Advice for President Obama About the War

Max's advice for February 24, 2009

Dear President Obama,

Max grew up as the son of a man who knew 'ALL' the answers to the problems of the world. Max's father said so! Many times, his father let everyone know that anyone who didn't know that he had the answers was a turkey or a knucklehead.

The famous Ma Bell, the second most powerful force in the world (next to God of course), thought so much of Max's father's opinions, that she made him 'Supervisor of Troubles'. This is true!

The advice Max promised you, President Obama.

Make the war on the Taliban legal!

Max, like many Americans, cannot understand why our government needs to play games that make us look like a second rate power. The idea that the United States is afraid to play by the rules is ridiculous. At least Max hopes it is ridiculous.

President Obama, Max would like to see you go before Congress and ask for a full Declaration of War on the Taliban and its allies.

Such a clear Congressional Declaration of War would remove the ambiguity of the past eight years.

It would make everyone captured on the battlefield a prisoner of war. It would make everyone who was captured off the battlefield legally a spy. There would be no ambiguity. None!

People captured on the battlefield in Afghanistan or fighting illegally in Iraq could all be sent to Afghanistan until the end of hostilities under the Geneva Convention.

The Taliban Government, which was the government that attacked the United States through their ally, Al Queda, is still a government and the terrorists still its ally.

By declaring war, a defensive war at that, we and our military know how to act. There is plenty of experience in military law on dealing both with POWs and with spies. There is also a possibility that war criminals, such as those that decapitated people in Iraq, can be brought to justice.

People who do not reasonably fall under the rules of war or as spies should be set free wherever they are welcome. Indefinite detention should not be practiced by a free society, even one that has seen its freedoms eroded by terrorists and bureaucrats reacting to terrorists.

Getting the United States Congress to declare war specifically on the government responsible for allowing the bombing of the twin towers would give your administration the legal framework to deal with the terrorists, Taliban and suspected terrorists without releasing them on U.S. soil.

By normalizing the war to a true war framework, the courts would be removed from the process, the Taliban could be put on notice to surrender or face extinction and those who work in concert with the terrorists could be put on notice of what their end as spies will look like if found outside the battlefield in Afghanistan.

Sending our troops to fight wars without truly declaring wars is an irrational act of pride. With many people from his family involved in fighting these undeclared or poorly declared wars, Max would like to see your administration arm them with the tools they need to defeat these enemies.

The argument that the Taliban is no longer a government flies in the face of absurdity. The Taliban and Al Queda occupy land as large as many U.S. states. They have houses, camera studios, animals and people under their control. They have their own secure banking facilities and occupy space on the Internet. They are a 21st century government and should be treated as one. They deserve to feel the full force of the United States on their homeland, just as we felt theirs.

Max wishes you well in all your efforts to make sense of bureaucratic mistakes.

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Link one is the Geneva Conventions' guide book.

Link two is how the United States declares war legally.

Link three is the Al Queda declaration of war on the United States in 1996.