In Democratic Doublespeak on Iraq, Tom Engelhardt and Ira Chernus dig up this nugget:
A senior Pentagon officer who has briefed Clinton told NPR commentator Ted Koppel that Clinton expects U.S. troops to be in Iraq when she ends her second term in 2017.
The key portion of Koppel’s NPR commentary (and check out the title: A Duty to Mislead?!?) is the following:
A Duty to Mislead: Politics and the Iraq War
“… I ran into an old source who held a senior position at the Pentagon until his retirement. He occasionally briefs Clinton on the situation in the Gulf. She told him that if she were elected President, and then re-elected four years, she would still expect U.S. troops to be in Iraq at the end of her second term. We’re talking about a shade less than 10 years from now.
I happen to think she’s absolutely right, and what’s more I’m sure there are several other Democratic Presidential candidates who agree with that assessment, that U.S. troops will be in Iraq for another decade, at least, even if every candidate is sounding as though the pullout would be immediate and total. When, oh when is that deadly serious issue ever going to become the topic of an equally serious and candid discussion? When, in other words, will we get the brutal truth, in place of vapid and misleading campaign applause lines?”
All progressives need to read the words of big-time insider Koppel, such revelations are rare! And, I highlighted the text above to emphasize that this diary isn’t about Hillary alone, it’s about the entire Democratic Party establishment. ‘It’ doesn’t want you to know, but it plans to stay in Iraq long-term, despite the fact that 87% (87%!) of Democrats want us out.
If you still don’t get it, read fake befuddled Harry Reid on Iraq troop numbers, and understand what that ‘befuddlement’ means about the Democratic establishment. Or read “the military decides how many” Ike Skelton, and understand what that giveaway of your political power to the military means:
But some Democrats, who won control of Congress in last November’s elections largely on a pledge to bring U.S. troops out of Iraq, admit they assume a sizable number would stay.
“The fact is I don’t know how many troops will be there. I’ve heard anywhere from 20,000 — and now I’ve got, this is the highest number I’ve heard — to 70,000,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, when asked about troop strength if a Senate withdrawal plan was enacted.
On Wednesday, House of Representatives Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton, a Missouri Democrat, was asked how many troops would be left behind if his legislation to bring combat troops out of Iraq by April 1 was enacted.
“I think it would be wrong for me to spell out the exact number of troops,” Skelton told reporters. “I leave that as a military decision … because I am not a general, nor am I the secretary of defense.”
So, if the Democratic establishment sounds to you like it bows and scrapes to the military, if its Presidential candidates sound like they want to patrol the world rooting out `evil’ wherever they find it, in other words if it smells neoconservative that’s because it is.
It’s just WRONG to think the Democrats — when and if they win the presidency — will reject (of their own free will, without us pushing them) neo-conservatism. Nope, instead they’ll continue and advance the neo-conservative Middle East chaos crusade.
Reason: because that’s where the money is, baby! Two of America’s super-heavyweight and richest lobbies are all out in favor of neo-conservative Middle East crusading. Actually, I had a comment on this ‘why’ a couple days ago:
Obviously the people don’t have power to do this:
As we select a new face to govern America, we must also choose a leader who is able to reevaluate America’s approach to foreign affairs and establish a new doctrine of policies which can carry us forward, repairing the damage from our mistakes and building a strong foundation for our relationships with nations around the globe.
The reason: our foreign policy is under the vice-grip control of the military-industrial complex and the Israel Lobby.
So, the questions that need to be asked are:
How do we escape from that control?
How do we nominate a candidate whose foreign policy represents the interests of the American people and not the interests of those two entities?
When will political analysts speak truth about the power those two entities have over our political system and its main Presidential candidates?
Now, why have the military-industrial complex and the Israel Lobby embraced neoconservatism? Hell, I don’t know, but I’d guess a huge military, when the `natural’ need for its services has declined (since the Cold War), needs to go out and create the chaos and instability that appears to call for a huge military. And I would guess the Israel Lobby is similarly influenced by Israel’s own military-industrial complex. But who knows why, really, the job for the people of the United States is to cut if not destroy the influence of these two massively wealthy lobbies on our two political parties.
To sum up, as of right now the 2008 Dem-Repub face off looks like it will be a bust as far as the issues that matter most to most of us, especially our death-dealing approach to Iraq and the Middle East. As I (more or less) commented a couple days ago:
Here’s the way it looks right now [should the Democrats take power in 2008]:
There is not enough support for ending the occupation in Iraq to matter.There is not enough support for universal health care to matter.
There is not enough support for leashing an out of control President to matter.
There is not enough support for restoring habeas corpus to matter.
There is more than enough support for a massive military attack on Iran to matter. [for another example of Democrats’ craven neoconservatism, see their recent support for Sen. Lieberman’s 97-0 ‘acts of war’ resolution on Iran]
I hope things change among [the ‘Beltway Democrats’ and] the Democratic Party’s presidential nominees in the next half year before the primaries. But they won’t change if all of us supposed progressives keep chanting, “I’ll vote for whoever the Dems nominate no matter what.” That’s what got us pro-occupation John Kerry in 2004.
What ‘no matter what’ support for the 2008 Democratic Presidential candidate may get us is a President who favors world super-cop neoconservative imperialism, which includes long-term Iraq occupation, cold or hot war with Iran, and the military running the U.S. treasury dry so that cut backs for the rest of us become ‘necessary’.
So, for a start, how about we refuse to support any Democratic Presidential candidate who won’t say the following:
We must remove ALL of our troops. There should be no residual US forces left in Iraq.
That was Bill Richardson. You could also lend your support to Dennis Kucinich or Mike Gravel.
