Despite a deluge of calls, letters, and e-mails, which Capital Hill staffers admitted ran overwhelmingly against the ludicrously-named “Resolution Authorizing the President to Use Force, if Necessary, to End the Threat to World Peace from Saddam Hussein’s Weapons of Mass Destruction,” Congress extended to George II the authority to make unlimited and preemptive war against another nation that has neither attacked us nor shown the ability or inclination to do so.
The resolution was deemed necessary on several grounds.
- Iraq possesses and is developing weapons of mass destruction - an unquestioned if Orwellian phrase that makes no qualitative distinction between a hundred pounds of spoiled hamburger and a 50 megaton bomb.
- Iraq has flouted a number of U.N. resolutions and international accords regarding such weapons, many of which the United States has also ignored or abrogated.
- A member of Al-Queda is thought to have visited Iraq.
- Iraq has shown a willingness to use military force in the Middle East, again, not unlike ourselves.
- Saddam Hussein is a real son-of-a-bitch who is easier to find than Osama bin Laden.