Originally published at: Trump Admin, GOP Leadership Scramble To Explain Why Iran War is Not War
With a hard deadline bearing down on them, Trump and his allies are scrambling for a way to argue that contrary to the shooting, ship boardings, and an ongoing naval blockade, the U.S. is not engaged in hostilities with Iran. These increasingly fantastical rhetorical sleights of hand are coming because of the War Powers Resolution…
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When is dropping bombs on a adversary not a war?
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Their argument seems to be that because we’re not bombing right now, all is sweetness and light.
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According to international law, a blockade, such as the one imposed by us on Iranian shipping, IS an act of war.
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Mike Johnson is a complete waste of three-dimensional space.
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To me the interesting dynamic is that when POTUS has a majority in Congress then Congress caves to POTUS. This scenario is giving DonOLD more kingly powers what the War Powers Resolution allows.
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Like a lot of the mid-level enablers in the Trump administration, (e.g. BOEM), there is only an acting agency head. So it was that the Pentagon’s acting Comptroller, Jules W. Hurst III, reported that the Iran War has cost a mere $25 billion to date. This is an amount nowhere near the $67 billion of the Iran War Tracker from Brown University’s climate lab, and an amount that roughly aligns with the NYT estimate of $1 billion a day (approaching 60 as the article notes). Linda Bilmes, a Harvard economist, was saying weeks ago that the total cost of the war could reach $1 trillion.
China must find the gullibility of Americans quite amusing, but, following the rule of Napoleon, it must never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake.
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“The misuse of language induces evil in the soul.” – attributed to Socrates
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“I have no idea where all these dead people and blown up buildings came from. It was like that when I got here. I swear.”
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Lawsuits take too much time
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If it ends up at SCOTUS, they just made clear with their destruction of the VRA that they don’t give a damn about Congress’s constitutional powers
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Dems need to be unified and clear: Not one more dime for the Pentagon until the illegality of attacking Iran is dealt with
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It’s a special military operation.
The use of the word “war” will be punishable by 5 years in prison, or a year on the front lines assuming you last that long.
And yes, this is a fascist dictatorship like Russia now.
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Laws are words which can mean anything or the opposite. Josh’s You Can Have Democratic Self-Government or the Corrupt Court — Not Both is a manifesto on the Supreme Court that explains we live in a post-law world. Words, numbers melt like a Dali surrealist painting, like an A.I. image - unreal. Or Feynman lecturing on Space-Time and the Big Bang.
This reminds us the the extremely rich are the most extremely psychotic, criminal, and perversely power hungry. We live in interesting times and will get more interesting as the Right tightens the vice.
Salvador Dalí
Persistence of Memory Tapestry, 1975
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Translation:
99% of the Republicans in Washington are too stupid to be allowed to have this kind of power. Meanwhile, Rand Paul and literally everyone not in the GOP in Washington is biting their tongues and not telling everyone else how easy it would be to get around this by simply saying:
'All our guys are on military bases where they should be anyway, or patrolling the waters they’d normally be patrolling. Our military operation to eliminate Iran’s nuclear ambitions was successful. Yay! Everyone can stay right where they are because they’re all in places they should be in anyway.
‘Oh, by the way, if they don’t completely and without restriction open the Straits by Saturday, that will trigger a new Emergency predicated on the attack on our National Security Interests that closing the Straits represents. After all, do you know how much of our Navy and airpower relies on petroleum products? It’s a lot. So keeping the Straits closed will constitute an attack, in the view of this White House. Just like it will in another 60 days, if it has to.’
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Yesterday Hegseth, under oath, told congress that we were “two months into a conflict” with Iran, which he compared to the wars the US had fought in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Vietnam. He described this conflict as “an existential struggle for the safety of the American people,” and he asked God to “watch over our troops in harm’s way.” He said “we fight” to “ensure the legacy” of “those who have fallen.” This was yesterday.
Today he says we’re not in war, directly contradicting what he said yesterday. We’re not in a war. We’re in a “ceasefire,” which is not a war. A naval blockade, presumably (since he doesn’t mention it) is not an act of war, although international law says it is.
Now, we know these sons of bitches will lie and contradict themselves just as much as they damn well please. But one reason they’re so free in their contempt for truth is that the national media simply will not call them on it. Literally, one day Hegseth is pouring contempt on Democrats for failing to support the war, and the next day he is pouring contempt on Democrats for insisting that we’re in a war instead of a ceasefire.
The Times, for example, has a long detailed report that includes all the highlights of what Hegseth said yesterday, and then today, but there is no mention whatsoever that his words on one day totally contradict his words on the next.
The story here is that Hegseth is lying brazenly and flagrantly about the war. That’s today’s story, and it goes completely unreported in the country’s major media. There simply is no lie so offensive, so obvious, so destructive, so soaked in contempt for the truth and for the media who are supposedly tasked with reporting the truth, that the same media will not simply ignore it.
The bigger story that goes unreported is that MAGA world’s major if not exclusive rhetorical mode in their public speech is lying.
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”War” is such an unhelpful term. Can we just say ‘more than a disagreement, less than genocide”?
Liars all. The Dems, if they get the trifecta in 2028, should just suspend the Constitution for a week and deport all these bastards to Argentina - Patagonia in the snow. That includes the Seditious Six on the SCOTUS.
During the second week they can restore the Constitution MINUS any acknowledgment or mention of the fictitious Trump Administration.
The new POTUS will be refers to as “47” and “45” will be dismissed as a clerical error.
A Patriot can dream.
Its a scrimmage, a skirmish, a sortie, a kerfluffle, a spat, a rumble, an encounter, an excursion, a tiff, a quarrel, a set to, a squabble, a fracas.
Well, first issue is: January. It’d be summer in Argentina.
But moreover… why? That’s a colossal over-reach. Suspend the Constitution? No. Absolutely not. You don’t uphold the rule of law by shredding it.
You just bring them all to the White House, so the President can shoot them in the head. Official duty, after all, protecting the national security. SCOTUS has ruled it’s not illegal for the President to do it.
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If it’s not a war, what the fuck is the Department of WAR doing???!?
Also, these big tough manly men sure do like to play little tickle-baby games with words don’t they?
Lying about its name, among other things. Takes an act of Congress to change the DoD’s name.
Whatevs. The law is completely irrelevant now if you’re in the GQP, it only applies to enemies and Dems
Also fuck Comey, he deserves all the karma he’s getting in the absurd seashell prosecution. He’s a key reason TSF won the first time.
Well, you’ve basically got 3 options:
- You have some degree of hope that working within the system can actually correct all of these things. Or,
- You start preparing to work outside the system to correct all of these things.
- You give up, and let them win, forever.
What’s it gonna be?