Obama Impeachment

[Pipebomb]

WASHINGTON, March 7—Under question from Sen. Sessions at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing today, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey indicated that "international permission," rather than Congressional approval, provided a 'legal basis' for military action by the United States.

H.CON.RES.107 pdf link Text quoted below
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...bc_3XULjG4QaOA

Expressing the sense of Congress that the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution.

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That it is the sense of Congress that, except in response to an actual or imminent attack against the territory of the United States, the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress violates Congress’s exclusive power to declare war under article I, section 8, clause 11 of the Constitution and therefore constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution.

First, I'll say I'm not a republican. I haven't heard much news about this so I'm throwing it out there. They ignored the War Powers Act with Libya and now they look to be doing the same in Syria by subverting Congress and going straight to the United Nations. Is the impeachment a reality?

[Flaank]

god, i hope so!!

[Kasierith]

Presidents can get around this by not declaring it a war, instead calling it military intervention, or action, or operations... essentially using semantics. It has happened in the past long before Obama. When we want to get into a small war, we just do it, and if it turns out that the battle is dragging out on and on instead of being a clean cut execution, than that's when its called a war

[LegendsnDreamz]

It's absurd to even bring it up this late in his term. Want him out? vote him out. The reality though, he'll likely get re-elected and if this crap comes up in his second term, you will really see the corruption in politics shine. I'd be willing to bet though that in his second term we really see an aggressive Obama. (I'm hoping at least) Republicans have been playing/stalling for far to long, Its laughable that they are trying to Impeach him right at the end just to sling more mud at Obama.

[Pipebomb]

Presidents can get around this by not declaring it a war, instead calling it military intervention, or action, or operations... essentially using semantics. It has happened in the past long before Obama. When we want to get into a small war, we just do it, and if it turns out that the battle is dragging out on and on instead of being a clean cut execution, than that's when its called a war

Crapper. Thanks for the quick reply. Syria here we come!

[hiromitsu]

I really wish that there would be more "yes" or "no" answers. Defense Secretary Panetta is plainly dodging questions all over the place.

[Flaank]

Presidents can get around this by not declaring it a war, instead calling it military intervention, or action, or operations... essentially using semantics. It has happened in the past long before Obama. When we want to get into a small war, we just do it, and if it turns out that the battle is dragging out on and on instead of being a clean cut execution, than that's when its called a war

so the president doesn't have to declare war but he can cause wars by invading other countries???? in my opinion any president who goes to war or causes a war without congress's approval should have been impeached.

---------- Post added 2012-03-10 at 07:30 PM ----------

we should only be involved in defensive wars and with a clear enemy not a tactic

---------- Post added 2012-03-10 at 07:30 PM ----------

we should only be involved in defensive wars and with a clear enemy not a tactic

[Kasierith]

so the president doesn't have to declare war but he can cause wars by invading other countries???? in my opinion any president who goes to war or causes a war without congress's approval should have been impeached.

Yes, essentially... it doesn't seem right or logical, but its how things work. But there is a basis behind going to war without congress' permission.. if the US were ever attacked, as in a true, military attack, and members of Congress were hit and people felt it was not safe to even meet to discuss going to war.. than having a singular leader would be vital for the continuation of the nation. But in terms of an aggressive war, it doesn't really have a logical purpose

[PACOX]

Unless they want riots and civil unrest, it will never happen. Bush got away with a lot of borderline stuff, at least Obama's operations were marked with a bit more success.

Presidents are allowed to conduct military operations kind of like the police can perform sting operations. Obama's legal counsel would laugh at them all over DC.

[Reeve]

Sounds to me like an attempt to sling mud right before an election.

[Zylos]

"Obama needs to do more about these terrorist nations"

"Obama needs to be impeached for doing more about these terrorist nations"

[Catharlex]

"Obama needs to do more about these terrorist nations"

"Obama needs to be impeached for doing more about these terrorist nations"

Came here to say the same thing.

user infracted: Please do not use "this" or any form of

[Deleted]

"Obama needs to do more about these terrorist nations"

"Obama needs to be impeached for doing more about these terrorist nations"

Libya wasn't really a terrorist nation at that point. But it certainly fitted exactly with Bush's "invade Iraq to give them democracy" thing that most(?) Republicans were behind at the time. Even better in fact, since the US was invited in to help this time by both the UN, the Arab League AND a subset of the population.

I want to know where the hell these anti-war deficit hawks were when Bush was in office.

[Eliandal]

Well, at least this is better than impeachment for a blowjob

[Zenotetsuken]

I hope he gets re-elected mainly so Republicans can feel a portion of the hell that Democrats felt during Bush' terms.

[Prothall]

"Obama needs to do more about these terrorist nations"

"Obama needs to be impeached for doing more about these terrorist nations"

Basically, this.

[skrump]

Well, at least this is better than impeachment for a blowjob

I don't get it either, they tried to impeach Clinton and now Obama yet nobody said a word while that idiotic jackass Bush screwed up everything he touched.

[mahananaka]

Just like Bush never got punishment for starting a war in Iraq with information they (his administration) knew was extremely sketchy, Obama would never get impeached for something like this. Particularly because while a ton of republicans will demagogue the issue; the republicans that can force (John Boehner and a few others) the issue won't because the Libyan action was beneficial to their donors. Also charges of impeachment occur in the House, but the jury for the charges is the Senate. Thus Democratic senate would never vote to remove their own president, unless the situation was so amazingly toxic, which this isn't.

[Firminator]

Bottom line is that the president has the power over the armed forces and its up to his discretion on whether or not to invade/help/assault another country, because of the way reality works, not just the way the law is written.

It goes like this: President sends the military to "defend this country" (loose phrase that is abused by republican and democratic presidents alike)
President alerts congress of this move to "defense" up to 48 hours later
Whether congress likes it or not, we now have a vested interest in whatever the president chose to do bc of the repercussions of just saying no to the military action. These include impeachment, international attention of lack of trust in the president, loss of life/money being in vain, etc. . .

(Un)Fortunately the way reality occurs is vastly different from the way the law calls for things to happen.

[Prancing Minstrel]

Crapper. Thanks for the quick reply. Syria here we come!

Extremely unlikely anything like that will happen with Syria, they're not isolated and have an army. Iran is the far more likely target.