Pelosiism is the Clintonism of “parliamentary cretins,” as they were called in better days, confronted by constituencies far to their left. Pelosiites talk left and act right -- sometimes for (misguided) strategic reasons; more often out of genuine conviction. Thus, according to news reports, the Pelosiites are again about to give the preposterously weak Bush government carte blanche to continue its stupendously unpopular occupation of Iraq. To save face, the Republicans offered and the (“anti-war”) Pelosiites accepted a paltry sum of money for domestic spending.
The Democrats will say that they tried to stop the murder and mayhem but Bush, with the power of the veto, wouldn’t let them. But, of course, it is nowhere written that they have to continue to fund Bush’s wars. For Pelosiites, though, it would be unthinkable not to “support the troops” – by disrupting their lives and the lives of their families, putting them in harm’s way, and turning them into the executors of Cheney’s and Bush’s deadly machinations. Just saying NO, as is their Constitutional responsibility, is out of the question. Better to talk one way and vote the other.
How far will Pelosiites go? Pretty much all the way, according to The Washington Post (November 9). It seems that as early as September, 2002, Democratic lawmakers – including Nancy Pelosi herself and, not surprisingly, Jane Harman and John D. Rockefeller IV – were briefed on CIA “interrogation techniques,” including water boarding and other forms of torture, and objected not a peep. Thus they lent their support, in this way too, to Cheney and Bush -- until torture, water boarding especially, became impolitic to defend, much like the war itself. I’ve written many times in these entries that Clintonism (and therefore Pelosiism) is a “kinder, gentler” version of neo-conservatism; that they are both fruit of the same noxious imperialist tree. It may be necessary to rethink the first part of this contention because, the more we learn, the more it seems that the words “kinder, gentler” give the Pelosiites, or at least Pelosi herself, too much credit.
Showing posts with label Democratic lesser evilism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Democratic lesser evilism. Show all posts
Sunday, December 9, 2007
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Profiles in Pelosiism
Pelosiism is the form Clintonism takes when the vast majority of the people (the demos in democracy) are far to the left of their rulers, for whom the exigencies of governing an empire and, not unrelatedly, serving their corporate paymasters are the highest priority. Pelosiites talk to their left, while aiding and abetting their Republican “rivals” with whom they disagree only enough to remain the lesser evil -- a point to which I will return.
Here are three especially flagrant examples of Pelosiism, all of them in the news in just the past few days:
(1) As Democrats prattle on about their abhorrence of torture and their respect for the rule of law, two of their number on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Charles Schumer and Diane Feinstein, voted with the Republicans – sending Michael Mukasey’s nomination for Attorney General to the full Senate for a vote where he will in all likelihood be confirmed (again with Democratic support). For all the many reasons that the eight Democrats who voted the right way could (and should) have opposed Michael Mukasey, they settled on only one: his professed uncertainty about whether water-boarding – drowning persons almost to the point of death – is torture and therefore illegal. Since the man is not an idiot and not more than usually ill informed, this can only mean that he supports the torture regime Cheney and Bush inaugurated. So too therefore do Schumer and Feinstein, even as they proclaim otherwise, and so, on balance, does the party that will let Bush have the Ashcroft-Gonzales successor he craves.
(2) As Democrats prattle on about their opposition to Cheney and Bush, the Democratic leadership in the House of Representatives succeeded in quashing Dennis Kucinich’s motion before the full House to impeach Dick Cheney, by referring it to the House Judiciary Committee, where liberal icon John Conyers, along with his fellow Democrats, will let it die a quiet death. Although the outcome was never in doubt, the leadership stumbled badly at first in the way they handled the affair, after some clever Republicans tried to force a vote that would expose the hypocrisy of the Pelosiite majority within the Democratic Party. However it seems that the incompetence of Republicans in the White House has infected the Republican leadership in Congress, allowing the Pelosiites to out- maneuver them. Thus Democratic duplicity remains more hidden than it might otherwise have been. Needless to say, were the Democrats only slightly less of a (lesser) evil than they now are, there would be no question of impeaching Cheney – and Bush and the others. Were they even remotely dedicated to the rule of law (not just in words, but in fact), they’d now be confronting the question of how and when, not whether, to bring the torturers to justice – for war crimes, crimes against the peace and crimes against humanity. But, as everyone knows, Pelosiites are dead set against impeachment.
(3) As the Democrats in Congress prattle on about social justice and about reversing the more egregious excesses of our current Gilded Age, they have decided not even to consider a plan to collect billions in tax revenues by fairly taxing the mega-millionaire managers of hedge funds. This time, the main villain is the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid. That he has lately been wined and dined – and who knows what else – by hedge fund lobbyists has been widely reported. But this latest “embarrassment” for ostensibly liberal Democrats isn’t just the doing of one powerful miscreant. Michael Franc, writing in The Financial Times (November 5), speculates that part of the explanation is that the Democratic Party has become the party of the rich; and that its leaders – Nancy Pelosi, for example, and Steny Hoyer – represent districts chock full of mega-millionaires. As Franc points out, the leaders of the Congressional Republican Party, in the meantime, represent comparatively poor districts. Evidently, decades of Republican pandering to “values voters” is working its toll; the Republican Party is now run by the folks the corporate board room and country-club set used to consider their harmless but useful idiots. Meanwhile, rich white liberals have taken over the Democratic Party, with predictable results.
Why is Pelosiism so rampant? The problem is not that the Democrats are stupid; that’s unique to the (new) majority wing of the greater evil party. So it must be some combination of the following factors:
1) The POP, the Party of Pusillanimity, is comprised of cowards or, what comes to the same thing, “liberals” – the people Robert Frost said won’t take their own side in an argument.
2) The POP is comprised of bad electoral strategists who think that the way to win elections is to position themselves in such a way that, without losing their “base” (who have nowhere else to go), they can pick up all the votes just to the left of their rivals. If the national polls that put Hillary Clinton in the lead are even remotely correct, they may be right. But they’re not right because their reasoning is sound. They’re right because many Democratic voters “strategize” similarly. In other words, sound strategic thinking has nothing to do with it. The POP is in the thrall of a self-fulfilling prophecy based on a collective illusion.
There is no doubt some truth in (1) and (2) but, as I have written before, the main explanation is something else altogether:
(3) The POP and the GOP, however much they differ at the margins, agree in their fundamental political orientation. Like the GOP, the POP is led by people intent on keeping U.S. corporations in control of the world economy and of the strategic resources, oil especially, on which it depends -- by insuring a pax Americana established through overwhelming military dominance. This is why they cannot willingly accept the appearance of defeat in Iraq, reality notwithstanding; and why they do not categorically oppose the neo-conservative plan to remake the Middle East – by waging endless wars to make the region safe for American corporations and, of course, for America’s favorite “ally,” Israel. The POP is more competent than the GOP under Cheney and Bush; and it is certainly kinder and gentler. It isn’t embarrassing to the rich white liberals the House leadership represents. Also, it isn’t quite as lawless (Bill Clinton’s Yugoslavia wars notwithstanding) or quite as murderous (his Iraq sanctions apart), and it is less inclined always to do Wall Street’s bidding (notwithstanding Bill Clinton’s entire Presidency). Nevertheless, the Pelosiite leadership of the Democratic Party is working for the same interests Cheney and Bush are. Cheney and Bush have made such a mess that the system our wretched party duopoly sustains faces trouble ahead. Indeed, thanks to forces accelerated by Cheney’s and Bush’s military adventures abroad, the empire is on the point of becoming undone -- and the landing may not be at all soft. Now is the time, therefore, for all good neo-liberal imperialists to come to the aid of the regime. This is the main reason for the Pelosiite machinations we’ve witnessed in recent days and for the many others that preceded them and for the ones that will surely follow – for instance when, in the near future, Pelosiite Democrats will give Cheney and Bush the extra $50 billion they want for the Iraq war and occupation.
Kucinich’s impeachment resolution would have garnered more than a few Democratic votes because there genuinely are progressive Democrats out there (notwithstanding the shabby performance of the party’s so-called Progressive Caucus). There is even a chance, a slight one, that in the coming Presidential primaries they can take over the party and, at least partly, change its direction. But for that to happen, it will be necessary first to dispatch the prospect of a Clintonite restoration, especially one led by Bill Clinton’s (marginally) better half. For good or ill, it is looking increasingly like John Edwards is the only candidate not too tainted by Clintonism with even a remote chance of defeating the Clintons. If he fails, it will again become time to rethink the lesser evil question; not the principle perhaps (our not very democratic institutions put that out of the question for now), but whether the lesser evil party really is less evil enough.
Here are three especially flagrant examples of Pelosiism, all of them in the news in just the past few days:
(1) As Democrats prattle on about their abhorrence of torture and their respect for the rule of law, two of their number on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Charles Schumer and Diane Feinstein, voted with the Republicans – sending Michael Mukasey’s nomination for Attorney General to the full Senate for a vote where he will in all likelihood be confirmed (again with Democratic support). For all the many reasons that the eight Democrats who voted the right way could (and should) have opposed Michael Mukasey, they settled on only one: his professed uncertainty about whether water-boarding – drowning persons almost to the point of death – is torture and therefore illegal. Since the man is not an idiot and not more than usually ill informed, this can only mean that he supports the torture regime Cheney and Bush inaugurated. So too therefore do Schumer and Feinstein, even as they proclaim otherwise, and so, on balance, does the party that will let Bush have the Ashcroft-Gonzales successor he craves.
(2) As Democrats prattle on about their opposition to Cheney and Bush, the Democratic leadership in the House of Representatives succeeded in quashing Dennis Kucinich’s motion before the full House to impeach Dick Cheney, by referring it to the House Judiciary Committee, where liberal icon John Conyers, along with his fellow Democrats, will let it die a quiet death. Although the outcome was never in doubt, the leadership stumbled badly at first in the way they handled the affair, after some clever Republicans tried to force a vote that would expose the hypocrisy of the Pelosiite majority within the Democratic Party. However it seems that the incompetence of Republicans in the White House has infected the Republican leadership in Congress, allowing the Pelosiites to out- maneuver them. Thus Democratic duplicity remains more hidden than it might otherwise have been. Needless to say, were the Democrats only slightly less of a (lesser) evil than they now are, there would be no question of impeaching Cheney – and Bush and the others. Were they even remotely dedicated to the rule of law (not just in words, but in fact), they’d now be confronting the question of how and when, not whether, to bring the torturers to justice – for war crimes, crimes against the peace and crimes against humanity. But, as everyone knows, Pelosiites are dead set against impeachment.
(3) As the Democrats in Congress prattle on about social justice and about reversing the more egregious excesses of our current Gilded Age, they have decided not even to consider a plan to collect billions in tax revenues by fairly taxing the mega-millionaire managers of hedge funds. This time, the main villain is the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid. That he has lately been wined and dined – and who knows what else – by hedge fund lobbyists has been widely reported. But this latest “embarrassment” for ostensibly liberal Democrats isn’t just the doing of one powerful miscreant. Michael Franc, writing in The Financial Times (November 5), speculates that part of the explanation is that the Democratic Party has become the party of the rich; and that its leaders – Nancy Pelosi, for example, and Steny Hoyer – represent districts chock full of mega-millionaires. As Franc points out, the leaders of the Congressional Republican Party, in the meantime, represent comparatively poor districts. Evidently, decades of Republican pandering to “values voters” is working its toll; the Republican Party is now run by the folks the corporate board room and country-club set used to consider their harmless but useful idiots. Meanwhile, rich white liberals have taken over the Democratic Party, with predictable results.
Why is Pelosiism so rampant? The problem is not that the Democrats are stupid; that’s unique to the (new) majority wing of the greater evil party. So it must be some combination of the following factors:
1) The POP, the Party of Pusillanimity, is comprised of cowards or, what comes to the same thing, “liberals” – the people Robert Frost said won’t take their own side in an argument.
2) The POP is comprised of bad electoral strategists who think that the way to win elections is to position themselves in such a way that, without losing their “base” (who have nowhere else to go), they can pick up all the votes just to the left of their rivals. If the national polls that put Hillary Clinton in the lead are even remotely correct, they may be right. But they’re not right because their reasoning is sound. They’re right because many Democratic voters “strategize” similarly. In other words, sound strategic thinking has nothing to do with it. The POP is in the thrall of a self-fulfilling prophecy based on a collective illusion.
There is no doubt some truth in (1) and (2) but, as I have written before, the main explanation is something else altogether:
(3) The POP and the GOP, however much they differ at the margins, agree in their fundamental political orientation. Like the GOP, the POP is led by people intent on keeping U.S. corporations in control of the world economy and of the strategic resources, oil especially, on which it depends -- by insuring a pax Americana established through overwhelming military dominance. This is why they cannot willingly accept the appearance of defeat in Iraq, reality notwithstanding; and why they do not categorically oppose the neo-conservative plan to remake the Middle East – by waging endless wars to make the region safe for American corporations and, of course, for America’s favorite “ally,” Israel. The POP is more competent than the GOP under Cheney and Bush; and it is certainly kinder and gentler. It isn’t embarrassing to the rich white liberals the House leadership represents. Also, it isn’t quite as lawless (Bill Clinton’s Yugoslavia wars notwithstanding) or quite as murderous (his Iraq sanctions apart), and it is less inclined always to do Wall Street’s bidding (notwithstanding Bill Clinton’s entire Presidency). Nevertheless, the Pelosiite leadership of the Democratic Party is working for the same interests Cheney and Bush are. Cheney and Bush have made such a mess that the system our wretched party duopoly sustains faces trouble ahead. Indeed, thanks to forces accelerated by Cheney’s and Bush’s military adventures abroad, the empire is on the point of becoming undone -- and the landing may not be at all soft. Now is the time, therefore, for all good neo-liberal imperialists to come to the aid of the regime. This is the main reason for the Pelosiite machinations we’ve witnessed in recent days and for the many others that preceded them and for the ones that will surely follow – for instance when, in the near future, Pelosiite Democrats will give Cheney and Bush the extra $50 billion they want for the Iraq war and occupation.
Kucinich’s impeachment resolution would have garnered more than a few Democratic votes because there genuinely are progressive Democrats out there (notwithstanding the shabby performance of the party’s so-called Progressive Caucus). There is even a chance, a slight one, that in the coming Presidential primaries they can take over the party and, at least partly, change its direction. But for that to happen, it will be necessary first to dispatch the prospect of a Clintonite restoration, especially one led by Bill Clinton’s (marginally) better half. For good or ill, it is looking increasingly like John Edwards is the only candidate not too tainted by Clintonism with even a remote chance of defeating the Clintons. If he fails, it will again become time to rethink the lesser evil question; not the principle perhaps (our not very democratic institutions put that out of the question for now), but whether the lesser evil party really is less evil enough.
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Con Job?
On the Iraq War and the rest, are Congressional Democrats too easily conned, as Rick Pearlstein writes in CommonSense.org? Maybe, though I suspect that, for explaining Democrats, strategic (mis)calculations about how to position the party for the 2008 elections matter more than con jobs. To the extent that Pearlstein is right, though, it is because, like all easy marks, the Democrats want to believe what Cheney and Bush want them to believe. They want to believe because, in the final analysis, they are of one mind with Cheney and Bush in promoting a neo-liberal economic order at home and an imperialist agenda abroad. This is the essence of Clintonism. If only for the sake of minimal political morality, the party ought to have purged itself of Clintonism long ago. It has not. Indeed, according to current polls, Democratic voters may well foist a Clintonite restoration upon us.
Over the Labor Day weekend, though, the United Mineworkers and the United Steel Workers endorsed John Edwards. He is looking increasingly like the best hope for a change of course – domestically. [On foreign policy, he is no worse than the others – Gravel and Kucinich excepted – but not qualitatively better either.] It would be a salutary development if organized labor would lead the way – not just in dispatching Hillary Clinton and Clintonism’s other “electable” avatars – but in keeping Edwards on-course thereafter. But organized labor has been off-course and enfeebled for decades and what Edwards offers may be too little too late. Still, between now and the early primaries, one can hope.
Over the Labor Day weekend, though, the United Mineworkers and the United Steel Workers endorsed John Edwards. He is looking increasingly like the best hope for a change of course – domestically. [On foreign policy, he is no worse than the others – Gravel and Kucinich excepted – but not qualitatively better either.] It would be a salutary development if organized labor would lead the way – not just in dispatching Hillary Clinton and Clintonism’s other “electable” avatars – but in keeping Edwards on-course thereafter. But organized labor has been off-course and enfeebled for decades and what Edwards offers may be too little too late. Still, between now and the early primaries, one can hope.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Here They Go Again
The Democrats left for Congress’s summer holiday by capitulating shamelessly to the Cheney/Bush government’s war on freedom (aka the War on Terror). Now The Washington Post (Aug. 31) reports that, when they come back, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is prepared to “compromise” with Republicans on Iraq War funding by dropping demands for “time lines” for troop withdrawals. Compromise? The man is about as compromised as anyone could be; anyone, that is, except the other party leaders and the all the self-declared “progressives” wallowing in Pelosiite hypocrisy.
If that isn’t bad enough, Washington is swirling with rumors of a post-Labor Day PR offensive promoting Cheney’s much desired extension of the Iraq War into Iran. Will Congressional Democrats do anything to counter the coming barrage? Not likely. Combine abject (and freshly rejuvenated) spinelessness with subservience to the government of Israel (which, not unrelatedly, wants war with Iran as much as Cheney and his neo-cons do) and what to do you get! One wonders why Cheney thinks he needs a PR campaign at all. With Democrats for an “opposition,” he can get what he wants anyway – notwithstanding the fact that three-quarters of the country and almost four quarters of the rest of the world are against him.
There is a smidgen of good news, though. The “base” is becoming more fractious and John Edwards is finally taking the gloves off, ever so slightly, in dealing with the threat of a Clintonite restoration. But, it’s one step forward, two steps back. With the fervor of right wing “think” tank ideologues promoting yet another war, the “liberal” media’s guardians of conventional wisdom are mobilizing to declare that “divisiveness” threatens to undo the Democrats’ chances in 2008. Apparently, they want things to get much worse, so that they can become marginally better. In fact, because many Republican and independent voters are wise to the Clintons and their ways, the Democrats’ electoral prospects depend on intensifying, not smoothing over, divisions in the Democratic Party. Victory in 2008 is the Democrats’ to lose thanks to mounting popular revulsion towards the Bush government. But the task will be much facilitated by putting forward a clear Democratic alternative; in other words, by handing Clintonism a resounding defeat. Many, probably most, party strategists will disagree. To them I appeal to ethically more demanding, but vastly more compelling, standards. As Democrats in Congress prepare to collaborate yet again with the Decider (and the vice-decider who runs him like a puppet), minimal decency and concern for humankind require that Democrats who know better and have the courage to act on what they know run against Democrats – still, alas, the vast majority --who don’t.
If that isn’t bad enough, Washington is swirling with rumors of a post-Labor Day PR offensive promoting Cheney’s much desired extension of the Iraq War into Iran. Will Congressional Democrats do anything to counter the coming barrage? Not likely. Combine abject (and freshly rejuvenated) spinelessness with subservience to the government of Israel (which, not unrelatedly, wants war with Iran as much as Cheney and his neo-cons do) and what to do you get! One wonders why Cheney thinks he needs a PR campaign at all. With Democrats for an “opposition,” he can get what he wants anyway – notwithstanding the fact that three-quarters of the country and almost four quarters of the rest of the world are against him.
There is a smidgen of good news, though. The “base” is becoming more fractious and John Edwards is finally taking the gloves off, ever so slightly, in dealing with the threat of a Clintonite restoration. But, it’s one step forward, two steps back. With the fervor of right wing “think” tank ideologues promoting yet another war, the “liberal” media’s guardians of conventional wisdom are mobilizing to declare that “divisiveness” threatens to undo the Democrats’ chances in 2008. Apparently, they want things to get much worse, so that they can become marginally better. In fact, because many Republican and independent voters are wise to the Clintons and their ways, the Democrats’ electoral prospects depend on intensifying, not smoothing over, divisions in the Democratic Party. Victory in 2008 is the Democrats’ to lose thanks to mounting popular revulsion towards the Bush government. But the task will be much facilitated by putting forward a clear Democratic alternative; in other words, by handing Clintonism a resounding defeat. Many, probably most, party strategists will disagree. To them I appeal to ethically more demanding, but vastly more compelling, standards. As Democrats in Congress prepare to collaborate yet again with the Decider (and the vice-decider who runs him like a puppet), minimal decency and concern for humankind require that Democrats who know better and have the courage to act on what they know run against Democrats – still, alas, the vast majority --who don’t.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Harry's All Nighter
As of this moment, Harry Reid’s all-night-and-into-the-morning Senate debate on the Levin amendment, calling for troop withdrawals to begin in 120 days, is still going on. The indications are that a determined Republican minority will block the amendment’s passage. However, the morning newspapers and NPR are ecstatic: the “fighting Dems” are back.
Leave aside whether what the Democratic leadership wants is more to embarrass Republicans than to change the course of Bush’s War. No doubt, they want both. The important question, largely ignored by the punditocracy, is just what this “historic” debate is about? The short answer is: not much.
The Democratic side wants four more months of murder and mayhem followed by slow but enforced “Vietnamization,” the Nixon-Kissinger strategy for “ending” the Vietnam War by replacing American troops with local surrogates. They also want “redeployment” of American troops to comparatively safe areas in Iraq or nearby. In other words, their objective is to maintain the occupation by doing what their former taskmaster, the now comatose Ariel Sharon, did to Gaza, when it became clear to him that the costs of a direct occupation were too high. What a model to follow!
The Republicans, on the other hand, want to delay a decision on essentially the same plan for two more months, while they figure out how they can start the process of Vietnamization without losing too much face. [For them, it’s a question of party loyalty; in other words, of their own electoral prospects. Never mind that Bush and Cheney will lose face no matter what; they no longer have any face to lose.] Be sure that, once they figure out what to do next, the hapless General Petraeus will play a role in the Republicans’ plans – as a fall guy, as an excuse for extending the killing even longer, or both. Conceding that the party duopoly under which we suffer is not about to change soon, these are not insignificant differences. The world would be a better place were the Republicans to be handed a sound defeat. But the “fighting Dems” are way, way short of the mark.
Harry, Nancy – who do you think you’re fooling? If you really want to end the war, end it now in the only way you can – defund it. If you really want to “support the troops,” support them now in the only way you can – bring them home; all of them. It’s not that complicated -- unless, of course, your real objective is, like Cheney’s and Bush’s and their neo-con advisors’, to maintain American dominance of the Middle East and, not incidentally, to assure that Big Oil and Israel have their way. Maybe you can’t break with that dream without jeopardizing your relations with your paymasters. But you can at least correct Bush’s tactical mistakes in implementing it. In so doing, you will earn the title of “lesser evil,” not just get it by default. Everyone knows that, like most Democrats, you suffer from a handicap – you were born without backbones. But Harry, Nancy -- you don’t need backbones for this; you have political cover. The Cheney/Bush administration is toast; their war is lost. The vast majority of Americans understand this. The “liberal” media may like their “fighting Dems,” but everyone with a shred of sense wants you to stop posturing, get some sleep, come back refreshed – and do the right thing. Stop the war NOW; bring ALL the troops home!
UPDATE: As predicted, the Levin amendment failed. With 70% or more of the electorate behind them, and with both the House and Senate in their control, the Democrats cannot stop Bush! Would even an outright dictator be able to wage war under such conditions? Or is this the prerogative only of "democratic" leaders -- like Tony ("Glad to See the Back of Him") Blair and George W. Bush? What an argument for "democracy" and "the American way"!
Leave aside whether what the Democratic leadership wants is more to embarrass Republicans than to change the course of Bush’s War. No doubt, they want both. The important question, largely ignored by the punditocracy, is just what this “historic” debate is about? The short answer is: not much.
The Democratic side wants four more months of murder and mayhem followed by slow but enforced “Vietnamization,” the Nixon-Kissinger strategy for “ending” the Vietnam War by replacing American troops with local surrogates. They also want “redeployment” of American troops to comparatively safe areas in Iraq or nearby. In other words, their objective is to maintain the occupation by doing what their former taskmaster, the now comatose Ariel Sharon, did to Gaza, when it became clear to him that the costs of a direct occupation were too high. What a model to follow!
The Republicans, on the other hand, want to delay a decision on essentially the same plan for two more months, while they figure out how they can start the process of Vietnamization without losing too much face. [For them, it’s a question of party loyalty; in other words, of their own electoral prospects. Never mind that Bush and Cheney will lose face no matter what; they no longer have any face to lose.] Be sure that, once they figure out what to do next, the hapless General Petraeus will play a role in the Republicans’ plans – as a fall guy, as an excuse for extending the killing even longer, or both. Conceding that the party duopoly under which we suffer is not about to change soon, these are not insignificant differences. The world would be a better place were the Republicans to be handed a sound defeat. But the “fighting Dems” are way, way short of the mark.
Harry, Nancy – who do you think you’re fooling? If you really want to end the war, end it now in the only way you can – defund it. If you really want to “support the troops,” support them now in the only way you can – bring them home; all of them. It’s not that complicated -- unless, of course, your real objective is, like Cheney’s and Bush’s and their neo-con advisors’, to maintain American dominance of the Middle East and, not incidentally, to assure that Big Oil and Israel have their way. Maybe you can’t break with that dream without jeopardizing your relations with your paymasters. But you can at least correct Bush’s tactical mistakes in implementing it. In so doing, you will earn the title of “lesser evil,” not just get it by default. Everyone knows that, like most Democrats, you suffer from a handicap – you were born without backbones. But Harry, Nancy -- you don’t need backbones for this; you have political cover. The Cheney/Bush administration is toast; their war is lost. The vast majority of Americans understand this. The “liberal” media may like their “fighting Dems,” but everyone with a shred of sense wants you to stop posturing, get some sleep, come back refreshed – and do the right thing. Stop the war NOW; bring ALL the troops home!
UPDATE: As predicted, the Levin amendment failed. With 70% or more of the electorate behind them, and with both the House and Senate in their control, the Democrats cannot stop Bush! Would even an outright dictator be able to wage war under such conditions? Or is this the prerogative only of "democratic" leaders -- like Tony ("Glad to See the Back of Him") Blair and George W. Bush? What an argument for "democracy" and "the American way"!
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