This comes from something I posted yesterday, but is equally relevant today.

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Here's a novel idea -- why not see what the U.S. Constitution says about the powers of Congress? Here is verbatim text from Section 8, which delineates its powers (excerpted, of course, to provide the most relevant sections):

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The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;

To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;

To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;

To provide and maintain a navy;

To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;

To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And

To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.

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Doesn't take a Constitutional scholar (which is lucky, since they're obviously a scarce commodity in this administration) to realize that CONGRESS *DOES* HAVE ALL THE POWER AND RIGHT TO END THE WAR IN IRAQ THAT IT NEEDS.

End of story.

...let's not be naive. There's an old, old saying regarding the selective morality displayed by countries and governments (hell, by nearly EVERYBODY in the world):

"They may be bastards, but they're OUR bastards."

Dictators and authoritarians may be brutal, undemocratic and the whole nine yards -- but if another country gets something of value from them, it's strangely easy to overlook lots of little "flaws" and carry on with business as usual.

Just consider the distorted and excessive policy against Fidel Castro and Cuba -- does ANYONE maintain that he's worse than, or even equal to, Musharaff/Pakistan, Mubarak/Egypt, or Abdullah/Saudi Arabia? Yet we act as though Castro/Cuba were the greatest threat to world stability, based on the level of our actions against him; compare and contrast with the dictators who are (or are THOUGHT to be) our friends!

...seems to be that mass murder ought to be done efficiently -- quickly and cleanly. Anything worth doing is worth doing well, right?

Given her obvious attempt at moral detachment from WHY mass murder is occurring, one conclusion seems inescapable.

Had she been alive during World War II, publishing her "thoughts" in magazines and newspapers of the day, dear Annie would have written admiringly of the highly efficient death machine constructed in the concentration camps of Nazi Germany. With her unparalleled moral detachment, she could avoid answering the messy question of whether those camps were wrong in any way.

No, I'm not calling Ann a Nazi. The Nazi epithet is thrown so often towards both liberals and conservatives that it's clearly lost meaning. But it's hard to argue that she'd have been uncomfortable with their genocidal practices, based on her latest column!

You could almost say it this way -- Cheney has had the best of all possible worlds (while the rest of us have suffered among the WORST of all possible worlds) -- he's been President without being burdened with any of the accountability. He was able to pull the levers of power behind the scenes, while Dubya has been the figurehead out in public.

On the other hand, NO ONE has had any accountability in this administration, at least until Democrats took over Congress in January. Dubya and company have had a virtual blank check up to now, but that check has been torn up at long last.

It would be so sweet to watch a Cheney campaign in 2008 -- kind of like watching Satan run for elective office. The sad part is, there is STILL 20% to 30% of the public who are deluded enough to consider voting for him. Look around you, folks -- who is carrying the Cheney virus? At least two out of every ten people you meet -- now THAT'S frightening!