What should President Obama do about Syria w regard to use of chemical weapons?

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/08/30/as-obama-weighs-syria-s…

Former President George W. Bush, in an interview, said Obama has a “touch choice to make” on potential U.S. military action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who is accused of using chemical weapons against civilians.

“If he decides to use our military, he’ll have the greatest military ever backing him up,” Bush said in an appearance on Fox News.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/08/30/as-obama-weighs-syria-s…

“A punitive military response without a U.N. Security Council mandate or broad support from NATO and the Arab League would be illegal under international law and unlikely to alter the course of the war,” he wrote in a statement. “It will only harden existing positions and postpone a sorely needed political process to put an end to the catastrophic violence.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-krauthammer-shamed-into-…

There are risks to any attack. Blowback terror from Syria and its terrorist allies. Threatened retaliation by Iran or Hezbollah on Israel — that could lead to a guns-of-August regional conflagration. Moreover, a mere punitive pinprick after which Assad emerges from the smoke intact and emboldened would demonstrate nothing but U.S. weakness and ineffectiveness.

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Comment: Why I voted do nothing

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/george-f-will-obama-talks-himsel…

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Last August, … [President Obama] startled his staff by offhandedly saying of Syria’s poison gas: “A red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized.”

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If a fourth military intervention is coming, it will not be to decisively alter events, which we cannot do, in a nation vital to U.S. interests, which Syria is not. Rather, its purpose will be to rescue Obama from his words.

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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/08/31/president-obama-says-us-must…

Obama said he would wait for Congress to return from recess; members are not scheduled to return until Sept. 9. Yet the president claimed any military response to Syria is “not time sensitive” and would be effective even one month from now.

The decision to seek congressional authorization is a departure from the administration’s decision to intervene in Libya in 2011. Though the president said he thinks he has the authority to order a military strike, he made clear he will ask Congress to vote on the issue.

“I have decided that the United States should take military action against Syrian regime targets,” the president said. He added: “I’m also mindful that I’m president of the world’s oldest constitutional democracy.”

The administration will now proceed with a series of briefings with lawmakers on Capitol Hill lasting through the weekend, as it tries to build its case for military intervention. Obama indicated he will not wait for either approval from the U.N. Security Council or the conclusion of U.N. inspectors’ investigation into the Syria attack.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/08/31/president-obama-says-us-must…

http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/31/us/obama-authorization-request-text/index…