As we noted yesterday, Glenn Beck is now demanding President Obama’s impeachment because, Beck claims, Obama has waived prohibitions contained in the Arms Export Control Act so that he can supposedly supply weapons to al Qaeda in Syria.
It is nonsense, of course, since what is really happening is that the US is simply providing “non-lethal” equipment to “experts monitoring the removal and destruction of chemical weapons under an agreement reached by the United States and Russia,” as the White House explained yesterday:
Today, the President signed a Presidential Determination exercising his authority to waive certain restrictions under the Arms Export Control Act. This action will allow the U.S. Government to provide or license, where appropriate, certain non-lethal assistance inside or related to Syria. This includes: 1) chemical weapons-related personal protective equipment to international organizations, including the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, for the conduct of their operations; 2) chemical weapons-related life-saving assistance for organizations implementing Department of State or U.S. Agency for International Development programs to strengthen local Syrian health care providers’ ability to prepare for and respond to any use of chemical weapons; and 3) defensive chemical weapons-related training and personal protective equipment to select vetted members of the Syrian opposition, including the Supreme Military Council, to protect against the use of chemical weapons. This action is part of longstanding and ongoing efforts to provide life-saving chemical weapons-related assistance to people in need in Syria.
But Beck doesn’t care that his entire premise is wrong or that he doesn’t even understand the applicable law, as he spent a good portion of last night’s programming accusing Obama of treason because he “goes around Congress and goes around the laws by waiving a federal regarding let’s not arm any known terrorists”:
Beck has a staff of hundreds, but apparently nobody has access to Google because, if they did, they could look up the law for themselves and discover that Section 40(g) gives the President the power to waive certain prohibitions provided that he keeps Congress informed:
The President may waive the prohibitions contained in this section with respect to a specific transaction if (1) the President determines that the transaction is essential to the national security interests of the United States; and (2) not less than 15 days prior to the proposed transaction, the President
—(A) consults with the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives and the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate; and (B) submits to the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate a report containing
—(i) the name of any country involved in the proposed transaction, the identity of any recipient of the items to be provided pursuant to the proposed transaction, and the anticipated use of those items; (ii) a description of the munitions items involved in the proposed transaction (including their market value) and the actual sale price at each step in the transaction (or if the items are transferred by other than sale, the manner in which they will be provided); (iii) the reasons why the proposed transaction is essential to the national security interests of the United States and the justification for such proposed transaction; (iv) the date on which the proposed transaction is expected to occur; and (v) the name of every United States Government department, agency, or other entity involved in the proposed transaction, every foreign government involved in the proposed transaction, and every private party with significant participation in the proposed transaction.
President Obama is not going around Congress or ignoring the law; he is, in fact, doing exactly the opposite.
And for doing exactly what the law allows and requires, Glenn Beck is demanding Obama’s impeachment.
