Donald Trump Gets Rare Bipartisan Backing for Syria Strike

WASHINGTON—For the first time since his inauguration, Donald Trump is being treated like a conventional president.

.. “In the short run, this will clearly benefit him politically,” said Karl Rove, the top political aide to President George W. Bush. “It will cause people to look at him differently, and it will cause our adversaries to see us differently.”

.. Democrats who have stridently opposed Mr. Trump’s agenda praised the airstrikes.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York called it “the right thing to do.” Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California called the military response “a limited, and I think an important strike, and it accomplished its purpose and sent a message.”

 .. Large numbers of Republicans have reversed their position on congressional approval for Syrian airstrikes since then-President Barack Obama weighed attacking the country in 2013.At the time, Republicans such as then-House Speaker John Boehner  insisted Mr. Obama lay out a fuller plan for action in Syria before launching airstrikes after the Assad regime carried out a suspected chemical attack in Damascus. Scores of Republicans said they would oppose an authorization for the use of military force. No vote was taken.

.. Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch also praised Mr. Trump’s action, though in 2013 he said he had “strong reservations” about authorizing force against Syria.

.. Mr. Rove said Mr. Trump would lose any newfound political goodwill if he didn’t articulate his foreign-policy philosophy “within days.”

.. “He told us he would be the president of America, not ‘the world,’ ” Ann Coulter wrote on Twitter.

.. Sen. Rand Paul (R., Ky.) said the airstrikes are “illegal, and they’re unconstitutional.” Rep. Barbara Lee (D., Calif.), the lone member of Congress to vote against the post-9/11 authorization to use force against Afghanistan, said the airstrikes represent “a dangerous military escalation into the Syrian civil war and are without legal justification.”

.. “It makes people question: If a photo of an incident that has occurred in another nation causes the president to drop 50 or more cruise missiles, is that a real well thought-out strategy, or is this an emotional reaction?”

Still against Intervention in Syria

Trump’s act of war is in violation of the Constitution, which requires congressional authorization for such an offensive use of military force, provoked by no aggression against our nation.

.. Bashar al-Assad’s continuation in power, dismal as that prospect may be, is in no way the worst conceivable outcome for American national security.

.. If the United States has not been attacked or threatened, congressional approval should be sought, not merely for legal purposes but also to ensure that complexities have been thought through and public support for a risky intervention has been won. Here, quite apart from the want of American legal footing, Trump lacks even the fig leaf of international legitimacy

.. count me out of the virtue-preening that obsesses over the type of monstrous weapons employed when the issue is the monster using the weapons — of any kind. Both Assad and his opposition jihadists regularly commit atrocious war crimes targeting civilians. It is not beneath Assad, his enablers, or his enemies — al-Qaeda, ISIS, and their fellow militant Islamists, all of whom seek and would use weapons of mass destruction — to enter a village and firebomb or shoot up several dozen civilians (including women, children, and “beautiful babies”) with conventional arms. That is a commonplace

.. The barbarism characteristic of Syria’s years-long civil war is not materially different because chemical weapons have been used

.. There is no American interest is deposing Assad if he would be replaced by

(a) a Sunni sharia-supremacist regime that is more likely than Assad to make Syria a platform for jihadist attacks against our homeland and interests or

(b) a Libyan-style failed state that has the same effect.

.. the principal American enemy pulling Assad’s strings is Iran

.. Until we have a strategy for both vanquishing the Sunni jihadists and choking the regime in Tehran

.. accommodations had been made with Russia — particularly in sharing air space — in order to promote U.S.-led coalition attacks against ISIS. Last night’s missile strike against the Syrian air base puts an end to those accommodations. Is the Assad attack worth it if it makes the ISIS campaign more difficult?

.. Proportionality means that a use of force, and the collateral damage it is sure to entail, should be reasonably related to the military value of a lawful objective. It does not mean that an unauthorized, unprovoked attack is legitimate as long as it’s not too big.

.. what are we going to say when Putin cites last night’s strike as justification for his own unilateral but “proportional” attacks in Eastern Europe?

Trump’s Syria Attack and Our Abject Media

it is when he orders the use of force that his judgment needs to be questioned more than ever. One reason that the U.S. can so easily and frequently resort to the use of force overseas is that the people that should be the first to question a president’s decision are instead among the first to cheer and celebrate it.

.. Zakaria’s statement is ridiculous, but unfortunately reflects a common assumption about what being the president means. For Zakaria and quite a few others, a willingness to deal out death and destruction to other parts of the world is what makes someone seem “presidential.” Worse still, they are most inclined to defer to the president when he is using (or abusing) military power, so that they are at their most credulous and indulgent when the president is at his most dangerous. That is all the more worrisome when we remember how obsessed this president is with how he is portrayed in the media, since it will probably encourage him to order other hasty attacks in the hopes of receiving more adoring coverage.