IVAW wants to prosecute Bush Administration
Taking up the clarion call from Geezers for Sitting on Our Hands (VFP), the Iraq Veterans Against the War, announced that they voted last month to pursue the Bush Administration for their prosecution of the Iraq War. So let’s look at their statement for their justification (Here’s the link, but you’ll have to paste it into your browser because IVAW doesn’t allow traffic from TAH http://www.ivaw.org/node/6087).
They claim that Bush violated the Constitution by not getting the authorization from Congress.
Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution vests the power to authorize use of military force in the Legislative Branch, not the Executive.
That’s funny because the October 16, 2002 Joint Resolution to authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq of the 107th Congress (it’s right there in the name) in section 3, paragraph (a) states;
Authorization.–The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be necessary and appropriate in order to– (1) defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq; and (2) enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq.
If you’ll remember, Democrats controlled the Senate in October 2002 and it still passed.
By the way, have you guys ever heard of the War Powers Act of 1973? It says;
In the absence of a declaration of war, in any case in which United States Armed Forces are introduced– […]
The President shall provide such other information as the Congress may request in the fulfillment of its constitutional responsibilities with respect to committing the Nation to war and to the use of United States Armed Forces abroad.
So you see, there’s no requirement to get a declaration of war from Congress to engage troops in combat.
IVAW also alleges that there was no “imminent threat” from Iraq. Do you mean aside from shooting at our aircraft patrolling the skies over the No-Fly Zone while our aircraft enforced the UN-mandate? Like the three times in ten years that the Iraq Army drove their armored divisions to the Kuwait border and rattled sabers – causing us to deploy troops back to Kuwait?
Or this;
And why limit the prosecution to just the Bush administration? The Clinton Administration called Hussein an imminent threat on December 18, 1998;
Earlier today, I ordered America’s armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. … Their mission is to attack Iraq’s nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors. … Saddam Hussein must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
The IVAW also writes;
IVAW further alleges that the Bush administration’s alterations to Iraqi laws were made for the intended benefit of U.S. multinational corporations and are illegal under international law.
What has the Obama Administration done to correct the supposed changing of Iraqi laws?
IVAW is just clinging to the last shred of their relevance while trying to avoid pissing off the Democrats.
It is time for America to hold the officials responsible for this war to account for their decisions.
Why just the Republican officials?
Category: Antiwar crowd, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Phony soldiers
VFP, IVAW…still stuck on stupid.
Defend: You got that right!
I am amazed that they are going back to these old, tired, refuted allegations. It’s almost as if someone found one of the first meeting agendas and decided they would re-run these up the flag pole.
“IVAW is just clinging to the last shred of their relevance while trying to avoid pissing off the Democrats.”
Too late! Who they gonna get for legal assistance to pursue the case–Branum?
Gosh, why would they only try to prosecute Republicans? Oh, yeah…that’s right. They are leftists. The only thing they want is to tear down this country and turn it into some sort of soviet s**thole.
Is this the part where Joe chimes in with the “Bush is evil!” rhetoric?
Hell, it’s just not IVAW thinking like this. A number of Democrats, other Americans and a few that comment here have amnesia when it comes to our past history with Iraq. Instead they pretend it all began with the Evil George Bush and his administration.
IVAW, and 100% of its membership, still and always- Useless assholes.
“IVAW is just clinging to the last shred of their relevance while trying to avoid pissing off the Democrats”
They have no relevance just like VFF, but unlike them, they have no political ties. The majority of IVAW hates Obama. VFF is owned by the Republican Party, Hegseth would suck Bush’s…you know.
ASH–do you actually manage to keep a straight face when you’re typing that bullshit? Since when is IVAW (or whatever they’re calling themselves this week) and Vote Vets, VFP, Veterans Today, NOT hugging the liberal jockstrap? ISO mean anything to you? Does it not bother you in the slightest that virtually NONE of the groups I’ve listed above would cringe at the mere mention of the words, “Republican”, “conservative”, or hell, I don’t know, “integrity”, “honor”, little things like that?
No political ties, ash? Even you can’t believe that.
“They have no relevance just like VFF, but unlike them, they have no political ties.”
LMAO!!!!
Can anyone say ISO? 😉
Whoops–change the word, “NONE” to “ALL”. Carry on.
They hug the “liberal jockstrap” as much as VFF, Legion, and VFWPac hug the conservative jockstrap.
I’m sure IVAW members are all sticklers for the Constitution. All of it. In its entirety. The tenth Amendment. The Second Amendment. Heck, the First Amendment.
Uh, dipshit? The VFW PAC endorsed Carol Shea-Porter in my district in 2008. She’s known around here as Carol Che-Pelosi. The VFW and Legion themselves are non-partisan.
Once again, FAIL.
Spanky, she must not be called that by many….maybe just you and Jeb Bradley call her that, since she keeps winning your district. You must hate alot of people in your district.
Yeah, non-partisan, as much as a non-partisan as VoteVets is.
She won twice–2006 and 2008, both times on “I hate Bush” rhetoric, and in 2008 when she rode on Obama’s jock. She’s now polling around the mid-30’s. And every time someone ties her to Obama, her approval dives that much more. Couple that with the fact she won’t show her fat ass in any townhall meetings these days, and she IS toast, as is Hodes. Funny how when word gets out that her voting record is more liberal than Barney Frank’s, the only people who like her are the pickle puffers and other liberals in Portsmouth and Durham. Regular folks don’t like being bullshitted, ASH. And FWIW, Bradley ain’t running this time either. Neither is Bush. Get over yourself.
ASH; you really are a dipshit. You can’t even tell the difference between a VV, IVAW, VFP, and a real Veterans Service Organization.
Old trooper, actually I can. But I was orignally comparing IVAW to VFF….both non-VSO’s. The difference is that VFF licks the balls of conservatives while IVAW hates all Americans.
Obama got elected, the well dried up and the stuff they have been up to lately has been getting more “We’re with you in spirit” than donations. It makes sense to recycle old causes in an effort to reboot the cash flow. The IVAW feels used up, and appears to have been cast aside by the “Loaded Lefties” and has probably even fallen off the FBI watch list. No offense, it’s just time to pack up the tent, the lack of relevance is getting embarressing or as we say in The South, “Bless Your Heart”.
“The difference is that VFF licks the balls of conservatives while IVAW hates all Americans.”
“They hug the “liberal jockstrap” as much as VFF, Legion, and VFWPac hug the conservative jockstrap.” Both from you ash.
vs.
“They have no relevance just like VFF, but unlike them, they have no political ties.” Also from you ash.
Make up your mind ash.
Robert, careful, AS will be back here, telling all that the FBI is using local police departments to keep an eye on IVAW. After all, they get stopped just for having bumper stickers.
And it reads like someone(ash hole)is sliding off his meds once again.
jacobite…go read number 18
Ash, I did, or can’t you read what I posted in #20? In this thread you have taken two mutually exclusive stances. At the very least your thought processing is very disorganized, to such a degree that it’s an easy leap to say your credibility is non-existent. Cheers. 🙂
Colin Powell describes the decision as one of the finest pints in his career. Kofi Annan wanted to give Bush a medal for such a courageous decision, saying that it was not only legal but necessary, and that UN security resolution 1441 explicitly called for some ass kickin´. It was a popular decision with almost every other country in the world, particularly NATO allies where there were millions of people celebrating in the streets. Hell the Iraqi National Congress was begging for liberation. I know a few tons of unenriched uranium and no capability of enriching it was an imminent and grave threat to US national security. They probably could have enriched and weaponized it within an hour and dropped it on the US with the horde of geese with satchel charges Iraq had. I think I even read an international law once stating “the United States can do whatever it wants and is not subject to or constrained by any other international laws in any shape, form, or fashion”, although I may be mistaking that for section II, article 2, clause 2 of the US constitution. Stupid the IVAW! Why do they have to bring shame upon such a proud moment in American history! This is the fault stupid liberals like Dick Cheney who didn´t finish the job in Iraq the first time around: “I think that the proposition of going to Baghdad is also fallacious. I think if we were going to remove Saddam Hussein we would have had to go all the way to Baghdad, we would have to commit a lot of force because I do not believe he would wait in the Presidential Palace for us to arrive. I think we’d have had to hunt him down. And once we’d done that and we’d gotten rid of Saddam Hussein and his government, then we’d have had to put another government in its place. What kind of government? Should it be a Sunni government or Shi’i government or a Kurdish government or Ba’athist regime? Or maybe we want to bring in some of the Islamic fundamentalists?… Read more »
Chris–cut-and-paste diatribes from ISO/WSWS/insert other dipshit loser website here ain’t gonna score you many points, m’kay?
Chris:
The proper term is “gaggle of geese.”
That is all.
@ Mr. Sparky Spark: I didn´t know Mr. Cheney was in the ISO/WSWS, what a revelation. I´m glad that you´ve broken out of your ideological mold enough to call the American Enterprise Institute a dipshit loser website.
@ Scott: So thats where the expression gagglef**k comes from. If we hadn´t invaded that gaggle definitely would have f**ked us. I wonder where the expression herdf**k comes from.
Snark will not overcome your inherent stupidity, m’boy.
Jonn, Unsurprisingly, you’ve misrepresented the language of IVAW’s resolution and the underlying issues. Your citation of the October 2002 AUMF is a red herring because the issue is not Congress’s authorization but rather the Bush administration’s alleged manipulation of the intelligence to secure that congressional resolution. IVAW alleges that Bush officials created the false perception of an imminent threat in order to receive authorization from Congress to invade Iraq. You also erroneously cite the War Powers Act of 1973 to assert that even in the absence of a congressional declaration of war or AUMF, the Executive has the power to unilaterally order our military into armed conflict, including the preventive (as distinguished from ‘pre-emptive’) invasion of another nation. There is no basis for this in constitutional law. The Constitution does give the Executive the power to respond to armed attacks or imminent threats against the United States and its interests abroad and the War Powers Act clarifies this as well as Congress’s critical oversight role in such situations. Iraq in 2002-2003 clearly did not meet this threshold. If it did, why would the Bush administration have bothered at all with the UN Security Council or the Congress? Would it really have sacrificed the security of the nation merely for political cover? Saddam Hussein was certainly a nuisance to the United States and a menace to the Iraqi people but he was not the imminent threat Bush officials portrayed him as based on an intelligence picture that was distorted by Feith and his subordinates et al. The history of U.S.-Iraq military engagements throughout the mid-1990s is certainly important to consider but those engagements did not give President Clinton or Bush II license to invade Iraq. By 2002 the inspections regime was on its way to being re-established until it was cut short by the Bush administration. Regarding Iraqi law, Iraq now has a semi-sovereign government that will decide which laws to keep or change. Many of them were beneficial but some likely would have led to foreign domination of the Iraqi economy if the insurgency had not created such a hostile… Read more »
Well, TJ, I retract the statement the other day about you being smart. If Congress delegates their own power to the Executive, as Congress did with the War Powers Act of 1973, there is absolutely a basis in constitutional law. Unfortunately for you, your opinion on this subject isn’t relevant to anyone who spent a minute in a ConLaw class.
And honestly, I wish you’d stop talking about your five years of military service. Four years were spent in the Air Force Academy hoodwinking the US taxpayers out of a free education. Of the single year of service after you were commissioned into the Army, half was spent in MIOBC – your basic course – and several months of paperwork tossing your derelict ass out of the Army. I figure that gives you about four months of actual service. How close am I?
T.J.
Once again the question is:
How does any of this assist vetrans, pertain to vetrans, or even get troops out of Iraq?
Go ahead and prosecute whoever you want, but please take the V out of IVAW or change the mission statement to something pertinent to veterans. Otherwise the organization remains a joke.
Daniel,
Maybe it’s just me but the best word I can think of to describe my reaction to your question is “incredulous”.
I’m not a combat veteran but I did devote five years of my life to something I believed very deeply in only to find out that all is not as it seems. I have some legitimate questions with regard to why and how we went into Iraq and I want those questions answered. You can’t tell me that the Senate Select Intelligence Committee spent years investigating the pre-war intelligence process just for a lark or because one political party wanted to score some points against the other. That narrative is designed to distract, dissuade, and get everyone back in line with the political establishment’s agenda.
This pertains to veterans because veterans put have put their lives on the line and sacrificed everything in the name of national security. They deserve the truth from their government, as do their families and every citizen of this country. If they cannot have the truth- if it is hidden behind layers of bureaucracy and deception by our own government officials -the whole American philosophical foundation of inalienable rights and the social contract means nothing. That is a system of government I’m not willing to fight to defend.
If I remember right, even those against invading Iraq thought Saddam had WMD. After WMD weapons were not found then everyone jumped on the Bush lied about them bandwagon.
You have to go back and look at the intelligence Congress and senior Executive officials were given. What intelligence did they base their votes and their public statements on, who gave it to them, and how was that intelligence derived?
Read the Pentagon Inspector General Report cited at the bottom of IVAW’s press release. Feith was feeding Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Libby, Cheney and others intelligence analysis that was decisively different from what they were getting from CIA, DIA, etc. It was particularly decisive in that it definitively established a connection between a senior Iraqi intelligence officer and Al Qaeda member Mohammad Atta in Prague at a time when the intelligence community could not establish an operational relationship between AQ and the Iraqi government. The focus of Feith’s work was established at the direction of Wolfowitz.
There are three possibilities with regard to Feith: (1) He was acting in good faith and integrity in providing alternative intelligence assessments; (2) He was attempting to manipulate his superiors out of unknown motives; (3) He was acting out a conspiracy at the behest of his superiors to provide them with the intelligence analysis they needed to make the case for war.
The Pentagon OIG does not pass through that door; nor does the Senate Select Intelligence Committee. Why?
It’s funny that you use the word incredulous because I have similar feelings when reading the stated objectives of your organization and comparing it to the name of your organization.
IVAW states that it seeks:
“Full benefits, adequate healthcare (including mental health), and other supports for returning servicemen and women”
However, what campaigns have they taken to ensure that this happens? I can’t find any published reports or press releases on the site that demonstrate the actions taken by IVAW to accomplish this. Do they attend congressional hearings on VA actions, petition politicians to increase support, or even make public announcements to the press about the needs of veterans? Or are they attempting to accomplish this through the burning of flags outside military installations or maybe in the prank calling of military commanders perhaps?
My issue is not over the legality of the war or whatever prosecution you put in a resolution. My issue is that IVAW calls itself a veteran’s organization when it spends more time debating issues such as the Israeli occupation of Palestine, immigration reform, the G8 conference than actually helping Soldiers.
I would accept IVAW as a legitimate organization (with the constitutional right to protest) if it just stayed within the realm of its original charter but the minute it strayed from that it lost all credibility and deserves the ridicule it receives on this site.
Actually we’re in the beginning stages of a campaign to mandate that veterans suffering from combat trauma or military sexual trauma not be redeployed. And I’d say that working to bring the wars to an end and hold our political officials accountable for sending our troops into a war of choice in Iraq is one of the best ways to support them. Think of it as preventative health care.
One of our mission points is Reparations- which we’ve defined to include the pursuit of criminal cases against senior political officials. Beyond that, in my mind the best way to honor our veterans is to pursue accountability and the rule of law at home.
Real VSO´s like the American Legion to name one, are worried about flags, baseball, bingo, immigration, and have been overwhelmingly accepted by a large majority of the newer and younger generation of veterans as places for them to seek help and acceptance and deal with their issues.
Let me see if I can boil this down to the basics. Hypothetically a “former” President with no further power mislead our country into war and as a result our service men and women are coming home injured inside and out and in some cases being sent back to the front. IVAW has limited resources. Under these circumstances why you would waste any money on trying to prosecute an ex-president, who may be innocent, when all these wounded warriors and their needs would more than consume the IVAW’s budget? And then on top of that why parade around one of your own directors boldly announcing that these tired and wounded “Soldiers…” whom have done their best to serve their country “… are not heroes”?
Chris–spoken like someone who hasn’t the first foggiest fucking clue as to what VSO’s do. Are you a member of the Legion or VFW, perchance?
Geez Chris, I must have been mistaken. All this time I thought it was the American Legion rep who helped me by spending countless hours filing and refiling my service-connected disability claims, setting up appointments and fighting to get them recognized and compensated, all free of charge and despite the fact that I’m not a member of the Legion.
No, it must have been the local IVAW chapter president, whose interaction consisted of handing me a card and moving merrily along after I told him I wouldn’t join his group as long as they continued to misrepresent their membership.
I’ve forgotton does IVAW have any Members who actually were in Iraq?
Other than Jesse MacBeth? 😉
Jonn you must have taken John Yoo’s Monarchy 101 class on the Constitution.
Here’s the statute:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/uscode50/usc_sec_50_00001541—-000-.html
Iraqi pot shots at our Air Force prior to March 2003 don’t constitute a national emergency so that rules out c(3).
The congressional limitation on the Executive’s power to engage the military in hostilities is, contrary to your assertion, well-grounded in the Constitution and in the Framers’ intent. The idea that the Executive has the power to initiate hostilities at his discretion is antithetical to our form of government. It is one of the things that most distinguished the 18h century United States from the European monarchies.
Robert,
I’m not here to defend Matthis’s statements and actions. I’m here to have a serious debate on the importance of pursuing accountability regarding our public officials. And your assumption that we’re trying to go after Bush is incorrect. He’s not the logical place to start and there may not be a case against him at all. My guess is that he has plausible deniability.
“Potshots” is a fairly cavalier term for someone who has never been shot at. I’m pretty sure those pilots who were on the pointy side of those anti-aircraft missiles wouldn’t be quite so dismissive.
Whatever constitutional point you’re trying to make is moot. Congress gave Bush the authority to use force “against the continuing threat posed by Iraq”. The key word is “continuing threat”. Continuing since the GHW Bush Administration. Continuing in spite of UN mandates. Continuing since the attempted murder of GHWB.
And if the War Powers Act is somehow contrary to the Constitution, why hasn’t the Supreme Court said as much as many times as it’s been invoked in the last 37 years?
There is a reason why Gulf War medals were given well after hostilities ended. I also remember in the late 1990s when Clinton launched a bombing campaign against Iraq. Now, I’m no scholar and may be wrong, but wasn’t that bombing seeking to enforce the same UN resolution as the one that applied in 2003? I voted for Clinton in 1996, but why isn’t he being accused of illegality? And why is IVAW focusing on Gaza? And why does IVAW promote and support flag burning board members who are not Iraq veterans? Maybe IVAW should figure these questions out first before retaining James Branum as their legal counsel on matters of Constitutional Law, with the help of various sycophants who operate in purely rudderless and close-minded formats.
TJ,
As long as you continue to retain Matthis as a member, and more importantly, as a director of your group, you give tacit approval to everything he says and does publicly, to include asserting that soldiers are not heroes. Matthis can go ahead and mislead, lie, and demonize veterans if that is his prerogative, but those of you who give him a platform and then willingly turn a blind eye to it are as guilty as he is.
Jonn, You wrote at 44: “Whatever constitutional point you’re trying to make is moot. Congress gave Bush the authority to use force “against the continuing threat posed by Iraq”. The key word is “continuing threat”. Continuing since the GHW Bush Administration. Continuing in spite of UN mandates. Continuing since the attempted murder of GHWB.” Members of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee clearly did not consider the point moot. SSIC spent at least four years investigating the pre-war intelligence process, including the role of the Iraqi National Congress in providing false intelligence to elected and appointed officials of the U.S. government. The Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee requested an independent investigation by the Pentagon Inspector General into the activities of Douglas Feith’s office. The FBI was asked to investigate who forged documents on Niger yellow cake and why. The Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee began an inquiry into whether senior Bush officials forged a letter between Iraqi intelligence and Saddam Hussein revealing an operational relationship between Iraq and AQ. Several of those investigations were halted at a certain point. Why? The point is most definitely not moot. As I said before, it may have become necessary for the United States to invade Iraq at some future point in any case. Or Congress may have voted for war even without being influenced by disinformation. Or the UN inspectors might have been given the opportunity to complete their work and discovered that Saddam Hussein was clean and therefore there were other ways of dealing with him that would not have led to the humanitarian catastrophe that’s spilled over into Jordan and Lebanon. Tell me that millions of Iraqis stuck in refugee camps and squatter villages is not going to create more terrorists. (The uranium you’ve been taunting me about was already declared by the way. Why it was allowed to remain there boggles my mind but it wasn’t a discovery as you make it out to be.) The point is, the process was corrupted. The bad guy is dead, yes, but the rule of law has been compromised in the… Read more »
I don’t know why you’re still typing, TJ. Congress authorized Bush to pull the trigger. Much of the information they used to arrive at the decision pre-dated the Bush Administration. You don’t think any of the investigations you mentioned were politically motivated? That maybe they ended because there was no credible evidence? Do you think for one minute that if there had been the tiniest bit of credible evidence, the Democrats wouldn’t have used that evidence in any election in the last seven years?
It doesn’t matter that 500 tons of yellowcake uranium had been reported or not. Hussein didn’t acquire 500 tons of uranium to make watches and compasses. Somehow, everyone thinks that because the UN knew about it, it was rendered harmless – yet there it was. I’m not “taunting” you with it, I’m merely saying that if 500 tons of uranium isn’t proof of Hussein’s nefarious intentions, there’s no convincing you or any of your fellow travelers that he was an imminent threat.
But what about the part of the cease fire agreement that required Iraq several conditions to follow for hostilities to stop that they did not follow?
@ Mr. Snarky Snark: M´man (I feel like a little catholic schoolboy all over again saying that),you are absolutely correct, I haven´t a clue as to what VSO´s do. I thought they were there to help veterans do things like go through their claims process with the VA. I didn´t know they had higher and more critical purposes like squelching “subversive” activities within the United States: http://www.legion.org/citizenship/counter I am glad to have such a prestigious organization like the American Legion out there performing such activities. With such an illustrious history of endorsing fascists, and having the civic courage to stand up to the dangerous radical revolutionary Marxists of the ACLU, how could you go wrong with them? I can only stand in the shadow of such great service to our nation, and the cutting edge competent service every post provides to this new generation of veterans sleeping in the alleys behind them. I have been far to incompetent and inherently stupid to even perform such menial tasks as helping veterans write stressor statements, obtain statements from former peers in their unit, obtain their C-files, or fill out a VA form 21-4138. I have never successfully had one of the nonexistent people I´ve never helped get a claim awarded, probably because they were universally phony veterans (as well as my inherent incompetence and stupidity). I`ve never needed to do that because American Legion will take care of it every time that I´ve never approached them. I only charge $500 for a lifetime membership to my nonexistent services which I think is reasonable. Plus it includes perks like discounts at many local liquor stores, a shack where we can finish a keg of PBR in peace, $2 lap dances at Smiley´s, a discount for lube at a local sex shop, free refills at Taco Bell, and a weekly skip bo tournament with some of the best players around. @ Scott: I´m glad you followed up on your contact to your local IVAW chapter and asked them for help with your VA claim. I know that IVAW is full of phony veterans, none… Read more »
TJ, I commend the civility of your debate. I will not engage that debate as I am not sufficiently versed to be qualified to weigh in. But imagine a Lincoln-Douglas type debate with one of your own party officials standing next to you tossing insults at your audience, or a least a large segment of it. It does tend to undermine your points, however sound your logic may be. You are going to have to do better than he’s not my IVAW when, in fact, he is. Who you associate with, and in this case is an officer of an organiation you openly support, colours everything you say.
@ Mr. Lily and TJ:
I´m sure Democrats have the intestinal fortitude for that! Look at all those torture photos they released as soon as that communist Obama took office. The Democrats use every scrap of dirt possible from the war on terror to score cheap political points, even at the cost of the integrity of their own similar pursuits.
The fact that Iraq had uranium that hadn´t been enriched more than 20 years after its acquisition is undeniable proof of advanced capabilities in the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction and Hussein´s nefarious intentions!
Just read IZSP-2003-00001122, its all there! The documents left behind by the Baathist government revealed the Camel´s of mass destruction program, but utterly failed to mention the geese. The gaggle of geese flew out of the country during the invasion to hide before the coalition found them.