Briant, see the War Powers Clause for more information on this. I'm hoping out of all the RP supporters here, someone can post the Article/Section to counter the assertion that war must be declared before going. That would pretty much resolve this whole issue.
Ok, I just watched the video over. They ask Ron Paul "Do we need authorization of Congress to attack strategic targets in Iran?" and he answers "absolutely". To this effect, he is absolutely right. The Constitution grants Congress the power to declare war, it's given no where else as a power so 10th amendment gives that right to no one else, and the War Powers Act extends the rule to basically say "you need to talk to Congress every time". Ron Paul should have probably distinguished between "declaration of war" and "Congressional authorization", but his answer to the original question was yes, and to this effect, he is absolutely right. So I think we can agree that Ron Paul is correct when he says we need to talk to Congress, but incorrect (assuming we follow the War Powers Act) in that it needs to be a specific declaration of war. I need to read the text of the War Powers Act more to fully understand what it allows. In any case, the War Powers Act has been argued to be unconstitutional (read Wikipedia for the exact argument), so that may be the basis of Ron Paul's argument.
What's preposterous is the idea of such a blind fool being in office. What a brilliant idea. Let's go back to ignoring the Middle East until they're banging on our door. I'm sure once they wipe out Israel they'll just stay in their area and not bother anyone else.
What's preposterous is the idea of preemptive war. Founding fathers and former presidents alike (the most memorable quote for me being Truman) have all stated that the idea of preemptive war is completely unacceptable, and that war is only justified in the defense against an imminent threat to our nation. Christian just war doctrine would also seem to not justify an intervention in Iran at the moment.
The War Powers Clause. This has been covered numerous times. Where in the Constitution does it say Congress must declare war? I've shown where Congress has the power to, but no one has show where they must. I would not have guessed this would be so difficult to find, but it seems to becoming more and more elusive. If anyone has the Constitutional reference, that states Congress must declare war before going, please post it.
GTech, once again, 10th Amendment. If it's not granted, they can't do it. Is the President granted the power to declare war? Then he cannot. The War Powers Act extends and clarifies Congress's power, and basically makes the point that the President needs to consult Congress for military action. It seems most of us are contending not whether Congress MUST declare war, but specifically that no other branch of government (specifically the president) can justify military actions, only Congress. I'd like you to respond to my post a few spots up though, about the original point: Ron Paul agreed with what we all agree with here, intervention in Iran requires Congressional involvement. He said "Congress must declare war", which is not entirely true if you believe the War Powers Act is constitutional. So depending on his exact argument, he's either justifying his point by arguing the War Powers Act is unconstitutional, or he's right in that Congress needs to be involved, but wrong in that it must only be in the form of a war declaration. The main point is he's a lot closer to reality than Romney's "let the lawyers handle it".
How did our Founding Fathers and former presidents deal with barbary pirates? Those were the modern day terrorists (quite literally) of the time. It doesn't appear they sat and waited for them to come attack us.
Yes, and Lorien is incorrect. The 10th Amendment is not solely about state's rights. It handle the idea that the federal government has enumerated powers only. So extending that to our original point, unless somewhere in the Constitution the President gets the power to declare war, he cannot declare war since it's not enumerated to him as a power.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/handbook/hb108/hb108-11.pdf This also explains the original intention of the Founders with regards to "declare war", on page 2 or 3. Basically, people were concerned that Congress at the time met too infrequently, and was too large, to oversee the power to "make war", the original intent of the power, so they sought fit to empower the Executive to conduct the war, but that the responsibility of starting military action rested with Congress.
You are conflating issues. Starting a military operation against a country that is a threat is covered under the war powers act. Declaring war is different.
Your reading of the war powers act is clearly off target. Are you seriously arguing that only the congress can justify military action and it must be passed by them first? The act does not say so:
SEC. 2(c) The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces. SEC. 3. The President in every possible instance shall consult with Congress before introducing United States Armed Forces into hostilities or into situation where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, and after every such introduction shall consult regularly with the Congress until United States Armed Forces are no longer engaged in hostilities or have been removed from such situations. This is text from the actual War Powers Act of 1973. It clearly states that the only times he is permitted to bring us into hostilities is a war declaration, statutory authorization, or national emergency. So once again, the President must consult Congress for approval for military action short of an imminent threat. The text that you quote applies for SEC. 4, which describes reporting to the Congress in the instance where war is declared. So since there are only three ways the President can use military action, this is describing reporting for b)statutory authorization (similar to how we got into Iraq), and c) national emergency. The reason this reporting does not apply for a) declaration of war, should be fairly obvious. If we declare war, he does not need to report into Congress according to these rules because we are at war until the war is over. These reporting rules apply only to temporary authorizations and attacks following national emergencies, in the case of a prolonged declared war, we are assumed to be at war until war is over and a peace treaty declared.
I'm bouncing around here. Oh well. 10th amendment is all about state's rights. You are attempting to argue that because congress has the authority to declare war, that the president cannot begin a military action. This is silly, from quoting amendment 10. This is the state's rights amendments. It is the amendment that makes each state sovereign to run its economy, its government as it sees fit. It is a carryover from the articles of confederation. It means that if a power is not specifically granted to the federal government; then the federal government does not have the power and it belongs to the states. Acts passed by congress do not infringe upon this. Get real. 10th amendment can be brought up in a lot of cases where it isn't being applied appropriately, but its irrelevant here.
Where have I said differently? The problem comes in the definition of imminent. Previous legistlation & statutory authorization made the Iraq War possible, statutory authorization made Afghanistan possible. I'm not seeing where your beef is. You are agreeing with me, you just don't realize it. You've just contradicted your own point that declaring war is necessary and should be congratulated for that
Lorien, in a sense, I do agree with you to a point. Remember that Ron Paul voted for us to go after al Qaeda in Afghanistan; he also agrees that intervention was justified in that case. As far as Iraq, he disagrees that there was an imminent threat to justify war; this is arguable. I'm not contending the way we started action in Iraq, so much as the reasons for doing it (the debatable point of if they were an imminent threat). But mostly I'm not arguing that as much as the original question from the debate and debate if he was wrong or not about Iran. This goes all the way back to the OP, and the original question posed in the debate if we needed Congressional approval for intervention in Iran in the future. Some candidates were unsure, whereas Ron Paul made it clear that short of an imminent threat, we did need authorization to attack in Iran, and that the President could not avoid Congress to pursue military action there. To this end, he is absolutely correct.
It's not approval. It's consultation. Reagan didn't need congressional approval to bomb Libya. He simply needed to consult them about it - and he did so after the fact, I believe. So, no, he's not right at all. He needs to tell them what's going on, but it does not need to be put to a vote of approval. And his further point that war needs to be declared is clearly off base, because it does not. Congress holds the purse springs and could cut funding for it. Prolonged military action; yep needs to be put for a congressional vote, but striking at targets that are deemed a threat does not fall under their watch.
SEC. 2 clearly explains that short of war or national emergency or imminent threat in which he does not have time to consult Congress, he does need Congressional approval--"specific statutory authorization"--to initiate military action. This was given in 2002 in the form of "Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq", and if we were to initiate attacks against Iran, short of a time-critical event, he will need authorization again, not just consultation.