Now that the mission in Libya is creeping away from humanitarian protection and toward arming an insurgency, this might be a good time for Congress to get involved. I know it’s quaint, but they do have war powers, last time I checked my Constitution. Bob Gates succeeded in getting a delay in any war powers resolution on Libya by Senate Democrats until after a briefing today with him and Hillary Clinton. But after that, Harry Reid said, “if in fact you want to do more legislatively, you’re entitled to do it…. The War Powers Act we believe is valid, is very clear, setting forth timelines.” It’s also clear that the President can only invoke force prior to a war powers resolution in the presence of an imminent threat, which Gates admitted was not the case in Libya.

In the House, where the White House doesn’t have the same kind of sway, Republicans are already introducing a bill to defund the Libyan operation, going further than a war powers resolution. Rep. Tim Johnson is the lead sponsor of the RECLAIM Act.

Liveblogging of the Senate Banking Committee hearing on foreclosure fraud continues. Senator Richard Shelby was actually pretty good, but then Sens. Mike Johanns and Bob Bennett went to some length to try to pretend the banksters weren’t doing what they were doing.

This hearing is the latest example of national policymakers getting involved in the foreclosure fraud issue. The Congressional Oversight Panel warning of the enormous risk from the failures of servicers was the first report of its kind at the federal level to take full measure of the situation, and this is the first Congressional hearing. Senators on the Democratic side like Jeff Merkley and Sherrod Brown are sure to press the bank representatives aggressively on why foreclosure mitigation programs have failed, and why they used false documents to evict people from their homes. The ranking member on the Republican side, Richard Shelby, wants to investigate failures at the major loan servicers.