Timothy P. Carney:
President Obama, who invaded Libya in 2011 without even asking for congressional approval, took the occasion on Tuesday — in his final 45 days in office — to lecture Washington about constitutional and democratic conduct of war.
“It is important for us to know what it is we are doing, and to have to explain what we are doing to the public,” Obama said at MacDill Air Force base Tuesday afternoon. Obama in March 2011 announced the U.S. intervention in Libya by radio address, over the weekend, from overseas.
“If a threat is serious enough to require the sacrifice of our men and women in uniform, then members of Congress should at least have the courage to make clear where they stand … by fulfilling their constitutional duty to authorize the use of force against the threats we face today.”
Again, Obama never asked Congress for authorization to invade Libya.
Libya wasn’t the only war Obama waged without asking Congress first. Throughout his presidency, Obama waged a drone war in Pakistan and Yemen. He claimed authority for this war by citing the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), Congress passed in the days after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, authorizing President Bush’s regime change in Afghanistan.
Obama on Tuesday also said that the U.S. should avoid intervening in foreign countries’ internal affairs, and when the intervention could leave things worse than we found them.