She literally says "war" nine times in the statement.

It's better than I feared, but not as good as I hoped. She can't seem to decide if the war itself is wrong or if war without Congressional approval is wrong. She says some good things here, I like that she called out the blatant aggression, but it's mixed with this weak liberal garbage about Congress's authority and the Constitution that undermines her condemnation.

What will she say if there is a vote, and the warmongers that control Congress vote for war?

All while he’s glazing Mamdani for saying…pretty much the same fucking thing?

If you cannot see the difference between Zohran condemning an illegal war of aggression and AOC using the term "combat operations" I recommend Reddit.

She spends the first four paragraphs calling it out as immoral, and at the end includes that it's also illegal. She isn't undermining her point by calling on congress to limit executive authority for military action, the war would still be everything she described it as in the first four paragraphs.

She can't call it an illegal war of aggression without calling it illegal.

I think that's just shotgun argumentation. Say all the reasons something's wrong so that if one doesn't move someone the other might. The problem in the "think of the process" argument is when it becomes the primary argument because it assumes the "don't kill people" one isn't important.

If it's both "war is wrong" and "presidents siezing war powers is wrong" and Congress gives its approval, then that doesn't take away her other criticism. She spends a lot more space taking about why the war is wrong than the process issue, but the process issue is also important because without taking back war powers statements of moral opposition mean nothing.

Does she use the term "illegal war of aggresion"?

I understand most people aren't aware of how politics works but hacks like AOC know how to spam the term "illegal war of aggresion" when it comes to Russia invading Ukraine. But for Israel they spontaneously forget them.

Did she say those exact words in this one statement? No. Has she condemned bombing iran as illegal in the past? yes.

She didn't say the the exact phrase in this release, possibly because what you're demanding was word-for-word already said by Mamdani in his condemnation. She describes it as illegal and repeatedly calls it a war, both in no uncertain terms, and has almost nailed the same phrase in the past the last time this happened.

What the OP means by an "illegal war" and what she means by "This war is unlawful." seems different. The OP is talking about international law: wars of aggression are illegal. AOC seems to only be saying it's unlawful because it lacks Congressional approval.

Yeah whining about the exact words she used while ignoring the substance of the memo is exactly the useless purity test that fucks up any attempt at getting real left politics in government.

She's a politician. War is a definitive term in politics. I don't know how US laws exactly dictate it, but I'd guess it needs to be somehow declared and it has legal consequences and whatever else it includes. However, as there's no congress approval for it then it, by definition, can't be a war. So it's a 'combat operation'. Just like Russia claimed their attack was 'special operation' instead of 'war'.

So, she's, for all intents and purposes, saying that it's illegal war operation, but keeping it politically/legally truthful, which is a pretty big deal on her job.

If Congress gives its approval she's going to need to sharpen her "war is wrong" critique a lot more than this, and that's one thing that would be really good about a War Powers Resolution. It'll force the anti-war voices to stop hiding behind proceduralism like this and to actually make the case against war outside of appealing to the Constitution or whatever.

I'm not seeing this post on Twitter. Maybe I'm not looking through the timeline correctly. Could you link it to me please?

No, that's not how this works at all.

That seems like it's wholly up for interpretation - she calls it unlawful, then after several paragraphs outlining it's fundemental immorality she points out that it's illegal under US law. If you choose to interpret that as her saying it's only illegal under US law I can't stop you, but I think that's a very unfair reading since she lays it out clearly as a war of aggression.

https://x.com/AOC/status/1937525272594595993

You are being insufferable. Cherry picking terms to support your nebulous narrative all so you can feel smug about leftist politicians and redditors. When Trump denies you your vote and ICE picks up your neighbors, who will you "No true Scotsman" then?

I’m permabanned from Reddit, so…

How did you manage that?

Oh the one from the 12 day war. Yeah that doesn't apply anymore.

Say do you think AOC could find bad words to describe Hamas on oct7?

Always just about the poor imperial stormtroopers, not a word about the actual victims of our empire

It's an example of her using the specific language you're criticizing her for not using in reference to the US and Israel attacking Iran. How on earth does that "not apply anymore"? It's literally the exact thing you said she doesn't do.

I didn't criticize her for her word usage during the 12 day war? I criticized her for her word useage NOW.

Politicians know extremely well what their words mean and are very selective in how they use them.

AOC used softball terms here. She didn't even condemn the US-Israeli attack. And the term "combat operations" cmon bruh

It’s really not hard these days.

It's not if you oppose the narratives Reddit wants to push. But you don't seem to do that.

But for Israel they spontaneously forget them.

No you criticized her for her word usage in general, please do not try and present this like I said you were criticizing her for what she said during the 12 day war. She used the same terms used by trump to emphasize what she was responding to - and then repeatedly clarified in the body of the statement what it actually was. That's a completely reasonable choice to make.

I criticized her for her word usage in this post which is her statement on this war. I don't care about a year ago.

Ok.

Does this Scahill bloke just repeat perfectly understandable phrases with a question mark for visibility and plausible deniability?

No. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Scahill

AOC: Always Opining Callously

Does this morphballganon bloke just repeat perfectly understandable phrases with a question mark for visibility and plausible deniability?

You also did that, yes. However in the section I quoted, which I responded to with the above example, you criticized her and those like her for her word usage in general within this context.

We used to call that Talking Hard.

Dude. I'm sorry she's imperfect for your particular criteria. She can still be the best for America's evolution while not being perfect. Maybe the libel of marking someone before their trial date is just a bridge too far; but we all got it from context clues.

I'm actually glad this is the best issue today you could come up with: the amount of hair-splitting is almost a good sign.

Scenario's like these show who will support and initiate imperialist wars when they are in power in the future. For you they are meaningless because you don't understand how politics works.

It's excactly how it works. USA has not been, from their legal point of view, in war since second world war. Their 'special operation' equivalent is (based on a very quick search) 'armed conflict' or 'prolonged period of sustained combat involving U.S. Armed Forces'.

If you insist on the term 'illegal war' the proper legal equivalent would be 'act of war'. In politics correct use of terms at least used to be pretty important, but obviously today, and specially in the USA, that goal has been flushed down the golden toilet multiple times. But that doesn't change the fact that she condemned the attacks while defending their constitution and that fact doesn't change even if you try to twist that to something else.

Yes, but unless she uses the exact words whatever shitposter would, she too is a bad person, and doing nothing but shitposting is justifiable.

The fact that it's up for interpretation actually demonstrates my point, that's what I mean by "she can't seem to decide" and that it's mixed with "weak liberal garbage." This isn't a strong enough statement for me to be satisfied.

Though, like I said, it's better than I feared. European liberals are coming out much more strongly in support of the war.

Saying words confidently doesn't mean you understand how politics works.

Also AOC didn't condemn the attacks at all

Trump proved you can just say shit and there aren't consequences.

Just call it a war. What are they gonna do about it?

She supported coups in Latin America, she's just as imperialist as the rest, so no, not good enough if you see us as people

So much coded language in here.

That and the condescending arrogance of "bombs are not the best way for Iran to accept our form of democracy" stuck out too.

My main concern is that she does not center the Iranian people as a reason to oppose the war. The war is bad to her because it puts US citizens and troops in danger, because it wasn't approved by Congress and so is unlawful, and because US wars don't ever actually create democracy. It's a very US-centric response, and she's a US politician so that makes sense, but we should demand she goes farther and condemns the killing of Iranians and condemns the violation of Iranian sovereignty.

Now is exactly the time when we should be demanding the strongest condemnations from our electeds and not letting them off the hook. It's our job to push our electeds to be better, and part of that means holding them accountable for their public statements.

Thank you for this well written up reply