In a move predicted earlier this week by members of Congress, President Trump has declared a “national emergency” for the sole reason of circumventing Congressional restrictions on arms sales, and using it to rush shipments of arms to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Under the Arms Export Control Act, Congress is supposed to get a 30 day
notice ahead of any sales, and can then block shipments. Concerns about
war crimes in Yemen mean Saudi arms would be likely to face some effort
to block them.
But the law has a loophole in it, which allows the president to declare
an “emergency” of any sort he wants, with no oversight on that
declaration, and then send the arms over without Congressional
notification.
This is a notoriously cheap way to circumvent Congress on arms exports,
but several Senators said they expected Trump to make such a move as
soon as next week. It appears he decided to get out in front of that
move with a declaration on Friday going into the holiday weekend.
Officially, the “national emergency” is tensions with Iran, though
several in Congress have pointed out that the US has had nonstop
tensions with Iran for decades, and that’s not a reason to suddenly
declare a new emergency.
You guys! You guys! There is a really big emergency in the Middle East. Thousands of innocent people are dying in Yemen and if we don’t act fast, the Saudis won’t have enough ammo to kill the rest! Come on now, lets dig deep, cross partisan lines, evaporate what’s left of democracy in this country and share the milk of human violence…. What do you say? We can all be villains. Just for one day.
Country Joe and the Fish.
“And it’s one two three what are we fighting for…. ”
For those that remember….
Our man is amoral, immoral and certifiable nuts.
He loves creating fake emergencies. That immigrant caravan approaching the southern border was one, remember that? He authorized use of the armed services to operate inside the country as a publicity stunt.
Anyone still think this big sparkly distraction with a bad comb-over is still a peace President? It takes no moral backbone whatsoever to oppose what SA is doing in Yemen. However, when you worship the almighty Dollar above all else, this is what you get.
Whenever Trump can’t get his way it is a national emergency. He can’t help it. He was raised that way. Papa Trump probably hired 24-7 childcare to make sure Baby Donnie never slept in a wet diaper. And the help were probably undocumented.immigrants Never thought I’d see a President more narcissistic than Bill Clinton.
We have lots of national emergencies going on, including millions of Americans without reliable or affordable access to preventative health care. Defending the lives of the American people is something the government is supposed to care a lot about, and be willing to spend real money on. Then there’s the national emergency that the US govt is constantly bullying and killing people around the world, severely increasing our risk of terrorist attacks. No example is clearer than this latest blind support for the Saudi regime.
Kushner working on a bonus from his bro, clown prince.
“Saudi Arabia, I like the Saudis,” Trump said at a July 2015 rally. “I make a lot of money with them. They buy all sorts of my stuff. All kinds of toys from Trump. They pay me millions and hundred of millions.”
Actually it’s a real emergency. Lockheed and Boeing said so.