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Putin wants US to take use of force off the table - unacceptable. "Putin: No US strikes for #Syria deal" http://www.politico.com/story/2013/09/putin-us-strikes-syria-deal-96559.html?hp=f3 Vladimir Putin: No U.S. strikes for Syria deal - Tal Kopan Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that for the proposed Russian agreement that Syria turn over its chemical weapons to work, the United States must take military action off the table....

Obama is going on a whirlwind media blitz this week in an attempt to sell a very skeptical public on war with Syria. Yet the Washington Post notes: Obama’s top aide says the administration lacks “irrefutable, beyond-a-reasonable-doubt evidence” that skeptical Americans, including lawmakers who will start voting on military action this week, are seeking. Indeed, those who have seen the evidence say that it is incredibly weak. German intelligence also says that Assad didn’t order the attacks. Moreover, President Obama correctly noted in 2007: The President does not have the power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack...

A chemical attack may be launched on Israel by Syrian rebels from government-controlled territories as a "major provocation," multiple sources told RT. The report comes as Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov proposed that Syria puts its chemical weapons arsenal under international control for subsequent destruction in order to prevent a possible military strike against the war-torn country. Moscow also urged Syrian authorities to join the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. The offer has already been passed over to Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem, who met Lavrov in Moscow for talks on Monday. “We don’t know if Syria will...

Rebels including Al-Qaeda-linked fighters gained control of a Christian village northeast of Damascus, Syrian activists and residents said Sunday, but government media provided a dramatically different account of the battle, suggesting regime forces were winning. It was impossible to independently verify the reports from Maaloula, a scenic mountain community known for being one of the few places in the world where residents still speak the ancient Middle Eastern language of Aramaic. The village is on a UNESCO list of tentative world heritage sites. The rebel advance into the area this week was spearheaded by the Nusra Front, exacerbating fears among...

As two dramas about the conflict vie for attention at TIFF, normally outspoken actors and filmmakers on hand for the fest remain conspicuously mum on the subject. The conflict in Syria and the increasing likelihood of Western involvement is occupying hearts and minds at this year’s festival. Still, when it comes to Hollywood voices publicly weighing in on the debate over U.S. intervention in the territory, the silence has been deafening. A number of high-profile Hollywood names on hand for the festival, who’ve been outspoken in the past on U.S. military intervention, have been uncharacteristically quiet on the issue. THR...

He turned the ball over underneath his own basket and now here’s the easy lay-up. Maybe the new White House strategy is to lose so much U.S. credibility through Obama and Kerry sounding like morons that Congress has no choice but to support bombing in order to get some of it back. Proposed White House sales pitch: “Vote yes and we’ll shut up.” Hours earlier, in London, Secretary of State John F. Kerry sketched out a similar transfer-of-control scenario, then dismissed it, after being asked by a reporter whether there was anything that Assad could do to avoid an attack....

As Congress debates whether to authorize a strike on Syria in response to Bashar Assad´s use of chemical weapons, much has been said and written about America´s special role in the world. Simply put, the blessings of prosperity obligate the U.S. to enforce the peace it seeks. There is no nobler duty. If the U.S. is unwilling to use its strength to respond to Assad´s crimes, then the defenseless will continue to be slaughtered in Syria, and America risks having similar atrocities visited upon its citizens. To allow the use of weapons of mass destruction to go unanswered would be...

Last week, Democratic Senators Joe Manchin and Heidi Heitkamp announced their opposition to American military intervention in Syria, and proposed a 45-day ultimatum for Bashar al-Assad to give up his chemical weapons first.  Barack Obama seemed to dismiss that option last week at the G-20 summit, but ABC News reports that John Kerry may have offered it as a way out of the trap Obama has set for himself: America’s top diplomat suggested in a passing remark that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad could avoid a U.S.-led strike if he handed over all his chemical weapons, but the State Department quickly...

WASHINGTON -- In an interview Monday, President Obama responded to a surprising late proposal that could head off a military strike against Syria. The Syrians agreed to a Russian proposal to put their chemical weapons under international control and destroy them. I talked to President Obama about that, and about a threat Syrian dictator Bashar Assad made during an interview with Charlie Rose. SCOTT PELLEY: Can you accept the Russian/Syrian proposal? PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, we don´t know the details of it yet. But I think that it is a potentially positive development. I don´t think that we would´ve gotten to...

Via the Free Beacon, Ed mentioned this already but a foreign-policy soundbite this immortal — maybe the greatest since “leading from behind” — requires video, especially with Assad claiming that his response might not be quite as teeny tiny. Kerry’s Syria pronouncements are aimed at three audiences — the majority of Congress, which worries about mission creep if they greenlight this fiasco; the McCainian hawkish minority, which wants mission creep in the sense that they want more support for the rebels in the name of regime change; and of course Assad and Iran, who need to have the fear...

President Barack Obama’s media blitz began on Monday evening, as he gave interviews to six television networks in which he presented his case on Syria. In his interview with NBC News, Obama called a Russian proposal for Syria to turn over control of its chemical weapons to international monitors in order to avoid a military strike a “potentially positive development” that could represent a “significant breakthrough.” At the same time, he said, he remains skeptical that the Syrian government would follow through on its obligations based on its recent track record. “Between the statements that we saw from the Russians--...

Originally, I planned to include this in the post about the CNN poll, but it deserves a stand-alone post for its insight into the assumptions of the White House strategic plan to deal with Syria.  Ben Rhodes, the deputy national-security adviser to Barack Obama and a public face on the push for military strikes against Bashar al-Assad,tells CNN this morning that military strikes on Assad won’t lead to any retaliation at all, because it’s not in Assad’s interest to answer back for an act of war: Ben Rhodes, White House Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communication & Speechwriting, appeared...

Robert Costa speaking on Larry Kudlow's CNBC show said that The House will not hold on a vote on the Syrian resolution if it fails in The Senate. The House is going to force the Senate vote first on the resolution. Also from NRO, McConnell is leaning 'No'

Sorry for the vanity , but is it possible that the plan all along was to terrorize Assad into handing over control of his chem weapons? With Obama and Putin hatching a scheme? And no, I didn't vote for Obama.

On Monday's CBS This Morning, Charlie Rose cited how Hillary Clinton once referred to Bashar al-Assad as a "reformer", but didn't use the former secretary of state's name in his question to the Syrian despot. When al-Assad asked to specify who had called him a "reformer, " Rose vaguely replied, "People who write about you; people who talk about you; people who analyze Syria and your regime." [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump] The veteran PBS host continued, "Now, they say – their words – a 'butcher' – comparisons to the worst dictators ever to walk on the...

RAF Typhoon fighters won a mid-air showdown with two Syrian warplanes heading towards Britain’s main base in Cyprus, the Sunday People reports. The dramatic confrontation came after President Bashar Al-Assad’s air chiefs sent two Russian-made Sukhoi Su-24s to probe British air defenses, the report said. The Syrian bombers refused to respond to repeated attempts by the control tower at the UK’s Akrotiri air base to contact them. RAF pilots flying the advanced combat jet were scrambled before the Sukhois could enter our 14-mile air exclusion zone. The Typhoons – which can scream from runway standstill to seven miles high in...

Rep. Justin Amash, an outspoken opponent of U.S. intervention in the Syrian civil war, has taken to Twitter to voice his opposition to military intervention. Concurrently, the Michigan Republican warns the American people of misleading claims being made by the Obama administration.Amash noted that he attended a classified briefing in which evidence for the limited attack on Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist dictatorship was presented to legislators who are now debating a war vote. Though Obama administration officials hope to win congressional support, Amash indicated the briefing had the opposite effect on him.Amash also suggested the administration is putting out inconsistent information...

Bild am Sonntag cites high-level German surveillance source suggesting Syrian president was not personally behind attacks President Bashar al-Assad did not personally order last month's chemical weapons attack near Damascus that has triggered calls for US military intervention, and blocked numerous requests from his military commanders to use chemical weapons against regime opponents in recent months, a German newspaper has reported , citing unidentified, high-level national security sources. The intelligence findings were based on phone calls intercepted by a German surveillance ship operated by the BND, the German intelligence service, and deployed off the Syrian coast, Bild am Sonntag said....

Fox confirms Vice President Joe Biden will have dinner Sunday night with a group of GOP Senators who could be swayed on Syria. The topic of conversation is expected to be what the President needs to say in his Tuesday address.

Obama is the second fervently anti-American president we have seen. That was hard to accept for a long time, but after the overthrow of our longtime ally Mubarak in Egypt, after Obama's active support for the Islamofascist Muslim Brotherhood, after the Benghazi arms-smuggling operation to Al Qaida-allied rebels in Syria, and now, after Obama's selective outrage against Syrian poison gas attacks in a civil war where 130,000 Syrians have died -- after all those facts I don't think Obama is running a pro-American policy any more. After all, Obama is running the "apologize for white folks" administration. It's the "American...