President Polbama
It began when James K Polk surreptitiously launched a war against Mexico for territorial expansion with the assumption that once US Military troops were there, Congress would acquiesce, not wanting to come out against the troops. The opponents were thus easily marginalized, with one Congressman — Abraham Lincoln — given the nickname “Spotty Lincoln” for his impassioned floor speeches.
This, I guess you can say, was a dramatic turn-around from President Madison, who had to be pulled by Congress kicking and screaming into War with Britain. President Van Buren later would be the ultimate appeaser, resisting the fanatical Mainers in their clamor for war with Canada.
The nickname “Spotty Lincoln” has stuck with Abe always, and today tourists at Mount Rushmore can be seen gazing at Lincoln’s visage with awed reverence, intoning, “There he is. Spotty Lincoln!”
Obama and Libya, and the creative parsings to evade the definition of “war” as against the “War Powers” Act, for some reason has skipped over the Polk Precedent on the matter. But, again, this would authorize something in the lines of “war”, which goes against the grain for a Nobel Peace Prize winner. I do not know if “Police Action Powers” Act would serve Obama better. There is something here in the way that Bush Administration officials offered up the War on Terror as one “without borders”, and later Obama’s nationalist opponents reference him as being “post American” and oh so International.
The current clamor will die down when Obama submits to the will of Congress in their demand to ascent to the deference of the Presidency and “Commander in Chief”. In the end, we will have at our disposal several vote tallies to decipher — to spot out the meaning of the “Tea Party” as portioned out by “Ron Paul isolationists” and “Sarah Palin Nationalists”, with a free floating “Democrat in the White House Bad” in the mix. The last I watched a Tea Party rally wasn’t a good sign — the creeping “War Protest Protest” vibe of the Bush Administration Era’s “Rally for the Republic” was sweeping through– and this against a sublimated period for war protests. (Partisan Hackery, ain’t it?)
I did watch as the usual small Friday contingent of protesters marched downtown, during Fleet Week, and had an “ugh” moment in watching someone try to give a sailor a pamphlet.
The question: Who is the Spotty Lincoln of Today?