<<It's not a bad thing to declare war.
However, on whom are we going to do it,
exactly?>>
In contrast to several other democratic nations, the
US Constitution doesn't grant the executive
"emergency powers" in times of national crisis; this,
coupled with investing in the Senate of treaty
ratification and the more recent War Powers Act, puts a
considerable brake on the Executive's role as head of foreign
policy. A declaration of war would, to an extent,
circumvent this, giving the President, and by extension the
military and intelligence communities, considerably
greater freedom of action and freedom from review than
they currently have. The extent to which these powers
might go has never really been tested.
Edmund