Libya and Liars

There are moral questions, questions of policy, of strategy--all kinds of questions on which humans of good will can differ.

And then there are liars, and shameless liars.

In the shameless liar division are the GOPers, prominent and not, who have extended their reflexive opposition to anything President Obama does or supports, even if they themselves have supported the same thing, to what used to be out of bounds for mere partisan politics: those very serious decisions involving the use of the U.S. military, putting Americans in harms way and causing destruction in another country. But several GOPers have lied about their position on Libya--which is in this case a more accurate term that the convenient "flip-flop"--the most prominent so far being Newt Gingrich. Either he lied when he said he was for a no-fly zone, or he lied when a few days later he said he wasn't.

But the simplier lie, and in some ways more pernicious, is John Banal's letter stating that President Obama acted without consulting Congress. In a letter that otherwise raised substantive policy questions, he asserted: “It is regrettable that no opportunity was afforded to consult with congressional leaders, as was the custom of your predecessors, before your decision as commander in chief to deploy into combat the men and women of our armed forces.”

This was and continues to be widely reported. What has not been reported is the answer to a question about this by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, in which he detailed the consultations that in fact happened:

...in briefings and in hearings that senior people in the administration, as well as the President, have been engaged in consultations with Congress, going back as far as February 28th when national intelligence officers from the DNI briefed House members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence where they had a closed session on Libya and Somalia; March 1st there was a similar closed briefing with Senate Select Committee on Intelligence members, with issues in the Middle East, North Africa, including Libya. Secretary Clinton testified to the House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on assessing U.S. foreign policy priorities and needs, which included a substantial discussion of Libya. That was on March 1st. March 2nd, Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen testified at a hearing on Defense Department appropriations, again including a discussion -- an ample discussion of a potential Libyan no-fly zone. Also on March 2nd, Secretary Clinton, at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, included a discussion on Libya and possible policy options.

The list goes on. March 4th, March 10th, March 14th, the ODNI briefed Speaker Boehner on Libya in a classified briefing -- that was March 14th. On March 17th, Under Secretary Burns testified in open session to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on popular uprisings in the Middle East, but the main focus was on Libya. On March 17th... there was an all-senators briefing on Libya developments and possible U.S. government and international responses, including potential military options, by an interagency team led by Under Secretary of State Bill Burns but including the ODNI and DOD."

Now it's possible that Banal only counts "consultation" as when the President talks to him. Just as it is possible that Republicans in the Senate had a number of second thoughts on appropriate action. But as Carney also pointed out:

"And I should mention, as you all know, that on March 1st -- I believe it was March 1st where the Senate passed a resolution calling on actions that they believed should be taken by the United States and international partners, which was extremely similar to the actions that, of course, we did take several weeks later."

Presidents should be able to confer directly with congressional leaders of both parties on such decisions as they make them, and history suggests this used to be done. But really, when lives are at stake, would you trust these guys? That's another deadly result of a policy of lying for partisan politics.