President Barack Obama said Saturday that though the American military is ready to strike Syrian targets, he’ first wants Congress to debate and vote on the mission.
“We should have this debate, because the issues are too big for business as usual,” he said in a statement from the White House Rose Garden.
Obama has faced growing skepticism from American people and little support from Congress.
But most members have stopped short of outright opposition; they want more information and they want a say.
The president was resolute that he has the authority—and the case—to strike.
He cited the evidence laid out Friday by Secretary of State John Kerry, and talked about “hospitals overflowing with victims terrible images of the dead. Alll told well over 1,000 people were murdered. Several hundred of them were children.”
“This attack is an assault on human dignity. It also presents a serious danger to our national security. It risks making a mockery on the global prohibition on the use of chemical weapons,” the president said.
He now wants consent from Congress, and urged it to put aside partisan differences. “Ultimately this is not about who occupies this office at any given time, it’s about who we are as a country,” Obama said.
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
At Truthout, we are reaffirming our commitments on this front: We won’t run ads or have a paywall because we believe that everyone should have access to information, and that access should exist without barriers and free of distractions from craven corporate interests. We recognize the implications for democracy when information-seekers click a link only to find the article trapped behind a paywall or buried on a page with dozens of invasive ads. The laws of capitalism dictate an unending increase in monetization, and much of the media simply follows those laws. Truthout and many of our peers are dedicating ourselves to following other paths – a commitment which feels vital in a moment when corporations are evermore overtly embedded in government.
Over 80 percent of Truthout‘s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and the remaining 20 percent comes from a handful of social justice-oriented foundations. Over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors, many of whom give because they want to help us keep Truthout barrier-free for everyone.
You can help by giving today. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger gift, Truthout only works with your support.