My name is Lois Herr, and I am a Democrat running for Congress in Pennsylvania’s 16th District. Born and raised in Lancaster County, PA., I am a 10th generation descendent of Hans Herr, who emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1711 for religious freedom (see our website for more background). When we win I will become the first woman ever elected to Congress from this district, and the first Democrat. I will also have succeeded in ridding the Congress of Representative Joe Pitts, a 5-term GOP incumbent (who is breaking an old vow not to serve more than five terms) and blind supporter of President Bush and his policies. Pitts votes with President Bush 91% of the time, and he votes the GOP party line 97% of the time. Pitts has rubber-stamped the Patriot Act, illegal wiretapping of American citizens, and the President’s use of signing statements to evade his responsibility to enforce laws passed by Congress. He has offered unflinching support for the war in Iraq, and has consistently voted for a ballooning federal deficit. As head of the GOP Values Action Team and Congressional point man in the war against contraception, Pitts’ mission is to write into law a particular brand of morality, displacing conscience and the Church with the State as arbiter of religious belief in this country.
Pennsylvania’s 16th District is changing. Five Democrats swept five Republicans out of office in Lancaster City elections last November, decisively defeating a two-term incumbent Mayor in the process. And this past May, Democrat Andy Dinniman easily won a State Senate special election in the 19th Senate District, which had never before elected a Democrat, and where registered Republicans out-number registerd Democrats by a nearly two-to-one margin (the 19th Senate District lies within the sixteenth Congressional District). The desire for change will make this the year for a Democrat to represent the sixteenth district in Congress.
I am determined to bring the Bush Administration and its enablers to account, and I challenge my opponent in this race to accept the League of Women Voters’ invitation to debate (a challenge he has thus far ignored). I have a strong and varied background in business, agriculture, education, and public service. I have been endorsed by, among others, the AFL-CIO, Communications Workers of America, the National Education Association, N.O.W., Planned Parenthood, National Women’s Political Caucus, Women’s Campaign Fund, Greater Reading PAC, Governor Ed Rendell, Senate candidate Bob Casey Jr. and former Senate candidate Chuck Pennacchio, Democracy for Lancaster, and other DFA affiliates. Below is my position paper outlining where I stand on the war in Iraq.
TIME TO FACE THE TRUTH ABOUT IRAQ
By Lois Herr, Democratic candidate for Congress in the Sixteenth District of Pennsylvania.
The War in Iraq has cost Pennsylvanians dearly in blood and money. At least 126 of our men and women in uniform have lost their lives so far, and unknown numbers have been wounded physically and damaged psychologically. The Department of Defense has been spending our tax dollars at the rate of $6.4 billion per month on Iraq operations at a time of record federal deficits. Yet the current representative, ultraconservative Joseph R. Pitts, continues to vocally support “staying the course” in Iraq; voting recently for a bill promoting “continued resolve” there.
I have a different view. I believe the time has come to face the truth about where we are. No partisan rhetoric, no rose-tinted glasses, and no spin.
As the nation now knows, this White House did not plan effectively for the post-invasion aftermath. In fact, President Bush and his advisers did very little war planning at all. Instead, they cherry-picked intelligence, undermined the work of U.N. weapons inspectors, misled the nation about Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction, and stiff-armed our allies in a headlong rush to war. In doing so, they diverted the nation’s resources from our true enemy al Qaeda, and created a breeding ground for terrorists where none existed before.
Today, our military is stretched to the breaking point, caught in a complicated conflict between insurgents, militias, and Iraqi security forces. And despite the best intentions and valiant work of our armed forces, our presence in Iraq is creating deep suspicion and resentment toward America. (Even General Brent Scowcroft, the national security advisor to President George H. W. Bush, has said that the Iraq war is “feeding” terrorism.) Most Iraqis want us to leave, and most Americans want to bring our soldiers home.
It is time to bring them home. We must change our policy and change our course. With a top-level commitment to bring our troops home, the logistics can be worked out very quickly by our quite capable military leaders, and experienced and respected diplomats can once again be charged with the rightful task of international negotiation. Withdrawing from Iraq involves the complicated task of bringing personnel home safely and recovering weapons and materials. It would be irresponsible and financially foolish for us to allow our weapons to fall into the wrong hands.
While America must remove its military presence from Iraq, we still have a responsibility to aid the Iraqi people not just for their own future but also to avoid destabilizing the entire region and threatening our own national security interests. We must work with the international community to assist Iraq’s newly formed government in ensuring that all the major parties–Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds–feel well represented, to refocus on providing training and technical assistance to Iraq’s newly-forming ministries, and to seek international aid for reconstruction efforts.
Making progress requires that our leaders put aside partisan attacks and face the facts. America has made great sacrifices in the past three years. Now to honor those sacrifices most fully, we must acknowledge that our men and women in uniform have done their job. It is time for them to come home and for a redirected policy to take effect for the future of our country and for the future of Iraq.
Please visit my web site, and please consider contributing to my campaign. Together we can make it happen.
Not only does Joe Pitts rubber stamp most of Bush’s agenda, including “staying the course” in Iraq, he is the point person in congress for a movement to ban contraception. It’s time for Joe to go! We need this capable, hard working woman to replace Joe and bring sanity back to our country and our politics.
Lois Herr would be an great Democratic candidate running against any opponent. What makes the PA-16 race so important are two things: 1) Voter anger this year gives Lois an even better chance of scoring a big upset, and 2) Joe Pitts is SO BAD that he has to go.
‘Pancake Joe’ Pitts has for years operated under the radar of many political observers, but when you scratch beneath the surface of his inoffensive exterior what you find is a radical Republican in the mold of a Rick Santorum: truly awful.
The awfulness of Joe Pitts caught the attention of The Liberal Doomsayer (a patriotic Pennsylvanian who doesn’t even live in PA-16!) and Doomsy’s written a few excellent blogs detailing Pitts’, shall we say, ‘shortcomings.’
If you’re not familiar with ‘The Pitts of Congress,’ please check out the following by Doomsy:
http://liberaldoomsayer.blogspot.com/2006/08/make-herr-yours-in-us-pa-district-16.html
http://liberaldoomsayer.blogspot.com/2006/09/you-cant-run-and-hide-joe.html
http://liberaldoomsayer.blogspot.com/2006/05/where-rubber-meets-road.html
A real Democrat can take back PA-16 this year!!
Please help Lois Herr in any way you can.
Lois will make a wonderful congresswoman. Can I come to the victory party, Lois?! Go Lois! Go Lois!
All readers: You can make a big impression to this admin, and any remaining office holding republicans after November seventh. Let them know your done with their law breaking, and you want to try and fix the damage they’ve caused. Lois is on our side,not the side of big corps and big money donors.
The powers is in your hands, we the voters are the boss, including the Commander and Thief’s. Vote for Lois Herr, she will be the first democrat to hold this seat since James Buchanan. The very first woman ever. If you don’t think that electing Lois Herr a democrat to a republicans strong hold seat since the civil war, wow they will be shocked. They’ll be shocked and will be lucky cause we have our self’s a great new congresswoman.
Buchanan actually ran for and won the Congressional seat as a Federal Republican, so Lois will be the very first Democrat ever.
by Children’s defense fund. In a conservative area that makes a big, superficial anyway, show about caring for children, I think Lois should make known Pitts “ZERO” score given to him by the Children’s defense fund. See story and listings at the following site.
I met Lois in January of 2004 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where we were knocking doors together in support of Howard Dean’s presidential run, so I can tell you she’s no Jonny-Come-Lately antiwar piler-on type. No, she walked the frozen ground of Iowa for Dean back when a lot of Dems were too timid to challenge the gung-ho groupthink of the Neocon Crusade. Later, when Dean told us that just voting only gets you a “C” in citizenship, she took it to heart and ran for Congress.
I lived in Lancaster County for 18 years, in both urban and rural areas, and saw how every two years the Democrats would coax someone into volunteering for the role of Sacrificial Lamb in the very heart of Pennsylvania’s Republican “T”. Lois is not one of those. She’s a serious candidate backed by a committed corps of Democratic activists, with a respectable and very genuine Lancaster County heritage and manner, yet at the same time a true progressive. If she can get her message out to the voters, she can win. But, since the local media is obstinately oblivious, that means money. Please throw some bucks her way if you possibly can.
It means a heck of a lot to me.