heat off the president in terms of having to get out of libya right away and on his plan drawndown in afghanistan? it does take heat off the president. a democratic president trying to wind down the war and not be criticized by uniformly by republicans for doing this. he can t be called a weak leader at this point. you know, depending op what happens on the ground. he gets a lot of cover. chris: next up, the friday lightning round including the czar amendment. we ll be right back.
funding for offensive u.s. military operations in libya. the pam, hayes of stand stand. jerk new york times, syndicated columnist charles krauthammer. the house had mixed messages to refusing to authorize military funding and operation. what is the take-away? we are basically status quo andy. the president can take assurance that he didn t have it stopped. he didn t have the funding cut off from under him. not a lot of bipartisan enthusiasm for libya. he hasn t spent the time building the case for the american involvement there.
and operationmly no articulation of ends. there is a pretense that deposing gaddafi is not the objective. obviously it is. otherwise you have endless civil war. means, obama introduces an idea of america leading from behind. gets us in a war. immediately withdraws. we pay for most of the operation. provide infrastructure. you get in a war and you lead or don t get in it at all. chris: having said, that do republicans risbek one of strengths they have had since ronald reagan has been strong on national security and strong on defense. do they risk losing that with all the muddled me sames that jeff talked about going out not only in the building behind me but also on the presidential campaign trail? the short answer to the question is yes. i would say that libya is an
exception. take libya and set it aside. because of the reasons that charles is pointing out. the white house would object to him saying war of whim. they would object to whim. but they formally object to war. they don t think it s a war, they don t think it s hostility. to libya is different. you have seen less i think the republican fleeing on afghanistan for instance. you have seen huntsman and romney trying to vit both ways. house of representatives, you have most republicans rhetorically supporting the president on afghanistan. think think if they felt if he was up for following the war and you would see the robust support for the war in afghanistan. i am not sure we have seen a hinge moment some subject. chris: let me quickly with you to finish up, does the splits within the republican party on libya, on afghanistan, does that take
if you think international intervention was justified or worth doing a fair number of republicans did, it s harder every step along the way for the republicans in particular to support the president when he is not coming to them or making the case. chris: jeff, one of the resolutions today, the one to cut off funding for offenseive operations introduced by the republican leadership. when you look at what is going on in congress and the 2012 presidential field where is the republican party on foreign policy right now? it s all the map. first time years after 9/11 this is happening. for the disagreements with what the president is doing, for the uncertainty about libya, there is still a big resistance to cut off funding. that does not play well.