From earlier in the day, Jeremy W. Peters in the NYT: "ISIS Vote Weighs Heavily on Senators With 2016 Ambitions."
In a speech before the vote on Thursday, Mr. Paul tried to square his belief that America cannot be the world’s policeman with his more hawkish statements lately in support of military action. “I’m not sending your son, your daughter over to the middle of that chaos,” he said. “The people who live there need to stand up and fight. I am not giving up. But it is their war, and they need to fight.”...Peters has nothing from Elizabeth Warren, and I'm puzzled that he ends his article by quoting Wisconsin Senator Tammy Baldwin (whom I've never heard spoken of as a presidential prospect): "I have so many questions... I worry about an open-ended conflict." It's not as if that's a particularly interesting quote! Did the article originally quote Elizabeth Warren, then swap in another female Senator for some reason (to protect Warren, perhaps)?
Senator Ted Cruz of Texas [said:] “I do not support arming the rebels in Syria because the administration has presented no coherent plan for distinguishing the good guys from the bad guys"....
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They mixed up the first gay Senator with the first openly fake Indian one.
Given what Warren has already gotten away with, it's hard to believe she needs protecting.
We are against the Shia in Iran, Syria and Lebanon and for them in Iraq. We want to bomb ISIS/ISIL/IS, which will only irritate them, while Qatar other US allies fund them and Turkey allows free movement of men and supplies to ISIS/ISIL/IS across its borders. We have to launch the bombers from as far away as Kansas because Turkey won't allow us to us its airfields, and placing A10's in Kurdish country (the obvious choice) would be "boots on the ground."
Instead of boots on the ground to fight ISIS/ISIL/IS, there will be boots on the ground in Africa to fight Ebola. Say what? How many of our troops will catch Ebola? Some will. Then what? There are only a dozen or so hospital beds in the US equipped to handle Ebola patients, and some of them are occupied right now.
The utter lunacy of Obama's choices is stunning. The tin-hat crown wonders if Obama will permit elections in 2016. I wonder if there will be an electorate in 2016.
I get the sense the moderate-to-hard left views Hillary is a loser in 2016.
You see the NYTimes taking not-so subtle shots at HRC. Morning RINO on MSNBC has had a full frontal assault Hillary for the last several weeks.
The left is pushing their chips to the Cherokee. They need another multimillionaire populist to rally around.
"I remain concerned that our weapons, our funding, and our support may end up in the hands of people who threaten the United States," Warren said in a statement. "I do not want America to be dragged into another ground war in the Middle East."
We've got to get the job done there and that requires us to have enough troops
so that we're not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians.
The vote wan't on whether the plan made sense, just whether the president gets to decide on it.
When Bush I was president, Iran was fighting Iraq: it was a horrible war, but at least they were far too busy with each other to worry about us (aka "The Great Satan").
Perhaps there is something to be said for regional balance-of-power Realpolitik?
I did not know Tammy Baldwin was still alive. What a great non-existent Senator we elected here in Wisconsin. She has taken on the role of Herb Kohl very well!
Re: the Iran/Iraq War. Kissinger (that ultimate Realpolitiker) said "It's a pity they both can't lose."
If we aren't willing to make a long-term commitment to Iraq like we did in South Korea, then there really isn't any reason to be there at all.
@sykes.1 - G W Bush is praised, even by the left, for his support and funding AIDs aid in Africa.
I wonder if President Obama is pivoting to the Ebola crisis to create a similar legacy for his presidency.
In testimony before the US Senate on February 10, 1966 George F. Kennan stated:
“There is more respect to be won in the opinion of this world by a resolute and courageous liquidation of unsound positions than by the most stubborn pursuit of extravagant or unpromising objectives … Our country should not be asked, and should not ask of itself, to shoulder the main burden of determining the political realities in any other country, and particularly not in one remote from our shores, from our culture and from the experience of our people. This is not only not our business, but I don’t think we can do it successfully …”
Former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara later observed in his memoirs "Kennan’s point failed to catch our attention and thus influence our actions.”
Of course, Kennan was talking about VIetnam.
Things are different now -- for those who forget history.
Mark @8:35 am. That's the point. If the Iraqis were as tough as the south Koreans, ISIS would never have gotten a foothold. The Kurds seem like the only fighters over there who can hold territory.
"I have so many questions... I worry about an open-ended conflict." It's not as if that's a particularly interesting quote!
It's interesting in one sense. Sounds like the mindless dithering of a person trying hard not to think too much about something unpleasant. From a U.S. Senator.
Fact is, we already have an open ended conflict. It's been going on for over 20 years under Democratic and Republican presidents, and in each case (at least at the start of the particular stage) with bipartisan and popular support.
The right question is, "what should we do to seek an end to what is already open ended?"
ormer Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara later observed in his memoirs "Kennan’s point failed to catch our attention and thus influence our actions.”
Interesting quote. Kennan was Old News. So yesterday. What did he ever do?
Destroying ISIS should be our "No. 1 priority." - Elizabeth Warren
"I remain concerned about possible unintended consequences of intervention. We must not get bogged down in another war in the Middle East." - Elizabeth Warren
Paul and Warren have both been all over the map on this issue. It is very disappointing that there is no consistent war skeptic in the senate.
CWJ said: "Destroying ISIS should be our "No. 1 priority." - Elizabeth Warren
"I remain concerned about possible unintended consequences of intervention. We must not get bogged down in another war in the Middle East." - Elizabeth Warren
It would appear our only Native American senator speaks with fork-ed tongue.
Ted is angry that Obama gets to use Cruz missiles without attribution.
Arming Syrian rebels? Well, given the condition of ME states like Iran, Iraq, Libya, etc., where secular rulers have been deposed, that is perfectly consistent with the lunacy demonstrated by our national "leaders" on other issues.
We're toast.
Count down before there are US boots on the ground. I mean troops, not "advisors".
I don't want to go all left wing or anything, but I would have voted "No", too.
I would not go on record as supporting the arming of Syrian opposition. I believe that ship has sailed. The probability of those arms being used against us are significantly higher than if we had done it early on. We spent billions and years training and arming the Iraqi army. It didn't work so well.
Our options stink, but I don't think arming Syrians will turn out well. Best to take out Assad directly and then support anyone fighting ISIS for control.
"It is very disappointing that there is no consistent war skeptic in the senate."
I don't think you need to be a war skeptic. I think there should be plenty of strategy skeptics, like Joe Manchin.
There needs to be 50,000 pairs of boots on the ground or a few hundred boots on the ground. Anything else is a foolish strategy. We are at 5,000 and if we just let the number keep creeping up, it will be a total mess.
A proxy army is an alternative to 50k troops, but you have to choose wisely. What's left of the Free Syrian Army ain't it.
Ted Cruz's concerns have been mine from long before the Syria situation. Picking sides in foreign conflicts is a notoriously tricky problem and seems to go wrong more often than it goes right.
I'm still not sure why this matters at this point beyond American pride. I vote for putting up a giant wall and just letting them kill each other.
No matter what, the following will happen:
a) Dems will mostly go with Obama cause he is Dem.
b) Repubs will mostly go against Obama cause he is Dem and Obama.
c) Dem citizens will go along with Obama because he is a Dem or they will hate him cause he is to the right of them on this.
d) Repub citizens will hate it because he is Dem and Obama.
Does not matter what anyone would be saying or doing if the parties were different or not. This is the way it is now. That is partially the way it is and this is partially because Obama has earned it. He has done all within his power (and some things not) to piss off and on the other side. It just does not matter anymore if he even tries to do the right thing in any specific instance. There really is no reaching across the aisle anymore as the other side will use that opportunity to cut your hand off.
Chickens, home, roost and all that.
The killing fields of the Islamic middle east are crying out for weapons and armies to shed blood there. All Islamic society suffers from a 1500 year shortage of shed atonement sacrifice blood. (Blood representing a violent death penalty.)
Mohammed's cult is a dark and miserable place where all happiness is intentionally suppressed and only a killing of others may atone for the weight of broken laws carrying the death penalty.
It appears Obama understands this. But giving up the Israelis to them to kill is still the wrong move.
Why vote for something that is obviously going to fail?
It's immoral to feed a war that we have no intention of winning. You don't fight just to fight. There has to be some goal, the goal has to be just, and there has to be some chance of success.
I don't know what the goal is, I'm not sure if any of the players are better than ISIS, and I don't see any chance of success.
It's a Thirty Years War situation. Meddling will just kill more people and keep the war going on longer.
We had a chance to stabilize Iraq and Syria, but this President threw it away. Now he's making things worse.
But that is part of my point. Are they voting against it because it will fail or for politics. Are the voting for it because they think it is the right thing to do or politics?
Do any of those in Washington even know anymore? Do they even care anymore?
I think we lost the opportunity to have a stable Iraq. At this point, the best we could hope for is a Kurdistan that could defend itself, not attack Sunni areas. The Iraq territory will be come a three part entity, the one good idea Biden has had in 60 years, with Kurds armed, Sunnis ignored and Shia left to the mercies of Iran.
The Sunni area will be controlled by ISIS and we should resist "the CNN syndrome" that got us into Somalia. Ditto with Kosovo. I wonder how many ISIS volunteers are from Kosovo and Bosnia that we worked so hard to help under Clinton.
There is no point in sending "boots on the ground." It is too late. I'm OK with killing ISIS from the air, especially with napalm and MOAB munitions .
Good for the No voters--this whole thing is a bad idea, Congress should not drop its role here, and this kind of open ended authorization is how we always escalate into a long, pointless and unwind able conflict. I'm surprised to find myself agreeing with Cruz and Warren but here we are.
It'll be interesting for Iraqi civilians to dodge bombs being dropped on them by a Nobel Prizewinner, but that's the world we live in. This president is a mess and should never have tried for a second term if he didn't want to president. What a shameful mess he is. Too bad he has no shame.
If we dole out arms to Syrian 'fighters' but not actually take part ourselves, due to the extremely weak capability of middle-eastern moderates, ISIS, and whatever other extremist organization du-jour will simply defeat them and take those arms.
Until a generation or so have grown up with the freedoms we are accustomed to in the west, there is absolutely no chance that these democratic forces and the people of those countries will be able to not acquiesce power to groups and fanatics like ISIS.
This is, of course, assuming that the people of the middle eastern region want to live without the threat of rape, murder, genocide and various other day-to-day forms of oppression.
Ted Stevens and Rand Paul and Elizabeth Edwards. Rand and Ted are in really bad company and should look around and where they've laid their hats and get out of there as soon as possible.
last I heard 78 is a lot higher than 22. ISIS is so brutal anti war Obama gets a consensus of senators willing to give him approval to take the fight to ISIS. And Ted and Rand want to be in the minority. Even the Vatican was on board with dealing with ISIS militarily.
Rand and Elizabeth are courting the anti war crowd, but really where have they been the past few years? They are nowhere to be found, because for most of them they were only anti war because Bush was in charge and they were anti Bush.But there are now more pressing needs that the police state. Like preventing a war on women beacause women have to pay for antiabortifacients at CVS.Priorities, man!
There were legitimate freedom fighters in Syria, and probably still are. Abbas basically let ISIS run free and decimate his enemies. Since those were also against ISIS. We should have given them weapons a long time ago. Now that ISIS drove off most of the moderates, it's a lot harder to arm those who would assist us who aren't bat shit crazy. But they are out there. One good thing is that if its a matter of money, we can arm some and if they even show a hint of turning bad we can refuse to arm them again, and take them on as if they were a faction of ISIS.
If we don't arm them, then we have to do it ourselves. Which means boots on the ground or at least a commitment to war on our parts.
Whoops, that meant to say Assad, not Abbas. Mixing up my Islamic dictators that start with the letter A.
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