A reader writes:
In recent weeks, you have (correctly, I think) praised Pres. Obama for abandoning the Bush unitary executive approach–both in his recognition that Congress, a co-equal branch of government, has a major role to play in health care and in his recognition that the executive branch must follow the law.
How, then, to explain your denunciation of not the substance of the McCain/Lieberman remarks–but their appropriateness? First you quoted from an Israeli reader wondering "I was under the impression that foreign policy was formed in the White House, not congress." Then you scoffed that "Lieberman and McCain have stated that they, rather than the president, determine American foreign policy toward Israel and Iran."
We should welcome Congress returning to its more aggressive role in foreign policy, rather than the rubber-stamp approach it took during too much of the Bush administration. It seems that you welcome a return to constitutional norms except regarding policy toward Israel, where a more robust Congress is going to make a more pro-Israel policy more likely. Criticism of Lieberman and McCain should be directed toward their hypocrisy, not their (correct) view that Congress should have a major role to play in foreign policy.
Nuh-huh. I understand that the Senate does have a role to play in foreign policy. And if McCain and Lieberman want to tie the president's hands they have a constitutional capacity to do so; if they want to block any possible sanctions, they can do so. What I object to is a direct undercutting of the president's negotiation and bargaining posture with a foreign government – in that foreign country – while the president is still attempting a diplomatic maneuver. If a Democratic Senator had, for example, gone to Paris in the run-up to the Iraq War and declared that he supported the position of the government of France in those delicate days, I have no doubt what would have been said.
But, as my reader said, it's Israel. The exception that proves every other rule in US foreign policy.
The Dish 