http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/52290/?page=1
While the Democrats caved on setting a timetable to end Bush’s murder of our military in Iraq and of our capability to defend ourselves against real terrorist threats, the Republicans are floating trial balloons on a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. They are doing this, not out of any concern for our troops but for their own asses in the 2008 election. What is so pathetic for the spineless Democratic leadership is the fact that when timetables are adopted, the Republicans will take credit for it. The Republicans depend on a citizenry with the attention span of a 4 year old and a spineless Democratic leadership.
Jim Hightower’s article in AlterNet is an already constructed spine for Nancy and Harry. We, the democratic base and the American people, may have to shove this spine up their ass to get them to actually have a spine, but this is a good start.
Hightower’s piece called Can You Believe This War is Still Going On? is long but well worth the effort. Maybe Pelosi and Reid can each have an intern read it. Here’s a few points to remember.
- This is Bush’s War
- He lied us into his war.
- He has continually demonstrated that he is incompetent to win this war.
And how has this made our country worse off? Hightower says this way better than I.
Asked in January 2003 what the price tag was for the Bushites’ upcoming Iraq attack and occupation, Donny Rumsfeld said that the budget office forecast “a number that’s something under $50 billion.”
Not quite right. Iraq is now costing us $6 billion a month (the surge will be extra), and total direct costs through this year will top $500 billion. Included in that is $12 billion that was airlifted in 2003 to the interim Iraqi government in shrinkwrapped stacks of $100 bills (the load weighed 363 tons) and promptly disappeared. Poof…gone!
Add in such indirect costs as veterans’ long-term health care and replacement of the military hardware consumed by the war, and the tab runs to $1.2 trillion or more. David Leonhardt, a New York Times economic analyst, has itemized some other things we could’ve bought with that sum instead of the mess in Iraq. His list includes:
TEN YEARS of universal health care, covering every American who is now without it.
DOUBLING the cancer research budget.
GLOBAL IMMUNIZATION of the world’s children against measles, whooping cough, tetanus, TB, polio, and diptheria.
UNIVERSAL PRESCHOOL for every 3- and 4-year-old child in America.
RECONSTRUCTION of New Orleans.
IMPLEMENTATION of all of the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations.
But even given these facts, Pelosi and Reid couldn’t summon the leadership stones to stick to their stated principle of getting us out of Iraq. No wonder the electorate think Democrats are weak. We are led by two who are.
But maybe we can hope that Hightower might be able to give them some backbone.
In a tragi-comic bit of presidential posturing, Bush assembled a dozen or so veterans, soldiers, and family members in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House for a media show on March 23. With these human “stage props” lined up behind him, George lashed out at congressional Democrats for passing a bill requiring withdrawal from Iraq next year. Without even a smile of irony, Bush called the Democrats’ effort “an act of political theater.”
Well, this particular withdrawal bill won’t get the job done, but it’s a reflection of the broad public demand to stop this horrible folly. Roughly two thirds of Americans want out of Iraq by next year, and 54% support a cutoff of funds for Bush’s surge. Even the troops in Iraq want a withdrawal, for only 35% of those polled by Military Timeslast December said that they approve of George W’s handling of the war.
Still, some progressives despair. They say that last year’s elections were a clear mandate for withdrawal, but the Democrats have been weak and the killing continues, so what’s the use? That’s right on the facts, but totally wrong on the attitude. We made great strides last year, and we’ve changed the national debate on the war. Yes, Bush and Cheney are boneheads, and the Democratic leadership has Jello in its spine, but what did you expect? Popular movements have always had to muster the tenacity to overcome disappointments– and ours is no different. Come on–we’ve got ’em on the run! Far from being down, take energy from the gains we’ve made–and keep pushing on. No one is going to stop the war but us.
Apparently, like the war of my youth, this one will only be stopped by massive unrest. As Jefferson put it when confronted with tyrannical executive power, “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
There is apparently no political party in America that cherishes this founding principle of our government, so it’s up to We The People.
