should there be some retribution? should there be some payment, if you will, some consequence, for doing this? well, i think we must act in this limited strike. i don t think that it is a correct way of doing it. i think he maids on get authorization for it. but he has boxed himself in by saying this is a red line. assad can not cross it. he s crossed it. the united states says he has crossed it. we still have a u.n. team that evaluated the evidence and samples they collected in syria. now, if we were to have a debate in congress and if we were to have a vote and i would be convinced this is the right action to take, i would be willing to support the president. just like i supported president bush even though all of these pokes, when they were senators, they bashed president bush to no end. i understand that. we have an important role to play. i understand the politics part of it. i understand looking back on what they said before. as i said, ambassador bolton, we
couldn t stop criticizing the go-it-alone president bush strategy. when all the facts were to the contrary. just suppose this with what president obama is doing. he is going it all alone. who is with us? had just said they will support it. we don t have any indication france will get involved. i very few allies are willing to get involved. this window of opportunity is taking action is getting shorter and shorter. we should go back to congress, we should have this open debate and he needs to make the mess waj to the american people, he hasn t sold the message to the american people. he hasn t convinced congress and he has brought us together in a bipartisan way to oppose this unilateral action against syria. congresswoman, we are 26 minutes past the time the white house said that president is going to come out. you are against this action. what about the use of chemical weapons by al assad?
white house, for this president, to get allies onboard. for all the criticism that the coalition of the took before iraq in 2002, 2003, this is not large coalition so far. no. it is interesting because so many of the opponents of the iraq war sniffed about george w. bush s coalition of the started out when looking at had in terms of fox news sunday, 30 countries. that s a u.n. compared to what going on. britain is now officially out. the only country in nato that says they may take military action is france. which is interesting because they opposed our military actions in iran. turkey has talked about at least support. the arab league talked about support but not military action. i can think of only one country, france, that spoke about putting
when i talked to senior officials, they say they are con suggesting congress but they are not getting congress approval. that s a big different frens what the president said he would do when he was a candidate in 2007-2008. let s remember the vice president joe biden, running for president, and in 2007 he was at a new hampshire campaign event where he said as senate foreign relations committee chairman at the time, then president bush moved forward with an attack on iran, try to prevent them from getting nuclear weapons and did without congressional approval, joe biden said he would personally lead impeachment charges against then president bush. we see a much different situation going on now. where they are moving forward without congressional approval. you are right. there is pressure. it is not just john cornyn who is significant. not just a rank and file, a leader, the whip, behind mitch mcconnell, the leader, number one. have you democrats as well. joe manchin of west virginia ca
weapons where its rhetoric is. coalition of willing of george w. bush looks strong now in comparison to this. germany speaking out against this. you have all of the european nato countries opposed to it. i doubt seriously that the u.n. work is going to change any of that. turkey is a nato ally and wants us to do something significant. it should be pointed out, however, has not been backing the secular movement of the syrian army. they have been voting most of the aid coming in militarily and humanitarian, most radical elements and people forget it was once a close ally of morsi and cairo is very much widely regarded inside of turkey. among the seculars as a radical muslim. so he is not really on our side. he is just opposed to assad. can i pick up one other point about the u.n. that ollie was talking about. the u.n. will come up at some point with this report on the what they found on the ground.