Ler's Get Clear About the Iraq War

When Congress authorized the President to make war if necessary against Iraq and the President acted upon that authorization, that is exactly what he did. He made war with Iraq and Saddam Hussein.

Both of those entities no longer exist as targets of war. Hussein is dead. The government of Iraq is not an enemy of the United States. THE WAR AGAINST IRAQ IS OVER. The Senate authorization is no longer valid. The President of the United States no longer has authority to wage war in Iraq.

So what are we doing there? We are fighting enemies for which there is no congressional authorization. The President has no authority to run around willy-nilly waging war against whomsoever he will because he was authorized to take down Saddam Hussein. Congress should do its job and either order him out of the nation or declare a war against whatever new enemy he has engaged.

That poses some problems, because this new enemy is not a nation. It is a legion of ideological groups who are scattered all around the world. Indeed, there are some right here in our own homeland.

There is no provision in the Constitution to pursue groups hither and yon from country to country. The President came close to violating international law recently when he authorized the invasion of an Iranian embassy in Iraq. He well knows that an embassy is an expatriate site of its homeland, and invasion of that embassy represents an invasion of the land to which it belongs. In effect he waged war against Iran without authorization from Congress.

He justifies his actions under an umbrella of a "war on terrorists." This is more akin to a "war on drugs" or a "war on cancer" than a valid international conflict.

Congress, TELL THIS PRESIDENT THAT THE WAR AGAINST IRAQ IS OVER. Tell him to get our troops out or to come to Congress with his justification for remaining and a request for a new cause of action.

Or,... Wll this Democrat led Congress also be a mere rubber stamp for whatever this power-hungry warmongering President decides to do?