Congress needs to do heavy lifting

There are no easy answers in the Middle East.
Sometimes, it seems there are no answers at all.
But certainly there are no easy ones.
President Obama knows that, and Congress is learning that as well.
The president’s decision to seek congressional authority for military strikes in Syria in the wake of the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons struck many political observers this weekend as a surprise.
It shouldn’t have.
This is a president who — despite the overheated rhetoric from his opponents — tries to find the middle way. He tends toward caution.
This is a president who — again, despite the Internet-fueled diatribes — is a scholar of the Constitution. He’s aware of precedent, and he’s aware of those times his predecessors have exceeded their legitimate authority.
And, finally, this is a president who understands politics. He knows if 80 percent of the American public believes he should take intervention in Syria to Congress, he’d be wise to follow the public’s advice.
Immediate reaction to that decision in the Middle East has been predictable.
The president has been labeled as “weak” by both the Assad regime and the Syrian rebels. That may be, in fact, the only thing they agree upon at the moment.
But in agreeing, they both demonstrate their ignorance of the democratic process. And they misjudge the United States of America.
This is, after all, a representative democracy, a republic. Its structure is inclined toward debate and deliberation.
Ideas are chewed on for some time. And the president’s decision to seek congressional approval is a part of that rich tradition.
Far from being a weakness, that’s our strength.
We talk things over. There is no all-powerful head of state who simply says, “Make it so.” We argue about these things.
And rather than suggest President Obama has erred in seeking congressional approval before initiating military action, we’d say a good case can be built that his predecessors in the White House would have been wise to do the same. That’s true for both Republicans and Democrats over the past 50 years.
There’s also a clear political advantage to the president in his approach.
He’s made this a “put up or shut up” moment for Congress.
Critics on both sides of the aisle love to engage in hindsight and sideline criticism. It’s easy and comes with no price.
But now there is a price.
There will be an issue, there will be a debate and there will be a vote.
And, politically, those votes will be on record.
Sideline critics (both Republican and Democrat) in Congress who have found it easy to shoot their mouths off are going to find out how hard it is to make an actual decision, a particularly tough decision over policy in a part of the world where there are no easy answers.
They ran for the job. It’s about time they had to do some heavy lifting. — J.R.[[In-content Ad]]