Again, an Administration that actually cared about outcomes would have responded decisively to the Blackwater incidents. Such an Administration would have welcomed investigations and taken immediate steps to reassure the Iraqis.
Instead, the Administration took immediate steps to reassure — Republicans!
Likewise, we would never have snipers setting up traps to kill random Iraqis or Generals wondering whether Republican partisan interests were trumping national interests.
(h/t TPM + Informed Comment)
Please share widely!
I bet these incidents aren’t treated by the right leaning media/blogosphere. Or it will be excused as some “Fog of War” or “isolated incident” bullshit.
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This war is disgusting. What America is doing to Iraq is disgusting. The politics being played is disgusting.
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In a word: FUCK.
The Democrats have been playing more politics than I’d like themselves. I don’t think they’ve done enough, and spending more time on Moveon.org than Blackwater isn’t a great start. I’d like to see some more legislators put their careers in a fraction of the danger Bush has put our young men and women. They weren’t elected to wring their hands in the majority, but rather to stop the Republican war.
I know.
Why doesn’t congress stop the war, or stop funding it?
Why doesn’t congress stop the war, or stop funding it?
…we (or at least I) have discussed this many times over the last 9 or so months.
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As long the GWBush (or perhaps other Republican administration), remains in power, the Democrats will find it impossible to pass a legislation, signed into law, forcing a timetable for withdrawal. Why? The Republicans in the Senate will likely filibuster it, and it is a certainty that Bush will veto it, which veto will not be over-ridden in Congress.
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Two, regarding the other strategy, defunding the war effort, the Dems could do that by not passing a funding request. The problem that Dems have is that Bush has well in excess of 150K American hostages (including the mercenaries/contractors. He is not going to remove them voluntarily, and, as I mentioned above, Congress is not in a position to force him to. Bush and Congress are playing a massive game of “chicken,” but in this case Bush has the upper hand.
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The long and short of it is that Americans are going to remain in Iraq until a Democratic administration takes over, and perhaps even longer.
the democrats aren’t any better. None of leading dem candidates for POTUS are willing to say they would do anything different.
but I am convinced they just do not get it or are not willing to go all out. The Democrats should put the Republicans to the test and not give up on legislation because they cannot get 60 Senators to support it. Putting them to the test would be saying, “Okay, go ahead and fillabuster legislation that the American public wants or cares about, like the the Webb amendment proposed. The problem is the Democrats are really not as good as the Republicans at playing the game of public preceptions. Just look what happened with the Moveon.org controversy. Not only did the nitwits at moveon.org play right into the Republicans’ hands, but then the Democrats in the Senate compounded the idiocy by voting to censure the group’s statements.
…more people should have recommended this.
And thank you too for running with this issue.