House speaker: Why Is Bam Against Syria Sanctions?

Despite the ongoing bloodshed in Syria, President Obama opposes a bipartisan move in Congress to impose new sanctions against Bashar alAssad’s regime, and House Speaker Paul Ryan can’t understand why. Writing on his official Web site, Ryan says the White House claims these “tougher measures designed to isolate the Assad regime for its war crimes” would be ineffective, because they’re unilateral. But according to Ryan, “rejecting new sanctions because the administration would need to build international support for them is the definition of leading from behind.” In fact, he says, Team Obama “opposed this bill to provide space for its ceasefire to play out,” only to see it fail “within a week.”