Barack Obama’s decision to go crawling to Congress for permission to launch a gratuitous attack on Syria is more than a humiliating climb-down. It could well signal the beginning of the end of the zionist imperial presidency.

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Tension between the executive and legislative branches over the power to declare war had been a long-standing feature of U.S. history. But until recently Congress had prevailed. When President Lyndon Johnson used the fraudulent Gulf of Tonkin incident to justify expanding the U.S. military’s role in the Vietnam War, he still had to have Congress pass the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution—H.J. RES 1145, Aug. 7, 1964—to make it possible.

The right of Congress to declare war is found in Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution. Section 1 states: “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.” Included “herein” is the power to declare war (Section 8).

This is perfectly straightforward, but it was effectively rendered null and void after the Bush-led junta occupied the White House.

Put simply, the junta’s task was this: if it hoped to force the U.S. to commit premeditated violence, torture and domestic repression for Israel’s sake, it had to emasculate Congress’s war-making authority and powers of policy oversight. Capitol Hill had to be turned into Rubber Stamp Hill.

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution

The specific tactic used to make the president the supreme war-making authority was to insist that Art. 2, Sec. 1 of the Constitution trumped Art. 1 Sec. 1: “The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.”

This, of course, has nothing to do with war-making authority, so a connection had to be invented. The point, we were told, is that Congress had a limited grant of power (“Powers herein granted”) whereas there is no qualifier on the term “the executive Power.” Of course, this argument is preposterous—if it were valid, the U.S. would be an elected dictatorship, not a republic because the principle of checks and balances would have no meaning. Yet, this scenario is exactly what the junta needed to accomplish. Nothing—not the Constitution, the courts or Congress—could be allowed to hold the White House accountable for anything it did. To all intents and purpose the rule of law no longer applied because Bush and his handlers had become a law unto themselves. The U.S. was now a dictatorship in all but name.

Now, Obama has implicitly repudiated the founding fascistic feature of the USA PATRIOT Act, by which the U.S. police state was created. The legislature, not the executive, once again has the authority to declare war, and Congress is not likely to give it up again.

There is more reason to be optimistic. The lies and false-flag attacks used to justify the destruction of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya to serve Israel’s grand hegemonic design are no longer even remotely credible. More than 90 percent of Americans do not want the U.S. to attack Syria, especially since the horrific chemical attack on Aug. 21 was committed by the U.S./Israeli/Saudi-backed insurgency. This “Triumvirate of Terrorism” obviously doesn't understand that running the same con on the same audience is a recipe for disaster.

The Isramerican Empire has crested, though how long it will take before it dies is unknown. The Western Roman Empire was bankrupt and on its deathbed for hundreds of years before it mutated into something else. Somehow, I don't think we'll have to wait that long.

(this column is adapted from Chapter 13 of The Host and The Parasite)