Senate advances bill to repeal Iraq war authorizations in bipartisan vote

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: CBS News

Washington — The Senate advanced a bill Thursday that would repeal the legal justifications used to attack Iraq in 1991 and 2003, nearly 20 years to the day since the U.S. began its "shock and awe" campaign to topple dictator Saddam Hussein. The bipartisan legislation would repeal the 2002 authorization for the use of military force, or AUMF, that Congress approved for the 2003 invasion, as well as the 1991 authorization for the first Gulf War.

The bill, which has 12 Republicans among its 41 co-sponsors, easily advanced by a vote of 68 to 27, setting up a vote on final passage as soon as next week. "The Iraq War has itself been long over. This AUMF outlived its purpose and we can no longer justify keeping it in effect," Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the Senate floor ahead of the vote.

Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Republican Sen. Todd Young of Indiana, the measure's lead co-sponsors, first introduced their legislation in 2019 and it cleared the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2021. That same year, the House voted to repeal the 2002 authorization, but it was never voted on by the Senate. Efforts to include a repeal in the annual defense authorization bills have also failed. "Leaving outdated authorizations on the books can lead to abuse," Kaine told reporters after the vote. "The president should have to come to Congress to start wars."

The White House said Thursday that President Biden supports repealing the authorizations and that doing so "would have no impact on current U.S. military operations and would support this Administration's commitment to a strong and comprehensive relationship with our Iraqi partners." Opponents of repeal say it could limit U.S. counterterrorism efforts in the region and hamstring the ability to react quickly to national security threats.

Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/senate-iraq-war-aumf-authorization-for-use-of-military-force-vote/

[maxsolomon]

1. Cat's out of the bag, guys.

War Crimes already completed.

But better late than never?

[ColinC]

3. I mean helping prevent more war crimes is also a good idea

[Renew Deal]

2. People were asking for this 10+ years ago

Better late than never I guess.

[BumRushDaShow]

4. The GOP managed to neuter their neocon war-mongreing wing

and got them primaried out office (like Cheney) or they decided not to run again. So the idea of a PNAC and "spreading Democracy around the world" had become "too elitist intellectual" for the gutter-dwelling current GOP.

Someone had posted something recently where Bolton was on Newsmax, arguing with some lunkhead this past summer. There was a video in a tweet but I found a youtube of it from TYT (which added its own commentary between clips) -

This is why this has become "more bipartisan". There's an interesting (but long) article about this phenomena here - https://newrepublic.com/article/168045/neoconservative-isolationism-republican-party

[Crowman2009]

6. Basically they Neocons were consumed by their own monster.

And now the monster is flayling around and yelling like a Karen.

[BumRushDaShow]

7. ...

[republianmushroom]

5. Bush's oil war and he had help in doing it.