Quote Originally Posted by OCDshaver View Post
Really gugi? I think I can follow logic just fine thank you. Apparently you are intent on ignoring my statements on national interest and would rather inject my personal distaste.
I just didn't think it is necessary to direct you to the first paragraphs of the founding document of the USA: Declaration of Independence - Text Transcript

Obama's argument so far is that the people of Syria have been abused by their government, so USA as the oldest modern representative democracy has a duty to intervene and failure to do so is a betrayal of its very founding principle.
I don't see how you can not assign top national interest to that, given the proclivity this country has to big words, even though in most cases its actions appear to be driven by money and power.

Do you expect Obama or any other politician instead of populistic rhetoric to offer as justification the ugly realpolitik calculations and the special interests and money behind the scenes?

No, Syria does not present direct thread to US soil, virtually nobody does. But leaving Assad's defiance to US go unpunished (if it was really him who used the chemical weapons), insures his victory in the current civil war, as well as strengthens Russia, Iran, Hizbollah, etc.. It would also accelerate the crossing of the next 'red line', Iran's nuclear weapons. That's not a direct thread to US either, but nuclear Iran vastly diminishes the strength of US. For better or worse the US policy is to maintain position of dominance and conduct its business from there. Any undermining of this position is against the US interests.
Is this the type of argument (and I made it as general as possible to minimize the ugliness, but the more specific you get the more cynical it is) you expect a president to make in justifying a war?

May be the world would be much better off with US having half of its current economic power and a tenth of its military power, but US does not think this would be in its national interest.