Despite Obama’s Claims, War Vote Delay Is a Defeat

President Claims to Support Delay After the Fact

After a solid week of defeats on the Syrian War, President Obama is doing some dramatic revisionism in an attempt to portray the situation, as it presently exists, as his carefully orchestrated victory as opposed to the rebuke that it was.

Trying to figure out where the president stands on the chemical weapons disarmament deal is virtually impossible at this point, since every new speech changes it markedly, but the president is clear in his “calls” for the Congressional delay of the war vote.

Calls ends up in irony quotes here because he only started advocating the delay a day after the Senate had already announced that it was taking the vote off the schedule indefinitely, and nearly a week after it became apparent that he was going to lose the House vote.

Opposition to the Syrian War has been so broad and so decisive that Congress dares not agree to the war, and the Senate has simply shelved the bill instead of forcing its hawkish leadership to face an embarrassing defeat. The House hasn’t delayed officially yet but is clearly headed for the same defeat, only even more dramatic.

The administration continues to push the idea of Congress authorizing war and it’s clear that’s their ideal. Since it’s not going to happen, they’re now tasked with trying to portray not getting the vote at all as their idea.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.