Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Convenient Surprise

White House memo ahead of the President's speech tonight--

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 301 of title 3, United States Code, I hereby delegate to the Secretary of State the authority under section 506(a)(1) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 to direct the drawdown of up to $25 million in defense articles and services of the Department of Defense and military education and training to provide immediate military assistance to the Government of Iraq, including the Kurdistan Regional Government, to aid their efforts to combat the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and to make the determinations required under such section to direct such a drawdown.

The relevant clause of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 states "an unforeseen emergency exists which requires immediate military assistance to a foreign country."

The ISIL insurgency in northern Iraq was unforeseen?