Oh hey, forgot to reply

I was serious Sicarius

It wasn't Draug's point (I don't think) to dismiss your experts. He was simply pointing out a fallacy (or at least a big change) in your argument. You began this thread by saying that this war was unconstitutional. When he pointed out that there is nothing in the Constitution itself limiting the President's power to go to war, you started referring to experts and other documents.

You can argue that a President with unrestricted power to declare war was not what the founding father's had in mind, but you cannot say that it is unconstitutional.

"You can argue that a President with unrestricted power to declare war was not what the founding father's had in mind, but you cannot say that it is unconstitutional."

That's a stunning statement. Really think about what you just said. The president HAS no power to declare war. Only Congress does. Without Congress's authorization he can only respond to attacks or imminent threats. That's in the Constitution, that's supported by history. Obama intervened in Libya without Congressional authorization when it posed no threat and did not attack the United States. He cannot do that. No president can do that. It is unconstitutional.

The legality is certainly an important issue, and this sets a disturbing legal precedent to be sure.
Regardless of that though, The US brings freedom (tm) and democracy (tm) to yet another country by bombing them into oblivion.

@Invictus - Please cite *where* in the Constitution it limits the Commander-in-Chief's powers. You can't. It doesn't. Your are wrong. End of story. Epic. Fucking. Fail.

Declaring war is reserved to Congress. But not all military action is war. We have not declared war on Libya. We are attempting to remove what is now an International Criminal from power. That is a police action, not a war. Prior to that, we were providing a people with assistance to fight an oppresive regime, btu we weren't at war with Libya. We were just picking sides and assisting in an existing civil war.

Your ignorance is astounding.

"That is a police action, not a war"

Um... the US isnt allowed to police the globe.

...wha

"War is a state of armed and often prolonged conflict carried on between states, nations, or other parties[1][2] typified by extreme aggression, societal disruption, and high mortality."

Whether or not Gaddafi is a criminal or not is irrelevant; the fact is that this is a prolonged, armed conflict between the nation-states of Libya and the United States (and the rest of NATO). A police action wouldn't see us bombing civilians.

We must recall the origins of these attacks on Libya. The Obama administration made no claim that Libyan leader Gaddafi was killing his civilian population. Rather, the claim was that Libya might begin killing its civilians in the future.

@Eden - "A police action wouldn't see us bombing civilians." Any civilian bombings are collateral, not intentional. This isn't Japan or Germany.

As far as whether or not this is war. I agree the President has overstepped his boundaries. My argument is that we had a legal obligation through our alliance and membership in NATO to act, which is granted the PResident for a term not to exceed 90 total days in the War Powers Act and that nothing in the Constitution prohibts him from excercising that for the 90 days. He has now gone beyond 90 days and *must* have some sort of approval, even if via Congress' authorizing of continued funding and if Congress didn't approve on some level, they'd stop the money from flowing.

But, it is time for Congress to either denounce and defund the effort, or to make it official. Those stupid fucks we elected to Washington are sending a mixed message by denouncing yet funding the effort.

To be fair, he said that Gaddafi's army was literally just about to kill civilians in Benghazi. And they were about to take the city. He already had killed protesters in Tripoli with abandon.

There's no debate that Gaddafi wasn't doing dreadful things to the people of Libya. The issue here is that Obama decided to intervene without getting authorization from Congress when Gaddafi had not attacked the United States and his actions did not threaten it.

"we had a legal obligation through our alliance and membership in NATO to act"

When this began NATO was not involved. It became a NATO operation well after the first assaults by the US, UK, and France.

"Those stupid fucks we elected to Washington are sending a mixed message by denouncing yet funding the effort."

They only didn't defund it because the defunding bill still had some funding in it. The House is actually being really bipartisan and principled on this issue. About time Congress stopped abdicating its powers to the executive.

Again, nothing in the constitution prohibits it. This phrase "grave threat" does *not* appear i the Constitution. Federalist papers be damned. they are *not* the Constitution, just an interpretation that, while followed often, are not the final word on the Constitution's interpretation. The SC has ignored them in the past and could very well find that their interpretation of the Constitution disagrees, especially when *nothing* in the Constitution reads even remotely similar to the Federalist Papers in this regard.

Er, sorry, should have clarified. It wouldn't see us bombing civilians *because we wouldn't be dropping bombs.* A police action would see the deployment of troopers to infiltrate Gaddafi's defenses and take him out instead of using bombs on anything. Bombs will cause and have caused collateral damage that's unnecessary for a police action. Collateral damage like the deaths of civilians and destruction of their property -- collateral, not intentional, but unnecessary collateral damage nonetheless.

As for NATO membership argument -- our commitments to other countries should not be overriding our commitment to the founding rules and principles of the contract that formed this state. That contract, the Constitution, is the final authority, and nowhere in it is the President granted the power to bypass Congressional approval for military action against countries which do not constitute a direct threat to us. The ultimate argument being pushed here is that the NATO obligations trump Constitutional obligations -- and if that's so, we need to leave NATO, not allow the Constitution to be undermined. I say that's not so, but I have a feeling saying that's not so and leaving NATO are in practice not far removed.

"About time Congress stopped abdicating its powers to the executive."

And by allowing it to continue through any funding, they continue to do so.

And, OK, so it was the UN Security Council's UN Resolution 1973 (2011) of 17 March (a 10-0 vote with 5 abstainees) which authorized support by member states and more or less obligated us to act.

Once again Draugnar, your ignorance is astounding.

More on the hacking side of this convo, When is the last time you can recall so many news items about hackers? It's become a massive meme within society as a whole. Hardly a day goes by without some discussion or news about hackers.
And, I should mention this right off: If there was ever any attempt to soft-pedal the word hacker versus cracker (with hacker meaning a guy who likes to fool around with his computer to discover new things and the cracker meaning the evil, black-hat criminal), well that definition is done. The hacker today is now the cracker for all practical purposes of discussion.

Now that I have that definition out of the way, let me try and figure out what is going on here.
First of all, there is no real outbreak of hacking. None of this is new. It's just that, for some reason, the media has decided to get on the bandwagon, and now not a day goes by without some sort of hacking story. And, of course, we have to have our hacking "bad guys." This means Anonymous, 4Chan, LulzRaft and LulzSec, among others. You can go into the sociology of these groups on your own time. You can research hacktivism and Lulz for starters.
From my perspective, the only reason the media is all over this is because there are group names attached to various attacks and this makes it easier to write a story. The fact is the hacking scene with many of the exact same players goes back decades. It's just that nobody was paying attention.
The media perked up when Sony was attacked over and over. I'm guessing a lot of reporters were spending too much time on the Sony online gaming system, and this got them to take action by writing about it. The Sony attacks seem to stem from some grievance that has been poorly reported.

But there is a lot of attention now turned toward hacking in general.
Out of the blue, Citigroup was hacked, then the CIA, and then the FBI and other groups were hacked. Now I'm finding this a little odd and wondering who is being set up here. Supposedly, some of the hacks of government agencies stem from the arrest of a few hackers in Europe. This is an attempt to make the hackers appear to be online versions of Hezbollah, as there are retaliatory attacks reported. You know, the way terrorists would do it.
It's all possible, but I'm suspicious of the whole scene. These hackers, who are normally casual in their approach, are made to look like bomb throwing Trotskyites from the 1920s, each wielding a Molotov cocktail and out to overthrow the government.

This above mental image, of course, is for public benefit. By making any one of these hackers appear to be a horrendous threat to public safety, a number of initiatives can be rushed through Congress. All sorts of onerous laws will be passed, which probably will not affect the scene at all but will allow more government intrusion into the Internet. It will become illegal to sell any programming tools that can be used by a hacker, despite the usefulness of these tools to security experts. It will also become a felony to attempt to deconstruct a password or enter a system for whatever reason.
I think that at some point people are going to have to be registered and licensed to use the Internet at all. You can see it coming as clear as day. These hackers, of course, have to be stopped, and this is how they'll do it.
There are events in history known as false flag events. These are staged by a government usually to distress the public, so the government can do something that the public would otherwise disapprove.
The U.S. is NOTORIOUS for a these, including Lyndon Johnson's phony Gulf of Tonkin "event" to start the Viet Nam War in 1964. This was deemed necessary to begin a full scale war with public approval and is now well documented as a false flag event. It never happened.
Many believe that the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana in 1889, which triggered the Spanish-American War, was also a staged event. This was never fully proven but always suspected.
Most political junkies are always aware of these possibilities. But, as far as I know, nobody has ever really considered the fact that any number of hacker attacks could be false flag events or, in other words, fake. The way the news is covering hacking lately, I suspect we are about to see a big one soon. A whopper that will upset everyone.

The end result will be a huge sweep of every hacker and would-be hacker with a grateful public cheering on the government. The hackers will not know what hit them, as they are arrested in a huge sweep. Give the possibility of this scenario about a year and see if I'm right.

@Eden - Please show me where int he constitution it limits the power of the President as Commander-in-Chief to only act if under imminent threat, direct attack, or with Congressional authority. Again, I say, you *can't*. It. Does. Not. Exist!

Show me where if defines Commander in Chief. You need to look at how the president's powers have been interpreted through our nation's history. Article Two does not exist in a vacuum.

I should point out, that the Constitution is generally a *limiting* document. It's articles and amendments limit the power of Government by saying what they cannot do in most instances, and what they must do in certain other instances. Nothing says "The Executive Branch must get Congressional approval or show an attack is imminent before beginning hostilities." Nothing.

Article II may not exist in a vacuum, but it essential defines "Commander-in-Chief" if you read it. I quoted it above.

"The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States"

Uh, how is that a definition? It just says he is it.

Read on, McDuff. It speaks of who will report to him and consult with him. Nice excerpt just before the pertinent information. Epic. Fucking. Fail.

You mean this?

"he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment."

That means that the president can ask for information from Cabinet secretaries and other executive branch officials. It establishes the president as the head of the government. The rest says he can pardon people. That has nothing to do with being commander in chief.

Seriously, your ignorance is breathtaking.

It's funny to read posts by individuals so ignorant of American military history. They keep making the inference that any use of military force against a non-American entity is going to war. Such is the face of utter ignorance. Here is a list of American military action starting with George Washington that demonstrates how American military units were used without going to war at all.
St. Clair's campaign against the Western Confederacy that culminated in the worst single defeat ever suffered by American forces at the hands of Native Americans.
Mad Anthony Wayne's campaign against the Western Confederacy three years after St. Clair's debacle that culminated in the victory at Fallen Timbers that opened up Ohio territory to settlement.
John Adam's Quasi War with the French in the Atlantic from 1798-1800.
President Jefferson's War with the Barbary Pirates from 1801-05.
President Madison's dispatch of an army under William Henry Harrison to deal with the Native Americans under Tecumseh and Tenskwatawah that ended in the American victory at Tippecanoe.
The list goes on and on and on.
Not a single action required a declaration of war according to the men who wrote the Constitution or contributed significant ideas to it.
Individuals ignorant of American history remain ignorant of what "war" was considered when the Constitution was written.
War consisted of formal hostilities between nation states not the use of military force.

And nowhere in that does it say he can make war whenever he likes. In fact Congress and only Congress has the ability to declare war. Declare war, here, means to initiate war against another power outside of times of emergency/imminent attack. The phrasing in the War Powers Clause was "make war" until it was changed to allow the President to repel invasions without Congressional approval. This does not mean that we can run around without abandon and attack a country that poses no threat to us without Congressional approval.

Exactly. Just because a conflict doesn't have a neat little 19th century declaration attached to it doesn't mean it isn't a war.

Well, then, Invictus. How about using English to define an English phrase/title. Commander - one who is in charge in the military. Chief - top of the food chain. So, Commander in Chief - The highest most position of authority in the Military. Pretty simple to define I think.

If you mean define it as in what it can and can't do. I already pointed out that the Constitution in most every instance says what a given Branch cannot do. I.e. "Congress shall make no law establishing..." If the Constitution didn't intend the President to have complete autonomy, it would have stated something to the effect of "The Executive Branch (or the President) shall commit no forces to action except in dire circumstances where an attack has ahppened or is imminent". But it says nothing of the sort. Therefore, constitutionally speaking, the PResident has complete autonomy over sending forces anywhere according to the Constitution. It just isn't an official war unless Congress declares it such.

Of course, considering the Founders could not have foreseen the extreme capability of the US Military ~225 years later, maybe the Constitution needs a revision. But until that occurs, you cannot say the Constitution restricts the President's ability to act in any way he sees fit.

"Declare war, here, means to initiate war against another power outside of times of emergency/imminent attack."

Really? I don't see declaring war defined in the Constitution to mean that? Where do you get that interpretation for declaring war?