For US Representative Barbara Lee (D-CA) it has been a long and lonely struggle. Congresswoman Lee was the only member of the US House to vote against Bush Lite’s Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) following 9/11. For more than 10 years she has banged her head at the wall, speeches from the floor imploring action, stand alone bills requiring a new AUMF for all of these new wars we keep getting embroiled in, amendments to bills in her committee to force a debate on the AUMF issue. You name it, she did it. And was shot down. Speeches didn’t work, new bills died in committee, amendments failed votes to be attached to bills.
But then, on Thursday, lightening struck. Lee sits on the House Appropriations Committee, and the committee is ramping up what is pretty much a “must pass” bill, the defense bill, so she got ready for one more cut on the forehead from the wall, proposing yet another AUMF amendment to the bill. Once again her Democratic colleagues spoke out in favor of the bill, but this time the fairy waved her wand. Republican after Republican stood to announce their support for the amendment, magic was in the air. And then it was time for the voice vote. The amendment passed with a unanimous vote. When the chairman reared his head back in surprise and said “Well, I guess the amendment has passed”, the room broke out in applause. The wall had finally broken.
Congresswoman Lee admitted that she herself was stunned, and began her celebratory tweet with one word, “Whoa!”. A part of her surprise, quite rightfully after all of these years was not so much that it squeaked through, but the depth of the support for it. The Hill quotes one member,;
“I feel like my world is rocked because I see these very different opinions and yet I agree with you,” Air Force veteran Rep. Chris Stewart (R-Utah) told Lee during the amendment’s debate.
“My friends in the military now . . .they notice that Congress doesn’t have the guts to stand up and have this debate and give them the authority with their continuing every day,” he added.
The second phrase of that quote is, in my mind, incredibly important. Here we are as a country, sending these brave men and women off to fight and die in far away lands, and yet our government can’t even give them the common courtesy to directly authorize and fund their efforts, just lump them in under the “Get Osama bin Laden” crowd. News flash, we did that years ago. You know you’re on a roll when one of the more powerful House Republicans, and a member of the committee comes out on your side;
Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), the chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, argued that the time is now for Congress to debate a new measure.
“We’re at war against an enemy that did not exist in a place that we did not expect to fight. How an AUMF that was passed 16 years ago — before I was in Congress — could possibly be stretched to cover this is just beyond belief to me," Cole said Thursday during debate.
You know, if you want to be cynical, you could ask, “Barbara lee has been doing this annually for more than 10 years, kind of like Rand Paul’s pilgrimage to his college pool to pay homage to Aqua Buddha, what took you guys so long?” But it really doesn’t matter. This bill is going to pass the committee, and be called to the House floor for debate and a vote. And that is when the fireworks are going to start.
The amendment itself is simple, direct, and really goddamn effective. If the defense bill is passed, 8 months after the date of the passage of the bill the Bush AUMF will expire. On that day, all of the current conflicts, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, Syria will all pretty much grind to a halt, they will no longer be authorized or funded operations. The congress will finally be on the spot, they will have 8 months to pick and choose which actions are truly in our critical national interest, authorize and fund them, or everything comes to a stop. And the ones that they don’t authorize will finally come to a grinding halt.
If you look at Barbara Lee’s amendment as a stone, the United States hasn’t seen a rock like this since David loaded up his sling. Every President, W, Obama, and Trump have hid behind the skirts of the post 9/11 AUMF. Not only the continuation of the madness in Afghanistan, and not only in Iraq and now in Syria, but in stealth proxy actions in places like Somalia and Yemen. None of these, with the exception of Afghanistan before Osama bin Laden took a nap with the sharks had anything to do with 9/11, but all of these Presidents were perfectly happy to swing their big military dicks without having to convince congress to approve it or authorize the funds.
And there’s a perfectly good reason that congress didn’t call out any of these Presidents on their street corner magic coin trick. This country is fucking sick and tired of endless wars ( I know I am). Both the President and the congress knew that to have to explain to the country why a backwater country like Yemen or Somalia was worth a single American life would lead to their immediate dismissal at the nearest possible ballot box. As long as a President was able to wriggle the sacred word “Terror” into his public decision, the congress was more than happy to give him a pass.
Mark my words, there will be a floor debate on this amendment, for one simple reason. There are congressmen and women in that chamber who have no problem whatsoever with someone else’s kid dying in a far off land as long as the campaign donations from Lockheed, Northrop-Grumman et al keep rolling in. Shit, they’d take donations from Krupp if it wasn’t for those pesky campaign finance laws. Can’t having deep pocket contributors getting a major case of the sadz just because a few people are squeamish at the sight of a little blood.
So, we are finally going to have this debate, whether the spineless chickenshits in congress like it or not. My personal belief, considering the outcome of the committee vote is that if a motion is raised to cut that amendment, there will be enough crossover GOP support to kill the attempt. If each GOP committee member converts just one of their like minded colleagues to the cause, this will pass. And they can’t bury the bill it funds defense. And if it passes, then the Senate will have its turn in the tumbler, all the while with every American watching, including the mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, spouses and relatives of every American service member looking on in intense interest.
If this bill passes both chambers it is going to put Trump in a real put-up-or-STFU moment. Trump campaigned on pulling us out of every stupid war his predecessors got us into, Hell, he’d retroactively pull us out of the Civil War if he could. But at the same time he has been sneakily increasing our footprint into Syria, beefing up Afghanistan, and plotting to spank North Korea. Without that 2001 AUMF as cover, Trump would not have been able to order the putative missile launch on Syria just cuz Ivanka saw a couple of pictures that made her queasy. After all, if we could only stop that stupid war, those people would be tailor made to slap together her shitty clothes and shoes. And he would have to get congressional approval before launching any preemptive strikes against North Korea, or trying to give Iran a shave and a haircut. But how would he look if he vetoed a bill funding his defense?
To hear Trump’s rhetoric on the subject, if he was any more of a pacifist he’d have to convert his religion to Quaker, but don’t kid yourself, he loves war just as much as any other chickenhawk GOP member, as long as Donnie Jr, Eric and Jared don’t have to go and fight in it. If he wants to get into the international Armed Conflict Disco, fuck him, let him pay the cover charge. Sorry Donnie Boy, there’s no VIP line for this club anymore.