Before you start labeling in illegal check something.

Its called the Presidential War Powers Act.

It does give a president the authority to use the military for 'a time'.

Reagen used it in Grenada and Libia. However it does not allow the pres
to wage war in a long range time frame.

He must get some kind of approval from congress.

I really have not noticed congress stopping any of this with more than
lip service.

Why? Meen Green. Ceasars favorite dish... money. Ask yourself how
many congressmebers are making money off this war.

Defense contracts are not just the perview of weapons manufacturers and
gas/oil companies. It takes a lot of pens, pencils, paper, food,
computers, nuts, bolts, generators, tents, outhouses, blankets, (this
list is enourmous) etc... to wage a war.

Do you really think Cheany is the only one making side money on the
death.

Bet every senator and congressperson has there grubby hands in the
blood... Opps did I say blood... I meant to say money.

AB as always, a bright becon in the tunnel of the dank.

Love the fact that you exercise that thing in you called common sense.



doc

have one on me

I want to ask one question of all of you. Have you forgotten Sept, 11?
And before anyone says it has nothing to do with this war you are blind.
It has everything to do with it! It is the reason we are there and they
are not here! I will support our soldiers as my son is one of them. I
was one of them back in desert storm, my father was one of them in WW
II. Legal or illegal we cannot stand by and watch crazy people impose
their will upon the world. My son is, as i did, as my father did giving
their freedoms and sacrifing their very lives to defend your right to
critizie the decisions and actions of our people who defend and protect
the very freedoms we enjoy.

Hi, AB!

The 'presidential War Powers act' is designed for emergencies; it gives
the President the right to react immediately to an attack on the US, and
then requires the President to seek and receive a Congressional
declaration of war. It does not cover the invasion of Iraq, or the
occupation of Iraq, as there was no emergency (the Iraq invasion was
'discretionary'), and of course the President never went to Congress
with a request for a declaration of war.

To be fair to Bush; he is not the first President to pull this stunt, by
any means. But just because he is not the first does not make the stunt
legal.

Oceans

i think war is not legal by any means whatsoever.
now what I'm going to state right now may get me several enemies or
people who are not going to like me anymore, but this is the way i feel:
Whatever hapenned to this country (9/11 for instance) it's a consequence
of the U.S. International policy it's somehow intrusive with regard
other countries' sovereignty.
As far as my little knowledge allowes me to speak in a certain point
other countries and its people will get tired of having another country
trying to be a cop or fathering them.
therefore, I may conclude that this attacks are a reaction against this
patriarchal american policy.

Just my opinion not trying to create controversy

TLW

Hi, Chopperdan!

Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with Sept 11. Even the administration
has finally admitted this, after months of 'hedging' and lying about it.
Saddam Hussein was not trying to impose his will on 'us', though he did
try on the Iranians before having his lunch handed to him.

You make much of your military history and assert that you are doing so
to protect my freedoms to criticize, etc. Please be advised that I am
not in need of your son's services. (I do appreciate your participation
in the Gulf War; as I have said, I supported that war and the liberation
of Kuwait.) I can easily protect my own freedoms and have done so for
years in more venues than you can probably even imagine. Your son does
NOT act in my name. In fact, if I could have my way, he would be on the
first plane home -- and I would rest easier knowing that we weren't out
there making people hate us. I would also rest easier knowing that he is
no longer in harm's way, whether he minds it or not.

Do you think this is a way-out, unsupported assertion? Please take a
thoughtful and careful look at the April 2006 National Intelligence
Estimate: it concludes precisely what I am saying here. Our presence in
Iraq has INCREASED the terrorist threat to the US, NOT diminished it.
It increases the danger to us with every day that we remain there.
Lengthy summaries 2006 NIE are available on-line.

Oceans

sadam needed to be dead its true but i dont think the reason we attacked
was soley to retaliate i wonder if they were retaliating on the oil . we
didnt bother korea when they were testing their bombs last yr
oh yea no oil their . i do beleive terrosist did the plane but why

Hi, Lonely Walker!

The Sept. 11 attack on the US occurred for two reasons:

1. Our unconditioned support for Israel these last 50 plus years.

2. Our support for a number of corrupt governments in the Middle East.

The first reason is pretty self-explantory: Israel is viewed as a
European colonial experiment that deprived the Palestinians of their
natural soveriegn rights and homeland.

The second reason, in my opinion, is more debateable. There is no doubt
that we have supported governments that have proven repressive of their
own people (like the Shah and SAVAK, a torturous secret police
organization, in Iran). But the question has to be posed: does this mean
that the US is responsible for the actions of those governments? Or can
we not say that the peoples of those countries have the primary
responsibility to deal with their own governments and remove them if
they are so repressive? The question becomes more complicated when we
realize that throughout the Middle East and Latin America, the US has
delivered arms to dictators, provided police and military training to
the oppressive governments, provided intelligence equipment to spy on
the local populations, protected the bank accounts of notorious
dictators, and when they were finally deposed and the death squads
disbanded, provided in some cases asylum to the dictators on our own
soil.

At the very least, this second reason for the Sept. 11 attack should
cause us to examine our own foreign polcies and actions, and ask
ourselves whether we may not be creating the very probelms that we
assert we are trying to solve.

It is hard for Americans to realize the degree to which the US is now
viewed as the number one rogue state in the world. We think of ourselves
as being good, moral, responsible, generous people. But this is at
variance with how the vast majority of people around the world view us.
We should have the moral and intellectual courage to examine WHY this is
the case.

It is a very sad situation. False patriotic bravado is not what we need
now. We need quiet, thoughtful discussion, in which we really listen to
each other, painful as it may be to consider to what extent we have
brought these problems down on our own heads. Wouldn't it be wonderful
if these JSH threads could provide a venue for such discussion?

Regards to everyone,

Oceans

AB, I overlooked a key point you made: yes, billions of dollars are
going into the pockets of contractors, thanks to the Iraq war. Federal
procurement laws have been broken left and right, but the US government
and military are now so dependent on contractors in Iraq that the
government has been unable to reign this abuse in, except for a few
slaps on the wrist to SAIC, Halliburton, KBR, Dynacorp (do I have that
name right???), etc.

But I don't think money was the main motive for attacking Iraq, nor was
it oil, IMO. The neocons, who manipulated us into attacking and
occupying Iraq, are primarily interested in benefiting Israel. (They are
sometimes called 'Israel-firsters'.) Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, David
Wurmser, Elliot Abrams, Charles Krauthammer, Bill Kristol, etc.

If we just wanted oil, we would have lifted the embargo on Saddam
Hussein and simply cut oil contracts; Saddam Hussein was happy to do so.
Admittedly, I can't think of a better way for Halliburton shareholders
to make buckets of money than the unnecessary and wasteful occupation of
Iraq. Yes, Cheney has a 'special relationship' with Halliburton -- he
still receives big bucks from them as part of a 'severance package', but
I would like to think he is not corrupt....

Regards,

Oceans

Oceans I agree in ur points of view.
Days ago I posted a thread the CIA as a facilitator for dictators in
Latin America back in The 60's in which i wanted outputs about this
topic. However, it got diverted in several things as most of the
threads.
TLW

Hi, Grizz! Thanks for posting. Question: what plane are you talking
about?

Oceans

oceans you said 9/11 occurred in part for our support for isreal....
you do realize that they would be exterminated by the oppressive
fundamentalist in the region if we do not stand up for them, right?
are you advocating isreal be left to defend herself against in entire
middle east?
advocating the deaths of countless people so to appease the radicals? I
pegged you for a tree lovong lib but i must confess that now im scared,
anyone who would turn their backs on women and children just so that
they could be paciff, is irresponsible and shows what side of wrong your
on.
poor jews cant catch abreak can they?
guess hitler was right, right? but of course we should ourselves die so
that we dont hurt anyones precious feelings.

doc

Walker, my regional expertise is really the Middle East and Muslim
worlds. Don't know so much about Latin America, though I'd love to learn
more.

I do know that Under reagan the Us started to support some really nasty
killers pretty much throughout Latin America. I think they thought this
was the way to 'fight communism' -- but as is always the case when we do
things like this it produces a popular backlash and every dictator that
we supported was sooner or later swept away.

The CIA, interestingly, was not brutal enough for the extreme American
right-wingers, and so the National Security Council within the White
House was expanded and for the first time given operational authorities
and responsibilities. Heteretofore, only the CIA had covert foreign ops
responsibilies.

The NSC went bezerk under people like Elliot Abrams and Ollie North.
Funds were illegally poached and used for the death squads in Latin
America despite explicit Congressional prohibitions.

Now, Abrams is is charge of the Middle East for the NSC, and a lot of
the worst of US policies and actions in the Middle East stem today from
Abrams. He is an old-time supporter of Israel.

The irony, of course, is that the US presence in Iraq is so damaging to
our influence in the region that in the end Israel's last ally, the US,
will have to back away from the blind support we started giving Israel
under Clinton.

Regards,

Oceans

what i meant to say that it was our support of isreal that kept them
from being exterminated by the other countries in the midle east, and
that anyone who advocated against it was basically advocating for the
deaths of countles women and children in isreal at the hands of the
radical fundamentalist in the region, and you scare me for wanting to
see millions of innocents killed. and sorry for mispelling passive.

Armydoc, sooner or later Israel is going to have to stand on itys own
feet. We didn't create Israel; Israelis created Israel. After fofty
years of American blood and sweat expended trying to prop Israel up, I
say it is time to declare whatever responsibility we might feel for them
to have been more than fully met. The Israelis have between 200 and 300
nuclear weapons; they have a massive weapons industry and a powerful
army thanks to unquestioning and unlimited US generosity. They carry on
an aggressive military and industrial espionage program aimed against
us, their supposed ally. If they can't stand on their own feet now, they
will never be able to do so.

We have our own needs here at home, as I am sure you know, and there are
far more important things for us to be doing with our money, skills, and
manpower than these 'discretionary' foreign adventures.

Oceans

oceans- so let me understand what your saying,,,
knowing that if we pull away from isreal they will be left to fend off
multiple fronts- the only way that they will be able to protect themself
then will be to employee the use of thermonuclear weapons (as you
pointed out they have many), potentially killing more than just the
obvious isrealis that will die , but now millions more in the
surrounding countries that isreal will definately strike back against.
Maybe the U.S. support of isreal is keeping more than just isreal alive.
im sure that isnt the primary objective, but im sure you see the need to
have our presence felt there in the region, the deaths of millions is
not something that i wish to live with if knowing that we could have
done something to prevent it, only to walk away and wash our hands of it
because it might cos to much money, how much is a life worth to you?

the second point was our support of several corrupt middle east
countries....
theres four really tat we talk with,,
qatar- and those guys dont care about anything, would rather race
falcons and ferraris up the steets.
kuwait- didnt really know they were corrupt... why is that?
jordan- seem to be a middle east version of the swiss
and the evil empire of saudi- we have a working relationship with them,
i wouldnt go so far as to say we support them.

doc

Al-Qaida has not named Jordan, Qatar or Kuwait as the corruptones. Why
do you say they are corrupt?

You are missing the point on Israel. The Sept 11 attack on the US
occurred BECAUSE of our support for Israel. How much are the lives lost
on Sept 11 to you? Or the ones being lost now in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Would you put Israeli lives before American ones?

Israel's survived just fine before we invaded Iraq, having sttarted
several wars against its neighbors and won each one (at least until its
invasion of Lebanon). In part this was due to US protection. The US is
now LESS able to 'defend' Israel, so if defending Israel is your number
one concern, then you should oppose the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Look at the April 2006 NIE -- it lays all this out unambiguously.

Israel is considered in the intelligence community to be the number two
or three greatest intelligence threat against the US. This includes
military espionage against us. Remember the spy Jonathon Pollard? Why in
the world are you supporting them?

you said that the second reason 9 11 happened was because of our support
for corrupt middle east nations, those four i just named are the only
four that the us has any significant ties to, i would love to know what
you consider or who rather, that we support and are corrupt.

i dp npt feel the first three are corrupt at all, saudi is pretty much
the devils den if you ask me, but like i said we have a working
relationship with them, a guarded one at that.

and isreal?