Sen. Adam Schiff walked straight into a trap on Friday's "Real Time with Bill Maher", and the result exposed the double standard at the heart of Democratic war-powers outrage.
Maher read Schiff a quote about presidential authority to use military force. Schiff called it "totally vague." Then Maher told him it came from Barack Obama's own Justice Department, about Libya.
The exchange was simple and devastating. The New York Post described Maher reading a 2011 Obama administration justification for military force in Libya without identifying it as Obama's. The statement, from the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel, dated April 1, 2011, read:
"The President had the constitutional authority to direct the use of military force in Libya because he could reasonably determine that such use of force was in the national interest."
Schiff didn't hesitate. He dismissed it as "totally vague." Maher asked the California Democrat directly:
"That's too vague for you?"
Then came the punch line. As Breitbart reported, Maher replied:
"Okay. Because that's from Obama about Libya."
The audience got the joke. Schiff had just trashed his own party's legal reasoning, the same kind of executive authority claim Democrats defended for years under Obama.
Caught flat-footed, Schiff tried to pivot. He shifted to Syria, arguing that Obama ultimately declined to strike Bashar al-Assad because he feared losing a congressional vote. Schiff framed that restraint as a virtue:
"Ultimately, he did not go forward with going after [former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad], even though Assad was gassing his own people, because he thought he may lose the vote in Congress."
He added:
"But I respect the fact that, that was important to him, and the fact that he did not have the support of Congress meant that we weren't going to go forward."
That's a generous reading of Obama's Syria debacle. Obama drew a "red line," watched Assad cross it, then punted to Congress when the political cost looked too high. Schiff calls that respect for the process. Others might call it indecision dressed up as principle, from a president who has never been shy about stretching executive authority when it suited him.
Schiff's actual goal on the show was clear. He wanted to attack President Trump over Operation Epic Fury, the joint U.S.-Israeli operation in Iran. Schiff declared:
"We are unquestionably at war now."
He then rattled off a list of grievances, invoking Alexander Hamilton's warning that presidents would grow "too fond of making war" without congressional checks:
"After Venezuela, after the earlier Iran conflict, after bombing Nigeria and Iraq and Syria, [Trump's] grown too fond of this."
Schiff closed with a dramatic appeal:
"And Congress... needs to step up, assert its role, or it's going to be gone for good, and then anytime a president, for any reason, anywhere in the world, for any length of time, will feel free to make war. And that would be hugely dangerous for the country."
Strong words. But they ring hollow from a senator whose party spent the Obama years defending the exact same executive war-powers framework.
Schiff's plea for congressional authority ignores what Congress just did. On Thursday, the House voted narrowly to allow Trump to continue Operation Epic Fury. A bipartisan resolution led by Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., tried to block the president from using the Armed Forces in the Iran operation. It failed, 212 to 219.
Four Democrats crossed the aisle and joined most Republicans to sink it.
The Trump administration and the majority of congressional Republicans have insisted the president acted within his authority. They remain confident he will continue to do so. The legislation, had it passed, would likely have forced the Iran strikes to grind to a halt.
The pattern here is familiar. Democrats champion broad executive power when their president wields it. Then they discover the Constitution's war-powers clause the moment a Republican sits in the Oval Office. Consider the record:
Schiff's own words on Maher's couch confirmed the inconsistency. He dismissed the Obama-era legal rationale as "totally vague", until he learned who wrote it.
Obama may have ruled out a political comeback, but his legal legacy keeps showing up at the worst moments for his allies. Schiff walked into a spotlight meant for Trump and found Obama's shadow standing there instead.
Principles that change depending on who holds power aren't principles at all. They're politics.
