First, it nowhere says in the Constitution that a declaration of war must contain the words "declare" and "war." So clearly, synonyms and other constructions, at least if they are unambiguous, amount to the same.
The Congress, if it were more pretentious, could say "we approve of belligerency against Iraq." If it wanted to focus more on the personality of Saddam, it could say "we authorize the President to kill Saddam Hussein" -- an act of war that would obviously give casus belli to Saddam's military and other agents, and would require the use of military force. Or it could authorize any other acts of war explicitly, authorizing the President to do whatever was specified. Finally, if we now spoke French (something that would not have seemed out of the question to the framers of the Constitution regarding a point over 200 years in the future), the Congress could authorize "guerre" instead of "war" and the Constitutional requirement would have been just as well meant.
And second, the only way to stop the President from waging an undeclared war is to remove him as Commander in Chief. Judges and Congressmen cannot order troops around. Military command cannot be divided, and by definition it belongs to the Commander in Chief. The way to get a new Commander in Chief is to impeach and convict the President, in this case of improper waging of war. In some circumstances that would be politically feasible (e.g., Bush bombs Toronto), but in this case it is not, precisely because three-fourths of the Congress has explicitly authorized the use of military force against Iraq.
You know-what the hell-I'm a young guy raised on MTV, I went to public school so my education is the best the taxpayer can be gauged for and I read this. I mean I am not an Ivy League professor or anything or the son of a Senator-patrtician -- BUT EVEN I KNOW THAT THE WAR CONGRESS CAN "STOP" A PRESIDENT IS TO WITHDRAW FUNDS FOR THE WAR!!" YOU DO NOT NEED TO REMOVE HIM FROM HIS OFFICE AT ALL!!!!
Secondly, the Republican controlled Congress during the Kosovo war DID!! deny Clinton military authorization-this AFTER Clinton started the shooting war. What did Clinton do? Continued to fight the war in violation of the constitution. Congress then had the opportunity to end the war and was so freaked-so afraid of the power they had so long gladly given up that they -- after denying the President authorization for the Kosovo war-gave the President the funds to carry out the same war they voted him to stop.
It was the last gasp of the republic. The rubber stamp congress is now in session when it comes to foreign affairs..so long as they can fight for their share of the domestic spoils--our empire's version of the imperial bribe.
PS: Used caps because I was to lazy to bold.