O.o

[apocalypsos]

Bush at today's press conference:

"I don't think that it's good policy to allow Congress to make laws or dictate policy in any area outside of funding. I don't think that's good for the country."

ARE YOU REMUS LUPIN FUCKING SERIOUS?

EDIT: For the record, he's talking in the context of the war, which ... seriously, rephrase. Sheesh.

Comments

[doqz.livejournal.com]

I shouldn't have started this, in the first place I guess. Wrong venue, by any measure.

But my point is this - Congress has a specifically curtailed role in military affairs; basically its ability to authorize its start or to bring it to an end by de-funding it.

Current Congress wants to end the war, but not through its traditional constitutional tools. Withdrawing the funds is seen as a risky maneuver that might backfire by placing the onus of likely ethnic cleansing that would follow on the Congress. With some reason that - that's largely what happenned in the wake of the Vietnam war, destroying Democratic Party's credibility on national security that still handicaps them.

So the current ideas being floated are to bring the war to a close by directly affecting operational tempo - schedule/number of reinforcements, scope of strategy, and so on. These are to be done through legislation - in effect Congress passing a law on how to manage Iraq war.

While it is indeed the job of COngress to pass laws, it's very much not their job to do so as part of strategic planning in an ongoing campaign.

Even apart from the specific example of Iraq and consequences it will have there, it sets up a dangerous precedent of diluting the power of the Executive (and it's useful to remember that the office will long survive the current holder) and introducing a stupefying amount of chaos into military operation.