#184 "Whither ... the Testicular Fortitude ... ?"

To semi-quote my question from last post. Well, just today, some small amount of ball-age was discovered in the U.S. House of Representatives in the person of--defying human anatomy--Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker. She represents one bicameral half of the Legislative branch of our tripartite Government under the Constitution-- as if you needed to be re-schooled after all the preceding bloggery--that is authorized as a Separate Power to hold the President in "check and balance." In this case, TO PUT A STOP to a BAD WAR.

As reported by McClatchy (on-line):

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday that it's up to President Barack Obama to persuade reluctant Democrats to FUND his Afghanistan troop build-up--his most important foreign policy initiative--because she has no plans to do so herself.

Put in overly-popular parlance ... that's balls. Though not mentioned in the the article, the elevated testosterone level is fully justified by that good ol' Constitutional clause proclaiming Congress's power "To raise and support armies ... [by] appropriation of money ... [etc.]" Stop the funding; stop the war; or, short of that, at least force a penniless White house and Pentagon to adopt different strategies to resolve this exercise in futility, and to get us the hell out. Which is what everybody wants. There are other ways to "win" a war than throwing troops at it. A Bush/Obama "surge" is another step deeper into the quagmire. It's heartening that a Pew poll reports that 51% of the American people are against escalation--to call it by its right name--even after the President's speech last week.

But it'll never happen. First of all, the troops are already on the way, despite the official Jan. 1 start-up date for the increase. In our military-saturated state of North Carolina, the government installations are emptying and deploying--Camp Lejeune disgorged a bunch of Marines last Friday, to a typically-hyped send-off.

Moreover, and crucially, Congress will NEVER stop the funding. It never has in recent history, and never will. Not as long as an Imperial Presidency is in power, and unchecked. Ms. Pelosi's intentions are good, but a funding bill for Obama's first escalation in March--the only one we can possibly forgive him for--passed EASILY through the House. This one maybe not so easily, but it will pass. Ironically, the opposition party, the Republicans, will make it a shoo-in.

Wouldn't it be nice if some wild-eyed, anti-war Representative--I'll nominate brave little Dennis Kucinich--wended himself over to the Supreme Court building and handed the Justices a brief. In it he would ask them simply to declare the undeclared war in Afghanistan unconstitutional ... and save us all a lot of trouble.

But, as the old proverbial exclamation goes, "Balls!" said the Queen, "If I had 'em, I'd be King."
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