Syria has utterly confounded the Washington political establishment, from the White House to the Capitol. There's no script for what's been happening. The usual political polarization, the simple calculus of R vs. D, has disintegrated into a tangle of uncomfortable alliances.
President Barack Obama has sought congressional approval for military strikes against the Syrian regime for allegedly using chemical weapons, and that requires him to harvest support from anywhere and everywhere on the political spectrum — even on the fringes. He could use an "aye," for example, from Arizona Rep. Trent Franks. But here's Franks, in a subterranean corridor, emerging Monday from a briefing on Syria: "It just seems that everything the president touches in foreign policy, he injects it with chaos and death."
So he's not an Obama fan. But he also abhors the Syrian regime. Franks said he's "undeclared" on how he'll vote. Undecided? No, just undeclared. He wouldn't even confirm that he's made up his mind.