Chad Blair: Is Sen. Hirono Our Stateswoman on Syria?

Most of Hawaii's representatives in Washington, D.C., moved quickly to proclaim where they stood on a U.S. strike on Syria.

U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz got out front on the issue. Soon after President Obama called for a military strike, Schatz called for sanctions against Syria but never explicitly backed a military strike. More recently, he decided that he actually opposed another American military intervention.

CORRECTION An earlier version of this story said Schatz suggested that he embraced Obama's call for a strike, but as Civil Beat reported earlier Schatz never explicitly backed a military strike, and he did say Congress should be involved in any decision to go to war.

Our two U.S. representatives, Colleen Hanabusa and Tulsi Gabbard, came across as more decisive soon after when they concluded that they did not support taking the fight to Bashar al-Assad for his force’s alleged use of banned chemical weapons.

But given that there hadn’t been a deep national debate on the issue (and there still hasn't), it makes me wonder: What if they are wrong?

That leads us to U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono, who is still mulling the right thing to do. The eldest and longest-serving member of the Hawaii delegation said — after the president's national address Tuesday evening — that she wants to continue assessing the complex situation before coming to a conclusion.

Read the entire piece here: http://www.civilbeat.com/posts/2013/09/12/19881-chad-blair-is-sen-hirono-our-stateswoman-on-syria/