Karen Tumulty, a national political correspondent for The Washington Post, clearly enjoys the access her 'Beltway Elite' status grants her to executive power and the rich-and-famous.
Perhaps all this access has colored Tumulty's views on executive power, leading her to celebrate is a bit more than a 'journalist' should. For apparently, she thinks this whole requirement for a president to get congressional authorization before engaging in offensive military actions is, well, outdated.
Tumulty, as evidenced by her
dialoguewith followers after this original Tweet, uses the "we haven't declared war since 1942" card to demonstrate (disingenuously) the irrelevance of
Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the Constitution. Additionally, she argues that the unenforceable nature of the War Powers Act makes the idea of congressional authorization for, say, a bombing campaign in Syria to be outmoded.
In short, Tumulty would like to see the Constitution amended so as to give the executive branch more latitude for bombing the shit out of people without this pesky constitutional requirement of congressional authorization.
The central problem is not that the 'War Powers Clause' of the Constitution has gone beyond its sell date. No, the central problem is twofold: a) presidents have been abusing their commander-in-chief powers by relying upon Article II, Section 2 to bypass congressional authorization, and b) the War Powers Resolution meant to curb such abuses has not been enforced.
However, Beltway journalists such as Tumulty, who love their access to power, apparently see the Constitution differently: as an annoying curb on executive power.