Which one messed up?
...Yes, at least *one* of them has to have done so.
By Moe Lane Posted in Congress — Comments (17) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
I am, of course, merely a Republican partisan - and thus, not to have either my judgment or motivations trusted in the slightest - but I must ask: when it comes to the Constitution, should we be taking seriously Senator Joseph Biden, or Speaker Nancy Pelosi? They apparently have a difference of opinion on the subject, particularly when it comes to the powers of the executive and legislative branches.
Read on.
[Update: thanks to Constant Reader rbdwiggins, we have the transcript. See footnote for additional amusing text.]
Transcript of Sen. Joseph Biden's view on the surge (with plenty of context):
MR. RUSSERT: ...there’s really little Democrats can do. Why not cut off funding for the war?
SEN. BIDEN: I’ve been there, Tim. You can’t do it.
MR. RUSSERT: Why?
SEN. BIDEN: You can’t do it. It’s—what—because it made sense in the Constitution when you said you could cut off funding when you had no standing army. We have a standing army with a budget of hundreds of billions of dollars. You can’t go in and, like a tinker toy, and play around and say, “You can’t spend the money on this piece and this piece and”—he—able—he’ll be able to keep those troops there forever constitutionally if he wants to.
MR. RUSSERT: Why not have legislation then that would cap the number of troops in Iraq?
SEN. BIDEN: Because it’s very difficult to—it’s constitutionally questionable whether or not you can do that. I think it is unconstitutional to say, “We’re going to tell you you can go, but we’re going to micromanage the war.” When we wrote the Constitution, the intention was to give the commander in chief the authority how to use the forces, when you authorize them, to be able to use the forces. And so, look, what we have to be doing here is the president—the only way this is going to change, Tim, and I’ve been saying—I’m a broken record on this—is when a majority of Lindsey’s colleagues, Republicans, say to the president, “Mr. President, enough. We are not going to support you any more,” that’s when the president will begin to change his policy. That’s when we begin to listen to bipartisan groups. That’s when we bebin—begin to listen to the majority of the expert opinion in this country.
Report of Rep. Nancy Pelosi's view on the surge (no transcript as of yet**, but the link has a video of the interview. This is an accurate and in-context summation of her comments):
(CBS/AP) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said newly empowered Democrats will not give President George W. Bush a blank check to wage war in Iraq, hinting they could deny funding if he seeks additional troops.
"If the president chooses to escalate the war, in his budget request, we want to see a distinction between what is there to support the troops who are there now," she said in an exclusive interview on Face The Nation.
"The American people and the Congress support those troops. We will not abandon them. But if the president wants to add to this mission, he is going to have to justify it and this is new for him because up until now the Republican Congress has given him a blank check with no oversight, no standards, no conditions," said Pelosi, D-Calif.
Now, before we go any further, let us note that both politicians are explicitly disavowing defunding existing troops in Iraq*, so what's at stake here is: when it comes to funding the surge, who is right, Biden or Pelosi? Because they cannot both be right. They simply cannot. Either Speaker Pelosi is correct, which means that Senator Biden is lecturing on Constitutional law from his nether regions; or else Senator Biden is correct, which means that Speaker Pelosi is committing her Party to a policy which it cannot, in point of fact, implement.
Put another way: at least one of these two people is in over his or her head.
Which one?
And why was that person given the very critical job by his or her Party?
Moe
*A bit of a relief, that. And a special comment to our antiwar lurkers: I hope that you at least got Christmas cards from all those people whose campaigns you contributed to, because that way you might have some sort of tangible reward for your support.
**Annnnd here we go. More contradictory goodness from the transcript:
SCHIEFFER: So, at this point, the Democrats in Congress are not prepared to pay for or to fund an additional number of troops in Iraq.
Rep. PELOSI: We have to see what the president has to say. It's not an open-ended commitment anymore. But we will always be there to protect our troops and to support our troops. The present burden is on the president to justify any additional resources for a mission. In our letter, we say to the president, as we have over and over again, we must change the mission to training, to fighting terrorism, to logistics, and force protection instead of combat. Our troops have done an excellent job. Every chance we get we praise them for what they have done. But unless there's a political and diplomatic solution to match their efforts, their hands are tied behind their back--their backs in order to end this. So the president is going to have to engage with Congress in the justification for any additional troops he may wish. But escalation of the war is opposed by the Democrats.
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Which one messed up? 17 Comments (0 topical, 17 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
"The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal comfort... has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
--John Stuart Mill
would never make it through customs.
The Academy: researching the Illiberal Arts
Both have expressed views which could be characterized as "messed up", however re: expressions on Executive powers related to the President's role as Commander-in-Chief, it is the Speaker and Mom (who is thusfar showing no substantive capacity to take proper care to protect either the country or it's children, not to mention her oath to uphold the Constitution) who has messed-up most. Of course, Senator Biden has the "advantage" of wanting to be President, and therefore is actually probably interested in seeing Executive powers preserved.
srlmd
I didn't realize anyone in the senate actually realized the constitution limited their powers.
Veritas magna est et praevalet.
Let's not pretend for a second that this has anything to do with the Constitution. This is about finding a cover story to sell to the activists on his left wing when they ask why he has not done more. If he actually has designs on the Oval Office in '08 (and they will be hopelessly and miserably dashed if and when he tries) he needs the money and the energy of netnuts; angry moderates are tough to find. He knows, on the other hand, that were he to embrace the cutting off of funds he'd be signing his ticket to oblivion with the moderate voters in the Democratic primary and, in the unlikely event he makes it that far, in the general election. It also has ramifications in the meantime, particularly in helping the esteemed gentleman from Connecticut decide whether he wants to remain in the Democratic caucus. Pelosi has a viable majority, a safe House seat, and to date no designs on the Presidency. She can say things that Biden simply cannot
has been posted at CBSNews. (pdf)
***
“The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.” – Ronald Reagan
I hate to wave my red pencil at you, but I fear I must, over this aggregious error in logic.
You see, they could both be in over their respective heads.
Pelosi, after many unkind years in the House, still thinks her Speakership somehow puts her on equal footing with the President. Biden, being Biden, has a kind of localized Parkinson's: his mouth talks, but he's not in charge of what comes out.
In this case, neither of them know what Captain Jack Sparrow put so eloquently:
There are two things that matter: what a man can do, and what a man can't do. For instance, I can kill you right now, but what I can't do is pilot this ship into Tortuga all by me onesies.
Congress can cut off funds for the war, micromanaging it, and dot each Constitutional i and t in some way the President would not be willing to challenge. But they don't want to face the electoral consequences, nor risk the "Constitutional crisis". Institutional people like Pelosi and Biden hate crises like that even more than they hate not being in power.
The Academy: researching the Illiberal Arts
the senate.
Biden (D-DE) admits on MTP today in response to a question from fellow MSM-DEM Party hack Tim Russert (D-PMSNBC) concerning Pelosi's claim that Congress can condition war funds on certain tactics being employed, that the Constitution gives plenary power to WAGE war to the POTUS.
Yet, all Biden has been doing since the MSM declared a quagmire in Iraq in hour 73 after the invasion, is never letting us miss any idea he has had about how to the wage the war.
Rather than presenting a united front behind the CINC to the enemy.
installed before the election, to settle such arguments between Congress and White House counsel, should a final decision need to be made on what the Constitution really says.
indeed when Pelosi can make one of the most superficial, and I say this with my sincere apologies to hardworking superficial peoople everywhere, self-absorbed, and buffoonish Senators look statesmanlike by comparison.
more later (hint: it was unconstitutional)
Gamecock, DeVine Op-Ed for Charlotte Observer, blogs at Race 4 2008.
The New York Times mentions the Pelosi petition then the Biden take but never admits that they are in direct conflict. I want to see what they come up with if they bother trying to resolve the two,
I was about to say both are some of the most messed up people ever (amazing their helping run the country isn't it?) when I realized that selecting most messed up politician is a Sisyphean task.
Biden is correct that the Constitution grants plenary power to the President to wage war. He is correct that in the current political context, it would be difficult for Democrats in Congress to cut off funding for the war without attaching blame for defeat to that action. Pelosi is correct that funding for the war could be cutoff, because the House has absolute control of the purse.
While we all like to think of our founders as the sort of nice moral upstanding people we'd like to have living up the street, sometimes they were downright obnoxious SoBs, and this is one of those instances. They didn't want Congress to be able to micromanage a war in which our vital interests are at stake, so they didn't give it that power. They were probably aware that the politics of the British court played as much of a role in our then recent victory as the tenacity and tactics of our soldiers did, so they put all of the war powers in the office of the President. On the other hand, they didn't want the President to have the power to go adventuring abroad with precious American blood. So they gave Congress the power of the purse to pull him up short if he did. The catch of course, is that if they do pull him up short, they have to take responsibility for it, and the electors will hold them accountable after the fact. Even in that day I imagine it was difficult to find lots of people who are willing to put their John Hancock on a document that drastic. Today it is impossible. Are the powers logically in contradiction? Yes, but the founders were smart enough to know that wouldn't be a problem in execution, because the imovable object would never meet the irresitable force in practice anyway. Compromise would always be reached before hand, and by giving each the power to stalemate the other, they would force that compromise would be accomplished.
But where does that leave us?
In a not very good position. The President can continue to muddle along (or "continue the long, hard slog" as Rummy said) with small numbers of our troops being killed on a daily basis, making some progress and having some gains to show for it. But never enough progress to win, because winning this war will require something that even after 9-11 our country hasn't been willing to do: "Kill the other dumb SoB for his" as Patton once so eloquently put it. Even if the other dummy is a Syrian, an Iranian, or even a Russian or Chinese and you have to follow him back to his homeland to make the point.
This "proportional response" and "winnning the hearts of the people" crap has led us into not having won any wars since it was introduced. Even in South America where we once thought the Gipper had finally gotten us past Vietnam, the old enemies are returning to their roosts. And if we don't figure that out as a country, it will start to suck to live here. We may not lose all of our freedoms in my lifetime, but I'm not willing to bet against it. And if there were to be an impartial historian after it happens, I think he would point to us as the last chance the forces of freedom had to turn back the tyrany of the Islamofacists before they took over the world.
Very well said.
I doubt that in today's climate it will be possible for Congress to automatically cut off funding for Iraq. However, should 80%+ of the electorate start supporting a relatively quick pull out, that might change. But as you said, if the percentage of the electorate is that high, chances are the two parties would reach a compromise beforehand anyways.
to go bake cookies and that he going to write whatever checks he wants and see if the bank stops payment when she calls.
Envisioning when all that is Left is the Right.