OntheWilderSide

Kimberly writes: Events are unfolding on the world stage so fast I can’t keep up. I thought with the Egyptian situation, we were on our way to peacefully toppling tyrants. It is so disheartening that in the wake of a fairly peaceful victory in Egypt, the US has accepted the violence in Libya, and jumped on board in the old, aggressive, immoral, violent way. It is so curious to me how fast the US was ready to act. And, how little time the US electorate had a chance to chime in, or steer us away from another war. News story via AP/Common Dreams and then commentary from a Libertarian via Independent Political Report.

US Launches 112 Tomahawk Missiles into Libya
Associated Press/via Common Dreams
Published on Saturday, March 19, 2011
by Robert Burns

The U.S. military attacked Moammar Gadhafi’s air defenses Saturday with strikes along the Libyan coast that were launched by Navy vessels in the Mediterranean…

Lee Wrights: Any US attack on Libya would be unconstitutional and despicable
Independent Political Report
March 19, 2011

Now the president has made an incredibly duplicitous statement on Libya, claiming that American leadership is essential in this situation and vowing that the United States would not stand “idly by while global peace and security is undermined.” In other words, we need some war so we can have peace. George Orwell, author of 1984, seems more like a prophet every day…
…All the while President Obama bobbed and weaved around the issue, even to the point of ignoring it completely in one of his weekly radio addresses. Finally, when Gadhafi was on the verge of destroying the rebels, the clumsy and inept United Nations Security Council stirred from its slumber to “authorize” members “to take all necessary measure” to impose a no-fly zone over Libya, enforce an arms embargo and freeze Libyan assets.

There are two things glaringly wrong with this view, as anyone who has even the remotest familiarity with the U.S. Constitution and American history could figure out, but which escapes most members of Congress and the president. First, the United States has no business initiating an attack on any other nation unless there is a declaration of war by the Congress. Second, Libya has not attacked us, nor does it threaten U.S. security or sovereignty. The conflict in Libya is a civil war, and anyone, especially anyone from the South, knows that civil wars are especially terrible and awful.

No resolution of the U.N. justifies violating the U.S. Constitution. Doing so sets the stage for U.N. sovereignty over the U.S. Any attack on Libya by U.S. forces, even those acting under the guise of this bogus document, would be a war of aggression since Libya has not threatened us…

Filed under: Anti-War, international politics, News, Peace, politics, progressive politics, US Politics, war Tagged: | attack on Libya, compare Libya to Egypt, Constitutional Law, Lee Wrights, Libertarian Party, Libya, Obama Administration, UN, US Constitution, war authorization, War on Libya