don't work.
Either use a bomb capable of killing a majority of the insurgency (nuke) or send troops to do basically the same thing.
Go for broke. I wonder what would happen if you threw this on a country
Looks like a plastic toy to me.
By fonewear 2014-10-09 11:39:50
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you?
Do to budget cuts History will be replaced with recess.
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By Lakshmi.Sparthosx 2014-10-09 11:50:11
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you?
Do to budget cuts History will be replaced with recess.
Bloated ticks of an administration need a pay raise, yo.
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2014-10-09 12:52:30
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you? I didn't flunk it, I just never had an interest in it period.
I didn't say that nuking people is the best idea, just an idea.
By Lye 2014-10-09 12:56:48
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you?
Do to budget cuts History will be replaced with recess.
English too? Let's try math. Do =\= due.
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By Lakshmi.Sparthosx 2014-10-09 13:17:30
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you? I didn't flunk it, I just never had an interest in it period.
I didn't say that nuking people is the best idea, just an idea.
That wont solve anything save bringing the first world to it's knees. The last two mushroom clouds are still shaping the the geopolitical landscape, I wonder what another would do.
But nice try though, problems are not often solved with one shot solutions.
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2014-10-09 13:35:23
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you? I didn't flunk it, I just never had an interest in it period.
I didn't say that nuking people is the best idea, just an idea.
That wont solve anything save bringing the first world to it's knees. The last two mushroom clouds are still shaping the the geopolitical landscape, I wonder what another would do.
But nice try though, problems are not often solved with one shot solutions. Fear of another nuke is what is shaping the geopolitical landscape. AKA Cold War.
And that would have solved that problem in one shot. Create an entire new one though...
By Jetackuu 2014-10-09 16:32:38
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »You really did flunk history, didn't you? I didn't flunk it, I just never had an interest in it period. this explains so much.
Quote: Can Obama wage war without consent of Congress?
WASHINGTON (AP) — On the cusp of intensified airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, President Barack Obama is using the legal grounding of the congressional authorizations President George W. Bush relied on more than a decade ago to go to war. But Obama has made no effort to ask Congress to explicitly authorize his own conflict.
The White House said again Friday that Bush-era congressional authorizations for the war on al-Qaida and the Iraq invasion give Obama authority to act without new approval by Congress under the 1973 War Powers Act. That law, passed during the Vietnam War, serves as a constitutional check on presidential power to declare war without congressional consent. It requires presidents to notify Congress within 48 hours of military action and limits the use of military forces to no more than 60 days unless Congress authorizes force or declares war.
"It is the view of this administration and the president's national security team specifically that additional authorization from Congress is not required, that he has the authority that he needs to order the military actions," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. He said there were no plans to seek consent from Congress. "At this point we have not, and I don't know of any plan to do so at this point," he said.
The administration's tightly crafted legal strategy has short-circuited the congressional oversight that Obama once championed. The White House's use of post-9/11 congressional force authorizations for the broadening air war has generated a chorus of criticism that the justifications are, at best, a legal stretch.
"Committing American lives to war is such a serious question, it should not be left to one person to decide, even if it's the president," said former Illinois Rep. Paul Findley, 92, who helped write the War Powers Act.
As a U.S. senator from Illinois running for president in 2007, Obama tried to prevent Bush's administration from taking any military action against Iran unless it was explicitly authorized by Congress. A Senate resolution Obama sponsored died in committee.
Nearly seven years later, U.S. fighter jets and unmanned drones armed with missiles have flown 150 airstrikes against the Islamic State group over the past five weeks in Iraq under Obama's orders — even though he has yet to formally ask Congress to authorize the expanding war. Obama told the nation Wednesday he would unleash U.S. strikes inside Syria for the first time, along with intensified bombing in Iraq, as part of "a steady, relentless effort" to root out Islamic State extremists. Obama has not said how long the air campaign will last.
The White House has cited the 2001 military authorization Congress gave Bush to attack any countries, groups or people who planned, authorized, committed or aided the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Earnest on Thursday described the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, generally known as the AUMF, as one that Obama "believes continues to apply to this terrorist organization that is operating in Iraq and Syria."
The Islamic State group, which was founded in 2004, has not been linked to the 9/11 attacks, although its founders later pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden. In February, al-Qaida declared that the Islamic State group was no longer formally part of the terror organization. And in recent weeks, senior U.S. officials, including Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and Matthew Olsen, head of the National Counterterrorism Center, have drawn significant distinctions between al-Qaida and the Islamic State group.
Earnest said Thursday that Obama welcomes support from Congress but that it isn't necessary. "The president has the authority, the statutory authority that he needs," Earnest said.
Others disagreed.
"I actually think the 2001 AUMF argument is pretty tortured," said Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., who serves on the House Intelligence Committee. "They are essentially saying that ISIL is associated with al-Qaida, and that's not obvious," Himes said, using an alternate acronym for the Islamic State group. "Stretching it like this has dangerous implications."
Himes supports a new congressional vote for a specific IS group authorization, as does another Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, Rep. Adam Schiff of California.
There is wariness even from some former Bush administration officials. Jack Goldsmith, head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel under Bush, said in the Lawfare blog that "it seems a stretch" to connect the Islamic State group to al-Qaida, considering recent rivalry between the two groups.
The White House also finds authorization under the 2002 resolution that approved the invasion of Iraq to identify and destroy weapons of mass destruction. That resolution also cited the threat from al-Qaida, which Congress said then was operating inside Iraq. But the U.S. later concluded there were no ties between al-Qaida and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein or his government, and the group formally known as al-Qaida in Iraq — which later evolved into the Islamic State group — didn't form until 2004, after the U.S.-led invasion.
Obama is using both authorizations as authority to act even though he publicly sought their repeal last year. In a key national security address at the National Defense University in May 2013, Obama said he wanted to scrap the 2001 order because "we may be drawn into more wars we don't need to fight." Two months later, Obama's national security adviser, Susan Rice, asked House Speaker John Boehner to consider repealing the 2002 Iraq resolution, calling the document "outdated."
Obama has asked only for congressional backing to pay for the buildup of American advisers and equipment to aid Syrian opposition forces. House Republicans spurned a vote on that separate request earlier this week, but Boehner is now siding with the administration. The White House acknowledged it could not overtly train Syrian rebels without Congress approving the cost of about $500 million.
Since U.S. military advisers went into Iraq in June, the administration has maneuvered repeatedly to avoid coming into conflict with the War Powers provision that imposes a 60-day time limit on unapproved military action. Seven times, before each 60-day limit has expired, Obama has sent new notification letters to Congress restarting the clock and providing new extensions without invoking congressional approval. The most recent four notifications have covered the airstrikes against the Islamic State group that began Aug. 8.
An international law expert at Temple University's Beasley School of Law, Peter J. Spiro, described the letters as workarounds that amount to "killing the War Powers Act with 1,000 tiny cuts."
Former Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., who now heads the Lugar Center for foreign affairs in Washington, said Obama could ask for congressional approval in a way that would be less formal than a specific war resolution — perhaps either as an appropriations request or a simple resolution.
"It may not be the most satisfactory way to declare war," Lugar said. "But it may be a pragmatic compromise for the moment."
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