John Yoo, the former Bush Administration lawyer who famously wrote the unprecedented memos legally justifying torture,, apparently isn’t happy that some Republicans, bending to Tea Party pressure, are looking to curb executive authority on matters of war:
“House Republicans are abandoning their party’s longstanding position that the Constitution allows the executive to use force abroad, subject to Congress’s control over funding,” Yoo wrote in an op-ed piece in The Wall Street Journal. “Sadly, they’ve fallen victim to the siren song of short-term political gain against a president who continues to stumble in national-security matters.”
Yoo slammed House Speaker John Boehner, who this week sent a letter to the White House declaring the Libyan action will violate the 1973 War Powers Resolution if it is not completed by Friday, for abandoning principles he declared during the Bush era that the president can execute military engagements without congressional approval.
Yoo also criticized the seven Republican congressmen who joined with a lawsuit filed Wednesday by the antiwar Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), who sought to stop U.S. military operations in Libya on constitutional grounds. [Politico]
