In response to a RW extreme accusation about the inherent "treason" of revealing the President's illegal wiretaps, acorrespondent offers these remarks:

">> revealing an ongoing intelligence operation *in wartime*.
(emphasis added)

Here we see "The Essential Big Lie" repeated yet again,
asserting that we are somehow "at war".

(NOTE: This is not to single-out Mr. Bray per se but rather to
note how pervasive this collective misapprehension has become.)

Unless the Congress took a vote which somehow went unreported,

*THERE WAS NO DECLARATION OF WAR BY THE US CONGRESS*

The US Constitution is extremely specific as to what is
required for the United States to "go to war". Congress
has the sole power to declare the United States to be "at war",
quite specifically to counterbalance the powers of the President.

President George Bush did not seek nor did the US Congress grant an
official Declaration of War; therefore the US is not "at war"
and there is no condition of "in wartime".

No Declaration of War, no "war powers" - it's just that simple;
anything else is an attempted "end-run" around the Constitution.

There is no Constitutional recognition for "kinda sorta like war",
and the continued reliance on this non-condition is
particularly ironic given President Bush's preference for Supreme
Court justices who interpret the Constitution "as written".
Congress complicitously repeating the infamous
"Gulf of Tonkin Resolution" fiasco after 9/11 doesn't make the
current situation "war" any more than it ensured success in
the Vietnam "conflict".

From the historical record, it seems to be immensely useful for the
suppression of dissent that this central assertion be pounded into a
populace again and again, that they are indeed "at war" with
A Great Enemy, thereby lending credence to assertions that
critical thinking about that government's behavior is even
more dangerous than usual.

The legal facts, however, are transparently clear:
there has been no Declaration of War by the US Congress,
therefore the US is not "at war". Claims to the contrary
are simply untrue, innocently or otherwise.

My larger point is that it is hard enough to have
reasoned discourse about something this emotionally charged
(and with such immense political spoils at stake)
without allowing the conversation to be subverted
by an erroneous premise extremely convenient
to one participant."

---

It is an interesting question how Congress can grant war powers without declaring war. Hmmmmmmmm?


A