[CLUE-Talk] The prism of our experience

[Jeffery Cann]

On Thursday 10 July 2003 11:24 am, Randy Arabie wrote:
>
> It is NOT a "conservative" or Republican issue.  The
> Christian Science Monitor's commentary, in this instance, is
> BS.

OK - I understand your opinion, but I hoped for some facts to back your 'it's 
not a conservative or republican issue' statement.   

Your point of the other conflicts not requiring a declaration of war is 
exactly what the CS article is talking about -- the fact that the Executive 
branch of government can go to war w/o a mandate from another 1/3 of the 
government is a problem -- too much power concentrated in the hands of a 
single branch of government.  Which, in this case, either lied to us or is 
incompetent beyond comprehension.

Perhaps if the President *had* gotten a declaration of war, then he would have 
done more homework and built a case for WMD in Iraq based on facts, rather 
than using straw men and scare tactics to dupe scared citizens into 
supporting the war.

Finally, notice that several of the conflicts you cited, specifically Korea 
and Vietname (and now Iraq) never had a good result -- they dragged on for 
years (even decades).  OTH-those wars that had a declaration, such as WW2 had 
a clear endpoint.

Perhaps this is why our government is designed to have a checks-and-balances 
system.  In this case (just like many others), the Executive branch screwed 
up big time -- either they lied or are grossly incompetent.  IMHO - a second 
set of eyes (so to speak) of the Congress could have avoided such an 
egregious breach of trust.

Jeff
-- 
"Keep yourselves far from every form of exaggerated nationalism, racism and 
intolerance."
-- Pope John Paul II