“President Obama to Congress: “So sue me.”
The comment follows House Speaker John Boehner’s threat last week to sue Obama over his alleged abuse of executive power in sending sending military advisers to Iraq and pledging to unilaterally act on immigration reform. Republicans have been furious about the president’s reliance on executive actions to bypass Congress, which Obama has countered by saying, “If Congress will not do their job, at least we can do ours.”
New York Times correspondent C.J. Chivers reports that morale, not numbers, is responsible for the swift fall of the Iraqi military: “What was sometimes labeled cowardice or treason in the rank and file was often nothing of the sort, members of the border forces said in interviews in recent days. [Soldiers] insisted that they were eager to fight but were undermined by high commanders who failed to provide border forces with water and food, causing the brigade to abandon positions in the searing desert heat.”
The discovery of the body came about an hour after Palestinians said an Arab teenager had been forced into a car in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina. Palestinian leaders have held Israel responsible, while Israeli leaders are calling for restraint until the facts became clearer in an effort to calm the charged atmosphere.
