[tsimionescu]

Interestingly, this is not just flaunting international law. It is a blatant violation of federal domestic law in the USA itself: Congress is the only body that can declare war, and they have not done so. The Presidency has no right whatsoever to attack a foreign country without a declaration of war.

While yes, Congress authorized the "War on Terror", there is very obviously no possible justification for applying that to the case of Venezuela.

[Ancapistani]

> The Presidency has no right whatsoever to attack a foreign country without a declaration of war.

That’s… just not true.

George Washington himself authorized the US Navy to attack French vessels in the Caribbean in 1798 - with no declaration of war.

[verzali]

> The Congress shall have Power...

> To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences 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;

[Ancapistani]

I’m quite familiar.

My point is that —- regardless of appropriateness —- this is about as far from “unprecedented” as can be imagined.

Congress didn’t declare ware on Syria, or Iraq, or Yemen, or Somalia, or any number of other African countries when the US attacked them during the Biden administration.

[verzali]

So the constitution is worthless then?

[Ancapistani]

That’s not what I was saying, but I didn’t argue when smarter men than I said exactly that:

    But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.
    - Lysander Spooner

[mothballed]

Liberia has/had a nearly identical constitution and look at them. It was just a roadmap for what the US could become if we became even more savage like them. It was never the Constitution that made the USA special, in other hands you got what we're getting now.

You always needed a populace that respected life, liberty, and property above all in order to have a prayer of it working out; that is long gone if it ever existed.

[pjc50]

> Congress is the only body that can declare war, and they have not done so.

People keep saying that, and it bears no relation to the actual post-WW2 US military history. How many declared wars have there been since then?

[whycome]

When people wanted “no more wars” this isn’t what they meant…

[pjc50]

Anyone who voted for him on that basis was the sort of sucker who loses poker games to five year olds.

[estearum]

Or virtually any other basis

[JumpCrisscross]

> It is a blatant violation of federal domestic law

War Powers Act of '73.

[moralestapia]

Nah. Not war.

It's some sort of DOJ operation.

Wait and see.

[herewulf]

Ah yes, using the Coast Guard's aircraft carrier, stealth fighters, and their famous "Delta Force" commandos. I bet they even got a warrant to kick in Maduro's door and read him his rights!