war but am proud of him for following the constitution and saying the president doesn t have unilateral authority. congress has the authority and he s going to seek it. i read you told this president how you feel about syria. do you think any of these conversations, or point to something, that would have gotten him to the point where he would say, i m going to go to congress first. me and 80% of the public telling all representatives they want congress to vote on this. this is the way it was intended to be. james madison wrote in the federalist papers, the executive of the branch is most froen go to war. therefore, we gave the power to congress. the constitution invested that power in congress to have checks and balances. to slow things down. let emotions die down and a have a significant debate over whether or not they are national security interests, whether it s good for the country. my problem with involving
friends. five destroyers, am amphibious ship in the region for a different reason other than syria but nones les all positioned in the area. what does this tell you what we re capable of or what a strike myself look like? might look like? who knows, harris. more may arrive to thicken our response, but what it says, a ten-day delay isn t going to harm our ability to strike. had fmay degrade our ability to target. those ships are fine. if they have to duck into a for the refuel and reprovision, that s going to go on fine. the striking end of it is fine. the real problem, i think we all have, and particularly people at the pentagon have, is the strike part. what are the what s the enemy doing right now? what will be his response? so far, at least, harris, that s unknown. general, i ll ask you to sis by. the president just sent a letter toening could, we re told.
going. again, ed henry told us at the top of the hour that the working bed deadline we re working with in terms of congress reconvening is september 9th. they could come back early. we haven t seen that since 2005. but it could happen, and we ll talk more about this as the hour goes on, but the president now reaching out in this letter form with his draft legislation of what it would look like. probably enumerating, were e don t know because we don t have the whole text yet, emumerating what exactly he would like to see in terms of the military strike on syria with regard to the chemical weapons use again its citizens. bring back the retired army major general bob scales. fox news military analyst back from the commercial. we appreciate your time, sir. first your thoughts on what s transpired here. well, i think the talk has started. the problem is, congress is not going to be called back early. so the military clock won t start until the 9th. but isn t is interesting that
griffin, thank you very much. we re getting new information from inside syria now, the assad regime and syrian state television claiming victory saying the u.s. will not strike them. there are even reports of a street parties going on in the capital city of damascus. live in the newsroom, leland vittert. reporter: the word stunning probably doesn t go far enough to describe the shock in all the capitals around the middle east when hearing president obama s word, probably the most surprised of all, the syrians themselves. state tv went on, first people were out in the streets interviewing damascus residents who said that no one is going to come attack, and one said, we re not going to be afraid. we want people who are afraid to go to israel. at the same time the syrian deputy prime minister went on television and said in an interview that the americans have lost the battle even before it started. his other words, the american
boehner s office saying he s all for it but not committing to actually supporting him. look at this statement from the republican leadership team, bane rer and some fellow republicans saying, we re glad the president is seeking authorization for any military action in response to syria. substantive questions raised, we expect the house to consider a measure the week of september 9th. this provides the president time to make his case to congress, and the american people. you note they say, consider a measure. not pass a measure. they re not committed to actually authorizing this force. though senior officials here say even if congress votes it down, the president does have the power, they believe, the executive power, to move moerd unilaterally. amp what happened in the british parliament, voted down on capitol hill as well, going to be hard for the president without that support to move forward. well, ed, i look at the calendar and study what you say. they usual buy donly don t do t