Oh no, here we go again, Dkos’s Markos and mainstream internet guy Dems have the hots for a ‘man in a uniform’. This time it’s fatigues-wearing Texas State Senator and Border Patrol (and former Afghanistan) Lieutenant Colonel Rick Noriega, who kos manages to describe as a “people-powered” candidate for John Cornyn’s Senate seat.
Don’t you love a lieutenant colonel defending America’s puppet government in Afghanistan?
In 2006 it was man’s man former Republican and Secretary of the Navy Jim Webb. …
Who has turned out, surprise surprise, pretty damn Republican-ite on many things, including human rights like habeas corpus.** The other man’s man kos l-o-v-e-d last year was Jon Tester, the equal to Jim Webb in disregard for basic human rights.
Anyway, as a Democrat who wants _all_ (that doesn’t mean leaving 70-80,000 behind) our troops _home_ (not redeployed in Kuwait and Afghanistan) _now_ (not in 9 months or 12 months or 4 more f%#king years), I’m not excited by either Watts or Noriega. Because their positions on Iraq seem to suck.
Here’s what little we know of Noriega’s position on Iraq (emphasis added):
Noriega said he would like the United States to follow the December recommendations of the Iraq Study Group on getting troops out of Iraq. “The war is the critical issue,” he said, adding in Spanish: “We have to stop the war.”
But the Iraq Study Group wouldn’t stop the occupation (or ‘war’):
Despite the breathless hype, the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group report did not include any dramatic new ideas for ending the war in Iraq. In fact, it did not include a call to end the war at all. Rather, the report’s recommendations focus on transforming the U.S. occupation of Iraq into a long-term, sustainable, off-the-front-page occupation with a lower rate of U.S. casualties.
And the Iraq Study Group misunderstands the key fact of the occupation, that the Iraqis don’t want us in Iraq:
…its authors … share one great misconception with Mr Bush and Mr Blair. This is about the acceptability of any foreign troops in Iraq. Supposedly US combat troops will be withdrawn and redeployed as a stiffening or reinforcement to Iraqi military units.
Mikal Watts, Noriega’s main Democratic opponent for Cornyn’s seat, is also minimalist and hard to pin down on Iraq. But his position is not much different from Noriega’s, as far as anyone can tell:
Watts took aim at Mr. Cornyn as a Bush loyalist in “an ill-conceived and mismanaged war in Iraq,” saying American troops should be withdrawn. But later, on his plane, he was ambivalent about setting a timetable.
Here’s more of our man in uniform (no we’re not under martial law, he’s swearing in to the Texas House). Kos really thinks this one will turn you on:
Hey guys, let’s ask more from Democratic candidates than that they be he-men, as ‘proved’ by their combat duds.
** The Senate bill that Tester and Webb have not signed onto, sponsored by Senators Leahy and Specter, would axe the following provision of the Military Commissions Act:
No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.
Also at http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=17877
