is quickly coming in to President Barack Obama’s announcement that he will ask Congress to authorize a limited military action in Syria — a call he made with arguing that ignoring Syria’s brutal ignoring of international law and norms on the use of chemical weapons could set a dangerous precedent as the world heads further into the 21st century.

Here’s his full statement:

A cross section of the reaction:
—Christopher Dickey, The Daily Beast:

President Barack Obama stood firm against Syria today, but backed away from the logic of war. It’s a neat ploy that might just avert what seemed a stampede toward disaster.

Sure, Obama made the case for attacking Syria to punish the criminal regime there for the use of chemical weapons, and he said he’d decided he should do just that. But he also said he’d seek a vote of approval from Congress, which isn’t likely to be back in session until September 9. While Washington pundits say that’s a roll of the dice, it’s really a kicking of the can. In one of the more revealing lines he uttered in the Rose Garden today, Obama said the kind of attacks he’s got in mind could wait days, weeks, even a month and be just as effective.

A look at the calendar shows that several critical opportunities for politics and diplomacy, and perhaps even the development of a more coherent strategy present themselves in coming days. Obama will be meeting with the leaders of the 20 richest and most powerful countries in the world in Russia this coming week. On September 17, the United Nations General Assembly convenes.

The threat of military action – vague as it is, limited as it is – will focus the attention of all these critical forums. In the meantime, the UN weapons inspectors, who’ve just made their exit (one is tempted to say escape) from Syria will present the results of their investigation. Even if they don’t point the finger officially at the Assad regime, it will be understood that they’ve confirmed its guilt.

–-The Washington Post’s Max Fisher offers three points. In a nutshell:

1. It’s good politics
Colleague Neil Irwin describes the move as a “bold — and risky — gambit” to force Congress to “put up or shut up.” Legislators can no longer simply critique Obama from the sidelines and must now play a role in the decision-making process, which by the way is so terrifyingly difficult that BuzzFeed’s Ben Smith says it could deepen the ideological wedge within the Republican party. It inoculates the White House a bit and alleviates what has been a politically unwinnable problem.

2. It’s good, maybe great, for the U.S. Constitution
A problem that critics often describe as “the imperial presidency ” – the enormous growth, since September 2001, of the executive branch’s ability to unilaterally conduct foreign policy and pursue aggressive national security policies – just took a big symbolic blow. Obama, by deferring to Congress even though he probably doesn’t have to, may have just undercut some of those “imperial presidency” practices – which he himself had previously used extensively, for example with drone campaigns and with the 2011 strikes on Libya.

3. Not great news for Syria
This detail is telling: According to the Associated Press, Obama had decided to launch strikes without congressional approval. But he changed his mind at the last moment and said he wanted to get Congress’ support – overruling every single one of his top national security advisors, who apparently counseled against it.

Go to the link to read it in its entirety.

The two crucial parts of his announcement just now:

1) No rush about doing whatever needs to be done with Syria. This is a punitive rather than a preventive action, which should be undertaken with deliberation and — if and when it happens — by surprise.

2) Recognizing the higher wisdom — for himself, for the country, for the world — of taking this to the Congress.

This is the kind of deliberation, and deliberateness, plus finding ways to get out of a (self-created) corner, that has characterized the best of his decisions. It is a very welcome change, and surprise, from what leaks had implied over the past two weeks.

—The New York Times:

The president’s announcement effectively dared Congress to either stand by him or, as he put it, allow President Bashar al-Assad of Syria to get away with murdering children. By asking lawmakers to weigh in, he is trying to break out of his box of isolation of the last week, in the face of deep skepticism at home and around the world about the strike. His decision indicates he does not want to go forward without Congress and the American public.

But it represents a major political gamble for a president with marginal command of Congress. Officials said he is likely to win support in the Senate, where leading Republicans quickly issued statements welcoming his decision, but the House is more of an open question given its strong current of antiwar sentiment in both parties.

The decision also means that the period of vacillation before a strike will extend until after Mr. Obama travels to St. Petersburg, Russia, for a summit meeting of the Group of 20 nations, a session that now seems certain to be dominated by the question of what to do about Syria.

President Vladimir V. Putin, the host of the meeting, has not only effectively blocked United Nations action, but on Saturday he suggested the American intelligence blaming Mr. Assad’s government for the chemical attack was based on a ruse.

Opponents of military action hoped the extra time would give them a chance to stop another American intervention in a region that has entangled the country at great cost for a dozen years since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Supporters of a military strike worried that stretching out the decision process would make Mr. Obama look like he blinked and undercut American credibility.

—Ann Althouse:

Besieged on all sides, he made the right move. He’s asking Congress, obviously because he wants to be told “no,” but this way he’ll be able to blame Congress for any bad consequences or accusations of such.

…Hastily organized… Congress out of town… Cameron just got out of having to participate by getting his “no” from the legislature… sending Kerry out yesterday to test the reaction was a total bomb. It’s kind of a little obvious, and he didn’t really have another good move, but I’m going to celebrate the occasion with a Nicely played, Mr. Obama.

President Barack Obama’s abrupt decision to hand over the choice to strike Syria to Congress may or may not wind up dislodging President Bashar al Assad from Damascus — but the American leader has already struck a rare and dramatic blow against his own power.

Presidents for decades have ignored the Constitutional requirement that Congress authorize acts of war, launching attacks from Kosovo to Libya without authorization. Presidents Bush and Obama took a 2001 authorization of the use of force against terrorists as a carte blanche for a global secret war from Rome to Pakistan; the last formal authorization came in 2003, for Iraq. And Obama — the president who spent the summer defending the vast surveillance power of the National Security Agency — had shown no particular inclination to give up presidential authority.

But Saturday’s announcement redefines the playing field over national security, delivering, six years late, on a promise he made during his presidential campaign, and more broadly on the vision of the presidency that he was elected by an anti-war Democratic Party to install.

“The president does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation,” candidate Obama told he Boston Globe in 2007.

The politics of Washington’s great institutions — the presidency; the congress; the courts — do not always align with partisan politics, and Congressional leaders had no choice but to celebrate the president’s surprise move.

— A predictable reaction from Peter King:

President Obama is abdicating his responsibility as commander in chief by seeking authorization from Congress to attack Syria, Rep. Peter King said Saturday.

In a scathing statement that differed sharply from the reaction of House GOP leaders, King said Obama was making a mistake that would undermine future presidents.

“President Obama is abdicating his responsibility as commander-in-chief and undermining the authority of future presidents,” said King, a former Homeland Security Committee chairman who has flirted with running for president in 2016.

“The president does not need Congress to authorize a strike on Syria. If Assad’s use of chemical weapons against civilians deserves a military response, and I believe it does, and if the president is seeking congressional approval, then he should call Congress back into a special session at the earliest date,” King said.

“The president doesn’t need 535 Members of Congress to enforce his own redline,” he concluded.

—Hot Air’s Ed Morrissey:

The change is certainly abrupt, but hardly surprising. When the UK’s David Cameron was forced to withdraw from the coalition, that left Obama politically exposed both at home and abroad. With only France enthusiastic about taking part in military action, it became a lot more important for Obama to get a vote of confidence at home. Plus, Obama’s rhetoric against George W. Bush during the 2007-8 presidential campaign made his hypocrisy on executive power painfully obvious, with even his own party insisting that he needed to get a Congressional blessing first.

That creates more headaches for Obama, however. First, Congress isn’t back until September 9th [see update below], which means this will take a couple of weeks to accomplish — if it can be accomplished at all. Capitol Hill might be inclined to defer to the executive, but only a handful of House and Senate members are enthusiastic about striking Syria, even after more than a week of beating the war drums. The opposition to another engagement will be fierce, and so far the White House has given a very ambiguous and diffident picture about the goals of a military action and the ability to contain the consequences afterward. On the other hand, this point from NPR’s Frank James will be on the minds of Capitol Hill denizens, too

–-The Jawa Report:

I just listened to President Obama’s speech which took place moments ago in which he laid out the case for war with Syria. He then went on to claim that he had the authority to go to war with Syria without Congressional approval, but that he would seek that approval nevertheless …. after they get back into session.

You’d think a war resolution would be something to call Congress back into session over now. Nah, it might interfere with his golf game.

So, I’m glad the guy who once claimed that President’s must go to Congress for war authorization is actually going to do that. Reluctantly? Sure. But in the end it’s what you do that matters more than what you think.

What do you say the odds are that the Republicans in Congress will actually stand up to this guy? I’m going with 3-1 against.

—Israel Matzav:

President Obama has passed the buck to Congress, announcing that he will seek Congressional approval for an attack on Syria…I guess that he’s determined to degrade the power of the US Presidency too as part of his term in office.

—The Volokh Conspiracy:

In previous posts, I have argued that congressional approval is constitutionally required for anything more than an extremely small attack. In addition, congressional authorization would strengthen the political support for any intervention, and thereby increase the chances of success. So I very much welcome Obama’s decision to seek congressional authorization. This wise decision stands in sharp contrast with the administration’s approach to the Libya intervention in 2011, where Obama violated both the Constitution and the 1973 War Powers Act by failing to secure congressional authorization.

If Obama fails to get congressional authorization, that might damage US credibility. Obama would then have to retreat from his threat that the use of chemical weapons by Assad crosses e a “red line” that would result in military retaliation. But, as Charles Krauthammer suggests, such a setback would be less harmful than a small-scale strike that fails to achieve any real benefit because it is not enough to deter Assad from future atrocities or accomplish any other worthwhile goal.

Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham are calling for a much larger intervention that would ” shift the balance of power on the battlefield against Assad and his forces.” Unlike the president’s proposed “shot across the bow,” this approach at least has a clear objective that might potentially be achieved. But I am not convinced that shifting the balance of power in favor of the Syrian rebels is actually likely to benefit either the United States or the people of Syria. At this point, the rebels are dominated by radical Islamists. If they prevail, the resulting regime could easily be just as brutal and anti-American as Assad. Perhaps there is a politically realistic way to inflict real damage on Assad’s government without thereby helping radical Islamist rebels seize control of the country. But, so far, I don’t see it.

In light of this difficult dilemma, additional public and congressional debate could have useful policy benefits, as well as legal ones.

Barack Obama has taken a potentially huge political gamble by putting the decision over whether to attack Syria in the hands of Congress.

Republican and Democratic leaders may be expected to back the president’s call for military action, but support among lawmakers, who have become increasingly restive in recent months, is by no means guaranteed.

With a vote not scheduled to take place until the week beginning 9 September, when members return from recess, Obama faces days of intense political debate over the evidence of a chemical weapons attack perpetrated by the Syrian government and the rationale for military strikes with limited international support.

In a sign of the looming battle, the Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, both hawks who have urged strikes on Syria, said they would use the vote to push for a more significant intervention than that proposed by Obama, who said that it should be “limited in duration and scope”.

“We cannot in good conscience support isolated military strikes in Syria that are not part of an overall strategy that can change the momentum on the battlefield, achieve the president’s stated goal of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s removal from power, and bring an end to this conflict, which is a growing threat to our national security interests,” they said in a statement.

Democrats control the Senate, but Obama could face the toughest battle in the Republican-dominated House of Representatives, which is opposing the president on a range of issues from healthcare to immigration reform.

JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief

Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.

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