Rep. Scholten’s recent statement further demonstrates her hypocrisy on US foreign policy matters

Last Thursday, Rep. Hillary Scholten posted the following message on her Facebook page:

While I’m relieved a larger catastrophe was avoided last night, President Trump’s erratic rhetoric and unpredictable actions are exactly why Congress must take back its constitutional authority over war decisions. A two-week ceasefire is not enough. Costs are sky high and the lives of 13 American services members have been lost, with so many more put at risk. I’m once again calling on my Republican Colleagues to support a War Powers Resolution and give the American people their power back over this reckless war.

There is a great deal to unpack with this statement, but I’ll focus on just a few things. First, I want to address the issue of Congress and its constitutional authority over war decisions. Rep. Scholten is pointing out a procedural matter  regarding the need to have Congressional approval in order for the US to go to war. Congress passed the War Powers Resolution in 1973, so gaining Congressional approval is a relatively new thing, but the reality is that the US Congress has rarely ever voted to approve war or other forms of direct US military intervention in another country. Therefore, Rep. Scholten can get off her high horse about Congressional approval and do something concrete to resist the US military’s assault on Iran.

Second, Rep. Scholten tries to show some defiance by saying that a two week ceasefire isn’t enough. Again, these are just platitudes with no concrete demonstration that she or any member of Congress is willing to actually resist the US assault on Iran.

Third, Scholten then refers to the lives of 13 American services members have been lost. Of course this is tragic, but why doesn’t Rep. Scholten mention the number of Iranian civilians who have been killed because of US military bombing in Iran? According to the U.S.-based rights group HRANA said 3,636 Iranian people have been killed since the war erupted. It said 1,701 of those were civilians, including at least 254 children. Here Scholten uses what Ed Herman used to refer to as worthy and unworthy victims, with US military members as worthy and Iranians as unworthy.

Fourth, for Rep. Scholten to call on her Republican colleagues to support a War Powers Resolution is just stupid. Of course they won’t, since they have demonstrated repeatedly that they endorse whatever the Trump Administration is doing. Instead of wasting time appealing to GOP members of Congress, Rep. Scholten should be supporting many of the national groups that are opposing the US assault on Iran, like Code Pink, plus should should have spent time in Grand Rapids last week when Congress wasn’t in session to meet with her constituents to find out what they think about the US war on Iran and how that is taking money away from working class families.

Fifth, when Rep. Scholten says that getting Congress to support a War Powers

Resolution that it would give the American people their power back, does she naively believe this to be true? Congress choosing to support a War Powers Resolution will not give any of us our power back, since the US electoral system is not even remotely design to give the people power. If Rep. Scholten – or anyone else for that matter – believes that voting for candidates that have already been vetted by members of political parties who have the most power and candidates that are already compromised by campaign contributions is equal to giving the public power then they are delusional.

Besides these five talking points Rep. Hillary Scholten is nothing more than a hypocrite. Scholten has consistently voted for the annual US military budget, which is just shy of a trillion dollars. Rep. Scholten unconditionally supported the Biden Administration’s military policies in the Ukraine and Israel’s genocidal campaign against the Palestinians.

Rep. Scholten has also been completely silent about Israel’s genocide under the Trump Administration, along with Israel’s bombing of Lebanon, primarily because she is bought and paid for by the Israeli lobby. To the degree that she is critical of what the Trump Administration is doing to Iran is because it is an anti-Trump position and not an anti-war position, since Scholten has already made it clear that she believes that Iran is a terrorist state.