I'd just signed clear with 5N7M in Nigeria and my spectrum scope showed a big pileup on 20 meters in the area reserved for extra class phone operation, so I tuned in expecting some rare DX station everyone was trying to work. I wish I hadn't. I didn't hear dozens of stations shouting their call letters trying to be heard on the other side of the planet, what I heard is what passes for political discussion these days.
"Well whaddaya think of a president who thinks he's a dictator and ignores the constitution"
"you mean Bush?"
"No, I mean Oh-Bah-Ma! Thinks he can declare war all by himself. At least with Bush both times he got permission from congress -- this guy thinks he's a DICTATOR"
"Ahhhh, come on. . ."
"That's an impeachable offense! That's Treason!"
Of course I'm editing here. There were too many voices stepping on each other to include it all or even to call it a discussion, but that's American politics in all its unsound and furious ignorance.
Actually the War Powers Act requires that the president notify congress within 48 hours, which of course was exactly what happened. Whether or not that will filter down to the terminally Foxed and all those so desperate to portray Obama as everything Bush was and worse, I don't know, but where there's a will to hate, there's always a way to hate. As much as facts might contradict the idiot rage, they have as much a chance to bust the pileup as a 2 Watt QRP rig with a Buddipole.
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ReplyDeleteCaptain,
ReplyDeleteI chose to delete my last comment ... not in disrespect to you, but because I no longer find humor appropriate when taking about the GOP, Bagheads, or their sympathizers. They are turning into fascists, and there is nothing funny about them anymore. Frankly, I am starting to hate them ... big time!
"At least with Bush both times he got permission from congress . . ."
ReplyDeleteIgnorance indeed. As John W. Dean explains in his book, Broken Government, in responding to Bush's request for authorization to use force in Iraq, Congress imposed certain conditions. Part of those involved providing a clearer, more-detailed explanation. Another part involved certifying certain conditions existed.
Bush did the former by slightly rewording what he had already said in seeking authorization. He basically failed to do the latter.
Thus, a case can be made that Bush defied Congress and pushed forward without congressional authorization — which is unconstitutional. Congress being under Republican control, nothing was said or done about it.
And, despite all that was known then about Bush's misleadership, disdain for Congress and disrespect for law and the Constitution, enough people voted for him to give him four more years. Among those Bush voters, I'm sure, were the ignorant jerks bellowing about Oh-Bah-Ma.
“Whether through the ideas of James Madison, Immanuel Kant, or John Stuart Mill, liberals have viewed violent conflict as regrettable and the use of political institutions as the best way to contain it. Conservatives, from the days of Machiavelli to such twentieth-century figures as Germany's Carl Schmitt, have, by contrast, viewed politics as an extension of war, complete with no-holds-barred treatment of the enemy, iron-clad discipline in the ranks, cries of treason against those who do not support the effort with full-throated vigor, and total control over any spoils won. From a conservative point of view, separation of powers is divisive, tolerance a luxury, fairness another word for weakness, and cooperation unnecessary. If conservatives will not use government to tame Hobbes' state of nature, they will use it to strengthen Hobbes' state of nature. Victory is the only thing that matters, and any tactic more likely to produce victory is justified. ”
ReplyDeleteFrom " Why Conservatives Can't Govern by Alan Wolf.
Thanks SW Anderson for that addition. If Reagan was a Teflon president, it seems Bush was even more slippery, but the anti-Obama thing isn't really about what the president has or hasn't done.
ReplyDeleteI should mention that the conversation I eavesdropped on went on to demand that the armed forces disobey orders and refuse to participate. The man cited the Nurnberg trials to demonstrate that the orders need not be obeyed because they were "illegal."
Yes, it's no longer hyperbolic to talk about fascism.
If I recall correctly (and this is from memory, I haven't looked it up) the War Powers Act gives the President the right to do what he damn well pleases for 30 days before he has to ask for a declaration by Congress. And (again from a possibly faulty memory) it is regarding GROUND troops. For temporary air strikes? He is the Commander in Chief.
ReplyDeleteThere were no declarations the LAST time we bombed Libya. And that was a Dem too, I believe.
People are getting crazier.
I'm not sure Reagan got permission to bomb Qaddafi either, but all this hoopla is the result of Obama Derangement Syndrome and has nothing to do with facts. Everything he does or doesn't do is proof that he's a Muslim extremist foreigner and fascist/communist tyrant looking to destroy our traditional values and the Boy Scouts of America.
ReplyDeleteIn other words he's got dark skin and went to Harvard.