I’m writing because I’ve seen next to nothing in the mainstream press about this, and I think DK members need to consider it urgently. A new, bi-partisan Senate bill (Corker/KAINE), would make it almost impossible to stop a President from attacking just about any one he pleases, and would make it possible for those attacks to be conducted almost entirely in secret. Please recall that Kaine was HRC’s VP mate.
Kaine has tweeted that this bill will restore ‘Congressional oversight’ to the POTUS’ war powers. It does nothing of the kind. Instead, it codifies, expands, and makes permanent just those powers. It reduces transparency in acts of war and aggression. It is a total abdication of Congress’ authority and responsibility, and brings us orders of magnitude closer to the brink of madness.
This article, in The American Conservative, of all places, gets it just right:
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/senators-offer-up-unprecedented-war-powers-to-president-aumf-kaine-corker/
Here’s a link to the pdf of the text of the proposed Joint Resolution:
www.foreign.senate.gov/…
And here’s a link to a Democracy Now conversation between Amy Goodman, Juan Gonzalez, and Faiz Shakir, the national policy director for the ACLU:
www.democracynow.org/…
American Imperialism has always been a bi-partisan affair. But the willingness of a Democratic Senator and former VP nominee to offer almost unlimited war-making power to an unbridled, unstable, cruel narcissist is almost beyond belief.There is very little sanity left in this country. Rand Paul, of all people, opposes it. But many Dems may support it. Are we going to count on Rand Paul to save us???