Uh the US Constitution lays it out pretty directly;

Section. 8.
Clause 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States......



Clause 11: To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;


The Bush Administration violated this by making up their own rules for treating their so-called "detainees".

And a majority of members of both houses of congress violated this basic provision when they approved the resolution "giving" that power to the pResident.

Just because "the congress says so" in no way overrules the Constitution, those resolutions giving the power to use military force against anyone who has not declared war against us are plainly un-constitutional and ILLEGAL.

 

haha, well, now we're on to detainees too. It's tough for you to stick to one point, apparently, but okay, we'll talk about that too.

First of all, "because congress says so" is EXACTLY what the constitution says when it gives the power to declare war to the Congress. What do you think that means, that congress has the power to declare war?

I'll tell you: It means when congress passes a resolution authorizing the president to send troops, then the president has the authority to execute that law. That kind of law is specifically authorized by the constitution. If Congress couldn't give the Commander in Chief the power to send troops, then how the hell would anyone ever act on the war powers clause?

Here's a more clear restatement: What you seem to me to be saying is that Congress somehow relinquished its power to declare war to Bush. That's not true. Legally, what Congress did is under the war powers clause more than enough to authorize Bush to prosecute a war. There's no requirement of a "We declare war" resolution the day before the fighting starts; just passing a resolution that gives the president the authority to go (and he doesn't even need that for every kind of act) is easily within the war powers clause. They know this over on capitol hill of course, which is why it's so silly to see them claim they didn't vote for a war. Voting to authorize the president to send troops is one of the most clearly constitutional ways to permit a war.

Now, for the detainees: That was ruled unconstitutional, but it was by no means a clear cut violation of the law. The reason the prisoners were at guantanamo is because location of the person matters to the law here. Also, remember the term "enemy combatant"? That's not a POW or a foreign citizen. There's a hugely complex (and brilliant) legal strategy behind the Guantanamo detention case designed specifically to COMPLY with the laws for dealing with POW's and foreign nationals in times of war. So I suggest you read up on that before you go knocking down what took years and thousands of pages to finally declare in a limited measure illegal.

 

Here you go, psoper...

BTW Congress = Senate & The House

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/proj...randtreaty.htm

nice try, but you missed on this point psoper..... <--- sound familiar?