Rand Paul Loves The Prince Of Peace Trump While Lindsey Graham Loves The Big Macho Ass-Kicker Trump

Last week-- on Fox News, no less-- Kentucky Senator Rand Paul (R) said Trump should never have pulled out of the Iran nuclear agreement and that the assassination of Qassem Soleimani was a mistake, the two blunders together making the U.S. "less safe." A poll by Ipsos since then shows that most Americans agree that Trump's botched approach to Iran has made the country less safe. Only 25% of Americans belief what Trump has done made the U.S. safer. This caused the Senate's most notorious closet case to pull his head out of Trump's butt to hiss some anti-Rand assertions before reinsertion. The AP's Ben Tobin reported that Lindsey Graham mocked Paul's constitutional knowledge: "If I had an eye problem, I would go to him. If I had a constitutional question, he would be the last guy I would pick."

Maybe Lindsey should take his problems with the Constitution to constitutional law professor and Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin, certainly the most knowledgeable member of either House when it comes to the U.S. Constitution. "Gee," he said this morning, "you think the people who pretend to be constitutional 'textualists' and 'originalists' would at least bother to read the Constitution, research its history and spend 5 minutes thinking seriously about it. The reason the Framers gave Congress the exclusive power to declare war, raise armies and make military appropriations is because the Kings and princes constantly plunged their populations into wars of vanity, political advantage and distraction, all at the great expense of human life and national treasure. Our Founders didn’t want presidents to have that awesome and easily exploited power and that’s why it’s the representatives of the people who, under Article I, must debate and deliberate the benefits, costs and consequences of going to war against other nations. Our passage of a War Powers Resolution on Iran last week is the beginning of restoration of Congressional warmaking powers that have been usurped by the President and abdicated by prior Congresses for far too long."




Graham was all in a dither because Paul criticized Trump's decision to authorize Soleimani's assassination while he was in Iraq without consulting Congress. "Trust me, I'm going to let people know that at this moment in time to play this game with the war powers act ... whether you mean to or not, you're empowering the enemy," Graham told reporters on Wednesday, referring to Republican senators Paul and Lee.

After receiving a briefing with fellow senators on Wednesday, Paul called the Trump administration's justification for killing Soleimani "absurd" and "an insult" to Congress.

Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, made similar comments, leading Graham to say his two Republican colleagues were "overreacting." The South Carolina Republican also attacked Paul and Lee for supporting the Democratic House's war powers resolution, a measure that passed Thursday evening to limit Trump's powers with respect to military action with Iran.

...Paul fired back during an interview later Wednesday on CNN, claiming Graham was invoking a "fake sort of drape of patriotism."

"I love my country as much as the next guy, but for him to insult and say that somehow we're not as patriotic as he is, he hasn't even read the history of the Constitution," Paul said. "He insults the Constitution, our Founding Fathers and what we do stand for in this republic by making light of it and accusing people of lacking patriotism. I think that's a low, gutter type of response."

Will John Bolton Testify? by Nancy Ohanian

Yesterday, Paul was on Meet The Press, still on the attack against the Trump regime's Iran bungling. The first thing Chuck Todd asked him was if he thought he had gotten "enough information to make you feel comfortable with what President Trump did?" Paul said he hadn't-- and that the information he got, as a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was "contradictory... We've heard that the-- from the Secretary of State that they don't know where or when but it was imminent. That to me does seem inconsistent. He thinks he can square the circle, but to me it seems pretty inconsistent. To me there's a bigger question too, though. This is what really infuriated me about the briefing: Is they maintain both in private and in public that a vote by Congress in 2003 or 2002 to go after Saddam Hussein was a vote that now allows them to still be in Iraq and do whatever they want, including killing a foreign general from Iran. And I don't think that's what Congress meant in 2002, nor do I think one generation can bind another generation. So my point in being for this war powers debate is that we really need to have a debate about whether we should still be in Iraq or in Afghanistan. There needs to be authorization from Congress... I think presidents of both parties have been trying to usurp the authority. But our Founding Fathers wanted it to remain in Congress. They wanted to make it difficult to go to war. And I think we've been drifting away from that for a long time. But that's why I'm willing to stand up. Not because I distrust President Trump. I actually think he has shown remarkable restraint. But I'm willing to stand up even against a president of my party, because we need to stand up and take back the power. We also need to debate whether or not we're going to keep sending kids forever to Afghanistan and Iraq. And I, frankly, think we ought to end those wars."

TODD: Are you concerned? I mean look, the numbers tell the story. It does feel as if we've sent more troops to the Middle East, look at what's happening in Saudi Arabia, which I know you've been against, then we're bringing them home. What kind of message does that send to the American people?

PAUL: Well, I think it's a mixed message. I think President Trump has been very consistent saying he doesn't want perpetual war. But I have pushed back and I've said, "If you keep sending more troops, you will have perpetual war." The troops are merely targets. I'm going to be having a hearing in the next couple weeks about the Afghan Papers. It troubles me that in private commanders and generals have been saying for more than a decade that there's no mission in Afghanistan. We had two young men die this week. You know, I have friends who will be sending their kids there in the next six months. I don't want to send these young men and women to war if there is no mission and if the generals are privately saying it can't be won.

TODD: Is there a way... it's my understanding during the briefing, according to George Will's reporting, that Senator Chris Coons multiple times asked whether, whether they would seek congressional approval to deal with Iran if Iran got a nuclear weapon, to deal with Iran in a military way. And they just kept dodging the question. How important do you think it is to get that, essentially, on paper?

PAUL: I think it's incredibly important. Throughout the whole briefing they were dismissive of Congress. They , in the end, said they didn't have time to come back. We only had about eight senators ask questions and they said, "Oh, we don't have time. We're busy" about coming back to brief the rest of us or take questions from the rest of us. So it was very dismissive. But it's also arrogant to say that a vote from Congress, 16, 17 years ago, that that vote now binds another generation and another generation to war in Iraq. It was against Saddam Hussein, for goodness sakes. This is a completely different government. This is not even the Iraqi government we're now fighting. It's Iranian generals that happen to be in Iraq. But here's the great irony of the Iraq War, and this is something Trump gets incredibly right. And that is that since the Iraq War we now have an Iraq that is more aligned with Iran than us. We're trying to force them to keep our troops. The irony of that is glaring. And I think we really need to have a full throated debate in Congress. The majority of American people want to come home. They don't understand why we're still there. I want to have that debate and I want to bring our kids home.

TODD: You know, it's interesting. You have-- and I think in some ways you believe President Trump's instincts comport with your instincts when it comes to national security and foreign policy. But his advisers are in a different place. How much do you think that-- does that bothers you? Or is that healthy?

PAUL: I'll give you an example. You know I'm on the Foreign Relations Committee and all of his nominees come before me. And I even warned some of them in private, "I'm going to ask you, 'Do you agree with President Trump that the Iraq War was a mistake?'" You know what? Most of them don't agree with him. He keeps appointing people to represent him that think the Iraq War was just great. They loved Dick Cheney's position and they still don't admit it was a mistake. So that's why he keeps getting policy that isn't his policy. I do think his instincts are pure. He's been saying it since -- for 20, 30 years. He's been saying it for a long time that the wars have drained our treasury and that he's not in favor of these wars. But then they convince him if we leave, we'll look weak. I actually think this is a time of strength right now. Soleimani's dead. The leader of a lot of the mayhem is dead. This will be the time to come home. The Iraqi government, the democratically elected government, wants us to come home. We should come home. And the only way...

TODD: I was just going to say you think the President should take them up on this offer? You want us out? Let's do it.

PAUL: Absolutely. And the only way people become stronger is when they stand up for themselves. In Afghanistan when the government, and the soldiers, and the police finally fight the Taliban, they'll do better. When Iraq says, "Oh my goodness. Iran is overrunning us," or they see that the Sunni extremists are overrunning us, they have to stand up and fight. If they can't fight for their country, why are we always the patsy sending our kids there?