Libya: what the heck are we doing?

President Obama is making his usual mess of things in the Libyan civil war, trying to split differences.  What happened to his willingness to negotiate with anyone as he stated during the 2008 campaign?  He seems to be bouncing between two of his secretaries: Robert Gates at Defense and Hillary Clinton at State. Gates has the dove position and Hillary Clinton has the hawk position with Obama being dragged into the hawk sphere, trying to make amends for former President Bill Clinton's lament that he did not act more decisively to stop genocide in Rwanda in the 1990s.

The Arab League seemed to advocate then equivocate about wanting a no fly zone established in Libya.  So why don't the Arab states just do it?  Why do they need western states, especially the Unites States, to do it for them?  They hate the west, especially the Unites States.

And why are so many in favor of opposing this particular tin horn dictator when there are so many from which to choose?  If this were Mr. fill in the blank tin horn dictator, I doubt that much, if anything, would be said much less done.  But because this tin horn dictator happens to be who he is, entire nations are behaving differently.

And why are U.S. war ships necessary to launch attacks?  Why not launch them from Italy or France or Greece or, better yet, neighboring Egypt?

The United States Air Force is the world's largest.  Second largest: the United States Navy.  What the heck are we doing spending so much money on our military when Europe is spending less each year.  One way to reduce our military spending is to eliminate the Army.  That would not just save enormous amounts of money but preclude us from engaging in mindless WWII type military activities like those conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan for so many years, including the incomprehensively stupid house to house search.  It's not 1944.

NO boots on the ground.  Anywhere.  Certainly not in stupid Libya, which is probably devolving into tribal war.

More fundamentally, Obama should have gotten Congressional approval, as Bush the younger did before attacking Iraq, and not acted unilaterally,  Congressman Dennis Kucinich, U.S. Representative for Ohio's 10th congressional district, has been making the point on TV talk shows that Obama is/may be committing impeachable offenses.  Unfortunately, all Kucinich is doing is talk.  He has taken no formal action.  If we removed a few of these presidents when they do this stuff they'd stop doing this stuff.

Leave Libya to the Libyans, whatever they are.