A Note on Future Presidents

It will take me a while to find a copy of the decades-old Doonesbury strip that leaps to mind, though I’m thinking it was the late Jerald terHorst and the long-running joke about future presidents.

Rep. Peter T. King accused President Barack Obama of “undermining the authority of future presidents” to engage in military action in a scathing statement issued following Obama’s Rose Garden speech Saturday.

Obama said he would seek an authorization for the use of military force against the Syrian regime in response to the widely-reported use of chemical weapons, but King, a New York Republican and former chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, blasted that move.

“President Obama is abdicating his responsibility as commander-in-chief and undermining the authority of future presidents. The President does not need Congress to authorize a strike on Syria. If Assad’s use of chemical weapons against civilians deserves a military response, and I believe it does, and if the President is seeking congressional approval, then he should call Congress back into a special session at the earliest date,” King said in a statement. “The President doesn’t need 535 Members of Congress to enforce his own redline.”

(Lesniewski)

It is not that we are unfamiliar with the defense of future presidents and presidencies, but this is something of a twist.

Ah, Congress!

Watch the birdie.

Oh, right. And remember, turnabout is fair play, or something like that.

Right?

Of course, yes, this really is what it comes down to:

The Senate came back into session for a few seconds at noon Monday, but why?

The House and Senate had agreed to adjourn for the August recess, leaving no need for the once-every-three-day pro forma sessions that had become the norm in recent years. But Maryland Democrat Benjamin L. Cardin’s perfunctory Monday appearance to gavel the Senate into session had a benefit that the White House will no doubt appreciate. Since this year’s August break runs until Sept. 9, a span of longer than a month, a particularly obscure Senate rule was due to take effect.

Niels Lesniewski explains the details for Roll Call.