High Plains Populism

Thank you, Congresswoman Hageman for voting yea on H. Con. Res. 21 on March 8.  Had the the resolution passed it would have directed the President, pursuant to section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution, to remove U.S. forces from Syria.  Unfortunately it failed 103-321.  There were 47 Republican and 56 Democrat yeas. Speaker McCarthy voted nea.

Here’s a little background:

The question is, does the US executive’s claim that its actions in Syria comport with US law stand up to scrutiny? Not only does it not, the claim is risible.

“Under both Mr. Obama and Mr. Trump,” explains the New York Times’ Charlie Savage, “the executive branch has argued that the war against Islamic State is covered by a 2001 law authorizing the use of military force against the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 attacks [Gowans’s emphasis] and a 2002 law authorizing the invasion of Iraq.”

However, while “ISIS grew out an offshoot of Al Qaeda, the two groups by 2014 had split and became warring rivals,” and ISIS did not perpetrate the 9/11 attacks. What’s more, before the rise of ISIS, the Obama administration had deemed the Iraq war over.

“The Largely Unrecognized US Occupation of Syria. Nearly One Third of Its Territory.”  By Stephen Gowans, What’s Left, 3/11/18. Mr. Gowans is quite the ardent Marxist but he has got this point about Syria exactly right.