GETTING OUT OF A DEATHTRAP

"Who the hell is shooting at us?" shouted Sergeant 1st Class Marc Biletski, whose platoon was jammed into a small room off an alley that was being swept by a sniper's bullets. "Who's shooting at us? Do we know who they are?"

Just before the platoon tossed smoke bombs and sprinted through the alley to a more secure position, Biletski had a moment to reflect on this spot, which U.S. Army has now fought to regain from a mysterious enemy at least three times in the past two years. "This place is a failure," he said. "Every time we come here, we have to come back."
--"Baghdad Battle Cry: Who's Shooting at Us?" Damien Cave, International Herald Tribune, January 25, 2007

Together, alone, trapped in a dark room with the blood of their comrade on the floor, they tried to piece together what had happened. Maybe the sniper saw Sergeant Leija's silhouette in the window and fired. Or maybe the shot was accidental, they said, fired from below by Iraqi Army soldiers who had been moving between the buildings.

The Iraqis were not supposed to be there yet…after arriving late at the first building, the Iraqis jumped ahead, leaving the Americans and pushing north without searching dozens of apartments in the area…

But Sergeant Leija's squad had no communications links with their Iraqi counterparts, and because it was an Iraqi operation--as senior officers repeatedly emphasized--the Americans could not order the Iraqis to get back in line. There was nothing they could do.
--"'Man Down': When One Bullet Alters Everything, Damien Cave, New York Times, January 29, 2007

New details also emerged about clashes on Saturday in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, which left five Americans dead. Lt. Col. Scott R. Bleichwehl, an American military spokesman, said the gunmen who stormed the provincial governor's office during a meeting between American and local officials were wearing what appeared to be American military uniforms in an effort to impersonate American soldiers.

The sophisticated attack hinted at what could be a new threat for American troops as they start a fresh security plan centered on small bases in Baghdad's bloodiest neighborhoods, where soldiers will live and work with Iraqi forces. Military officials have said that one of their greatest concerns is that troops will be vulnerable to attack from killers who appear to be colleagues.
--"U.S. Toll in Iraq is 27 for Deadly Weekend," Damien Cave, New York Times, January 22, 2007

Iraqi forces were surprised and nearly overwhelmed by the ferocity of an obscure renegade militia in a weekend battle near the holy city of Najaf and needed far more help from American forces than previously disclosed, American and Iraqi officials said Monday.

They said American ground troops--not just air support as reported Sunday--were mobilized to help the Iraqi soldiers, who appeared to have dangerously underestimated the strength of the militia, which…had amassed hundreds of heavily armed fighters.
--"Missteps by Iraqi Forces in Battle Raise Questions," Marc Santora, New York Times, January 30, 2007


Most of you have probably never heard of an Army captain, a West Pointer, by the name of Brian Freeman, but Senators Christopher Dodd (D-Conn) and John Kerry (D-Mass), certainly have.

On a fact-finding trip to Iraq just before Christmas, as they were waiting on a Green Zone landing zone for the helicopter that would fly them out of Baghdad, the young officer approached them, "almost out of the shadows."

Here is what followed:


Even though he felt nervous, he told his wife later, he delivered his message with urgency. Soldiers were being deployed to do missions that they were utterly untrained to do; Freeman, for example, an armor officer, had been sent to help foster democracy and rebuild an Iraqi civil society. State Department personnel who could do those jobs were restricted in their travel off military bases by regional security officers who said it was unsafe for them to venture out…

Once in Iraq, Freeman was dismayed to find that his training, "had no relation to what they were actually doing," Charlotte Freeman said. "He was appalled," enduring danger but seeing no clear mission, she said. Moreover, he believed that the Iraqis "didn't want us there."

…Freeman, 31, took a short holiday leave to see his 14-month old daughter and 2-year old son, returned to his base in Karbala, Iraq, and less than two weeks ago died in a hail of bullets and grenades. Insurgents, dressed in U.S. military uniforms, speaking English and driving black American SUVs, got through a checkpoint and attacked, kidnapped four soldiers and later shot them. Freeman died in the assault, the fifth casualty of the brazen attack.
--"Soldier's Death Strengthens Senators' Antiwar Resolve: Kerry, Dodd Demand Stronger Challenge to Bush," Jonathan Weisman and Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post, January 30, 2007


According to NBC Nightly News tonight, further investigation has revealed that the attack on the soldiers at Karbala was a deliberate betrayal by the Iraqis who were working with the Americans. The news broadcast described how the attackers not only gained entry through numerous checkpoints, but that they were waved through by Iraqi security guards who pointed out where the Americans were. Presumably, it was also the Iraqis who conveniently provided the American uniforms. The claim is being made that the Iranians funded and trained the sophisticated attack, but after all the "proof" about weapons of mass destruction that duped us into war with Iraq in the first place, I am dubious that the Iranians are behind it. Maybe they are; but whether they are or aren't, Bush and his neocon buddies are obviously itching for something to provoke a fight with Iran, and I expect more such "evidence" will come to light in the future.

Whether the Iranians funded the operation or not is beside the point as far as I am concerned. Putting the spotlight on the Iranians only makes us forget that it was the IRAQIS WHO BETRAYED THE AMERICAN SOLDIERS.

In the Haifa street battle described in the opening quotes, we have a situation where American soldiers are ordered to enter into a joint operation with the Iraqi Army. Instead, not only are they forced to do most of the fighting, but their Iraqi counterparts not only skip over searching entire sections of buildings--leaving them all desperately vulnerable--but also fire wildly up into the buildings without waiting to see where the Americans are--hence the tragic, useless, and unneccesary death of Sergeant Leija.


Then there are the risks involved in leaving small groups of U.S. advisers in the hands of underequipped Iraqi Army units of dubious skill and loyalty. Over in Iraq, Lt. Col. Rodrick Arrington, an adviser attached to the First Marine Expeditionary Forces in Ramadi, notes that Iraqi troops he works with answer their cellphones while on patrol. Because of absenteeism and lack of pay, the Iraqi units are usually 50 percent under strength, and Iraqi officers often prove unwilling to conduct risky raids. Some units are infiltrated by militias or insurgents…"We're setting ourselves up for a potential national disaster in which some Iraqi divisions could flip and take five thousand (U.S. troops embedded with Iraqi forces as advisors) hostage…or multiple advisory teams go missing in action," says retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey.
--"The Perils of Partnership," Michael Hirsh, Kevin Peraino, and Sarah Childress, Newsweek, December 18, 2006

The prospect of a more intense battle in the Iraqi capital could put U.S. military commanders in exactly the sort of tough urban fight that war planners strove to avoid during the sprint 2003 invasion of the country…military officials said sustaining it for more than a few months would place a major strain on U.S. forces that already are feeling burdened by an unexpectedly long and difficult war…

…Military experts…wondered, as one said, how a "thin green line" of 17,500 additional soldiers in Baghdad could affect the security situation in a city where many of the 5 million residents are hostile to U.S. presence. "Too little, too late--way too late," said retired Col. Jerry Durrant, who has worked as a trainer of Iraqi forces.
--"Intensified Combat on Streets Likely," Thomas E. Ricks and Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post, January 11, 2007


I suppose it could be argued that I am biased, since I want this war to end--never wanted it in the first place, particularly when my own son could be sent back for a third deployment at any time in the next few years, even after he musters out of the Marine Corps. And you could even say that Senators Dodd and Kerry, who were so deeply distraught at the death of Capt. Freeman just weeks after he asked for their help were also biased because they have both opposed this war. You could even say that Gen. McCaffrey has always made his views known on this disastrous war--maybe he's biased, too.

So, fine. I'll let the soldiers who are doing the actual FIGHTING in Iraq speak for themselves. What do THEY think about the president's big plan to send in more troops into the deathtrap of Iraq?


Moments before he stepped into his squad's Stryker…Spec. Daniel Caldwell, 20, echoed a sentiment shared by many in his squad: "They're kicking a dead horse here. The Iraqi Army can't stand up on their own."…

…Apache Company's mission: to search a few houses for weapons caches based on intelligence reports. Caldwell and his soldiers worried about the intelligence they had been given. It had come from an Iraqi Army--or "IA" in U.S. soldier lingo--officer a week ago. They had wondered whether they were being set up for an ambush.

"It's a joke," said Pfc. Drew Merrill, 22, of Jefferson City, Mo, shaking his head and flashing a smile as the Stryker rolled through Baghdad.
--"U.S. Unit Patrolling Baghdad Sees Flaws in Bush Strategy," Sudarsan Raghavan, Washington Post, January 12, 2007

The Iraqis will accept mediocrity," said Staff Sgt. Luke Alphonso, a U.S. Army medic from Morgan City, La., who's been assigned to train members of Iraq's 5th Army Division for the past six months. "They will let us do everything for them."
--"Soldiers Doubt an Influx of American Troops Will Benefit the Iraqi Army," Nancy A. Youssef, McClatchy Newspapers, January 10, 2007

The American military, once a staunch supporter of President Bush and the Iraq war, has grown increasingly pessimistic about chances for victory. For the first time, more troops disapprove of the president's handling of the war than approve of it, according to a 2006 Military Times Poll.
--"More Troops Unhappy with Bush's Course in Iraq, Poll Finds," Robert Hodlerne, Military Times, December 29, 2006

"It is time for U.S. troops to come home," said Marine Corps Sgt. Liam Madden…"Not one of my brothers should die for a lie. This is my generation's call to conscience."

"We're not anti-war," said Navy Mass Communications Specialist 3rd class Jonathan Hutto, 29…"We're not pacifists. We're anti-Iraq war."

…"I want Congress tomorrow to realize that they are accountable to their citizens," Madden said. "And their service members are on the front line."

…A 2003 Naval Academy graduate now in the individual Ready Reserves used tougher words. "This administration has betrayed our armed forces," said Lt. j.g. Fabian Bouthilette, 26. "I actually believe that the conduct of this administration is more detrimental to the Constitution than anything else. This was begun on an immoral, illegal basis. We were lied to."
--Service Members to Rally Against the War in Iraq," William H. McMichael, Navy Times, January 15, 2007. All the soldiers, sailors, and Marines quoted in the Navy Times article had had at least one deployment to Iraq and several were due to return. They submitted a petition of over a thousand names to Congress on January 15, 2007. Although the event was covered in military publications, with respect, pointing out that their action was legal and that they had suffered no deleterious consequences because of their actions, the presentation of the petition and the accompanying press conference was not covered by any of the three network news broadcasts. I know because I watched all three.


"The story below only appeared on our CBS website and was not aired on CBS. It is a story that is largely being ignored, even though this is taking place every single day in central Baghdad, two blocks from where our office is located.

"Our crew had to be pulled out because we got a call saying they were aobut to be killed, and on their way out, a civilian man was shot dead in front of them as they ran.

"…This is not too gruesome to air, but rather too important to ignore."
--e-mail sent out by CBS war correspondent Lara Logan, asking for friends in the media to campaign her network to get her two-minute segment aired. Lara Logan has placed herself in the deadliest of assignments with Marines and soldiers alike--Once, while on foot patrol in Ramadi with Marines, it was too dangerous for her to take a camera crew, so she carried a handheld video camera and ran down Ramadi streets with the Marine squad, who could not move slowly due to the danger from snipers. I have seen many of her intense and amazing reports--she speaks for the troops, not for CBS news.


While Bush races to step up the deployments of American forces to Iraq--my own nephew will be headed to Baghdad with an army Stryker brigade two months ahead of schedule--and plays Chinese fire drill with American troops he's pulling out of Afghanistan in order to extend their deployments an extra FOUR MONTHS and send them to IRAQ, and thumbs his nose at the Congress, his own joint chiefs, and the American people, saying that, "We've already got the money for the surge," or, as the Puppet Master himself, Dick Cheney, put it, "They can't stop us"--it seems that they are, indeed, stoppable.


"For almost four years, this administration has been saying, 'Just give us another six months. Give us more time. The Iraqis need more help. We need more troops. We need more money.' I am not willing to sacrifice more young men and women for a policy that isn't working…

"There is no strategy. This is a pingpong game with American lives."
--"The Angry One," Wil S. Hylton, GQ Magazine interview of Sen. Chuck Hagel, (R-Neb.), appearing in the January, '07 issue. Sen. Hagel is a combat veteran of Vietnam, having fought bravely during the Tet offensive of 1968, once saving the life of his own brother.

"We've abdicated our responsibilities. That has to do with the fact that the Republican Party controlled the White House, the House, and the Senate. When that happens, you get no probing, no questioning, no oversight. If Bill Clinton had invaded Iraq and after two years he was having the same problems, do you think the Republican Congress would have put up with that? I don't think so.
--ibid


The thing is, there has been much hoopla about these congressional resolutions opposing Bush's so-called "surge" of more than 21,000 troops into Iraq. It has been said that the resolutions are toothless and that, unless Congress is willing to cut off funding of the troops, the president can do whatever he wants. Dick Cheney has flat-out said that. In fact, the president and vice-president seem to be throwing down a challenge to Congress, forcing them to either cut off funds to the troops--which virtually none of them wants to do--or wave their yellow ribbons and get on board the president's train wreck.

They should take a moment, sometime, and read the Constitution.


The Constitution's provision that the president is commander in chief clearly puts him at the top of the military chain of command. Congress would be overstepping if, for example, it passed a law requiring generals in the field to report directly to the speaker of the House.

But the Constitution also gives Congress an array of war powers, including the power to "declare war," "raise and support armies," and "make rules concerning captures on land and water." By "declare war," the Constitution's framers did not mean merely firing off a starting gun…In giving Congress the power to declare war, the Constitution gives it authority to make decisions about the war's scope and duration.

The Founders, including James Madison, who is often called "the father of the Constitution," fully expected Congress to use these powers to rein in the commander in chief. "The constitution supposes, what the History of all Governments demonstrates, that the Executive is the branch of power most interested in war, and most prone to it," Madison cautioned. "It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the Legislature."

In the early days of the republic, the Supreme Court made clear that Congress could limit the president's war powers…The court has repeatedly reinforced this principle…

…Past Congresses have enacted just the sort of restrictions the Bush administration is trying to foreclose today…There is little question that Congress…can…pass laws that set the terms of military engagement.
--"Congress, the Constitution, and War: The Limits on Presidential Power," Adam Cohen, New York Times, January 29, 2007


Here's the thing, boys and girls. The men and women who proudly wear the uniform of the United States military are our FAMILY. They are our children and our siblings and our parents and our friends. They go where they are ordered to go and do what they are ordered to do because they are unbelievably brave and valiant. They have no choice but to trust that the civilian leadership who shapes those orders will not do so recklessly, throwing their lives away on a lost cause.

They have to believe that in order to do their jobs.

And yet, they no longer believe it. By a very large majority, quoted in their own Military Times, the troops who are fighting this war no longer trust the word of the people in this administration who keep demanding more and more blood sacrifices from them.

There is not a whole lot they can do to fight that--not legally.

But we can.

Although he may think of himself as Ruler of the Free World, this president is, actually, a plain old civil servant. He works for US.

Our elected representatives in Congress work for US.

And it is up to US to make our voices heard--loud and clear--to every senator and congressperson, that we want this madness stopped.

THEY have the power to stop it.

WE have the power to MAKE THEM.

The brave young men like the soldier who died on Haifa street in Baghdad and the soldier who died at the hands of traitors in the Iraqi Army, and the Marines who can't trust their Iraqi counterparts on even a simple patrol--they are depending upon US to restore accountability to those who would order them to die.

Keep up the pressure. Let the timid in Congress, the angry in Congress, even the misguided in Congress, KNOW THAT WE WILL NOT BE SILENT.

Our own troops in the field have let us know that this whole "strategy" is a deathtrap. The Iraqi Army who betrays those who have tried so patiently to train and arm and support them, has let us know the same thing.

SUPPORT OUR TROOPS. BRING THEM HOME.

One more thing--just in case someone thinks that any Democratic suggestions for peace would only bring down the wrath of hell on the Iraqis themselves…Maybe we ought to listen to what THEY have to say…for a change:


Representatives of Iraq's government are hedging their bets on America's political future…by building ties with the Democratic Party…

…They concluded early that even the most staunchly antiwar Democrats would not abandon Iraq…

…Almost all agree on Democratic Party initiatives, squashed when Republicans controlled Congress, to prevent the building of permanent U.S. bases here. They note news reports of Democrats acknowledging the suffering of the Iraqi population.

"I see that the Democratic ideas are more related to reality," said Ammar Tuma, a lawmaker who serves in Maliki's ruling Shiite coalition. "They talk about the real problems that the Iraqis are facing every day."

To date, government officials said, they've also found Democratic visitors such as Pelosi, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois less parochial, more culturally sensitive and more willing to listen to Iraqi concerns than the Republicans.

…"Now it's different because the Democrats have some decision-making power," said Farooq Abdullah, a Maliki advisor. "Before, we were meeting mostly with Republicans because they were the ones in power. Now we're meeting with both of them."
--"Iraq Cultivates Ties to Democrats," Borzou Dargahi, Los Angeles Times, January 28, 2007


Do I mean to imply that the Democrats have all the answers? Of course not. Clearly, nobody does. And in point of fact, the loudest and angriest voices coming out of Congress today are coming from moderate Republicans, some conservative Republicans, and conservative Democrats as well as liberals.

The point is that George W. Bush does not have all the answers and neither does he any longer have all the power.

There are steps that can be taken by Congress to defy him and to rein in his megalomania. All they need is a push from their constituents.

Call your representative and senators. Sign petitions to his or her office. Write letters and e-mails. MAKE YOUR VOICES HEARD.

Together, we can find a way to end this madness and get the hell out of an American deathtrap in Iraq.

Later, I'll write more on HOW.

THE STATE OF IRAQ'S UNION

(the Iraqi) Parliament in recent months has been at a standstill. Nearly every session since November has been adjourned because as few as 65 members made it to work, even as they and the absentees earned salaries and benefits worth about $120,000.

Part of the problem is security, but Iraqi officials also said they feared that members were losing confidence in the institution and in the country's fragile democracy. As chaos has deepened, Parliament's relevance has gradually receded.

Deals on important legislation, most recently the oil law, now take place largely out of public view, with Parliament--when it meets--rubber-stamping the final decisions. As a result, officials said, vital legislation involving the budget, provincial elections and amendments to the Constitution remain trapped in a legislative process that processes nearly nothing. American officials long hoped that Parliament could help foster dialogue between Iraq's increasingly fractured ethnic and religious groups, but that has not happened, either.
--"Iraq Parliament Finds a Quorum Hard to Come By," Damien Cave, New York Times, January 24, 2007

Over the past six months, Baghdad has been all but isolated electrically, Iraqi officials say, as insurgents have effectively won their battle to bring down critical high-voltage lines and cut off the capital from the major power plants to the north, south, and west.

The battle has been waged in the remotest parts of the open desert, where the great towers that support thousands of miles of exposed lines are frequently felled with explosive charges in increasingly determined and sophisticated attacks, generally at night. Crews that arrive to repair the damage are often attacked and sometimes killed, ensuring that the government falls further and further behind in its attempts to repair the lines.

…Skilled looters often arrive with heavy trucks that pull down more of the towers to steal as much of the valuable aluminum conducting material in the lines as possible…

What amounts to an electrical siege of Baghdad is reflected in constant power failures and disastrously poor service in the capital, with severe consequences for security, governance, health care and the mood of an already weary and angry populace.
--"Iraq Insurgents Starve Capital of Electricity, James Glanz, New York Times, December 19, 2006

About 1,000 British and Iraqi troops raided a police station in the southern city of Basra on Monday, killing seven gunmen and taking custody of more than 100 prisoners who were believed to be marked for execution by a renegade police unit.

Many of the prisoners at the Jamiat police station showed signs of torture, including cigarette and electrical burns, gunshot wounds to their legs and knees, and hands that had been crushed, said Capt. Tane Dunlop, a spokesman for British forces in Iraq. The station, a base for a squad known as the serious crimes unit, was later blown up by British forces.
--British Troops Raid, Raze Station House in Southern Iraq, Nancy Trejos and Sudarsan Raghavan, Washington Post, December 26, 2006

The United States established the Central Criminal Court of Iraq three years ago, envisioning it as a pillar of new democracy. But like the faltering effort to create effective Iraqi security forces, the system for detaining, charging and trying suspects has instead become another weak link in the rule of law in Iraq, according to an examination of the justice system by the New York Times.

…Almost every aspect of the judicial system is lacking, poorly serving not just detainees but also Iraqi citizens and troops trying to maintain order.

A classified Pentagon assessment completed in June of the American effort to strengthen Iraqi justice found one sign of progress: the prosecution of former senior government officials. Everything else, from training judges to building court capacity to minimizing civil rights abuses by Iraqi security forces, had fallen behind, according to the assessment by the National Security Council.

…"The most fundamental thing we need to do in Iraq is establish the rule of law," said Mark Waller, an Air Force Reserve major and deputy district attorney in Colorado, who spent four months this year in Baghdad helping to prosecute detainees. "It's the cornerstone of a civilization. Without it you have anarchy. And we are falling short."
--"The Legal System in Iraq Staggers Beneath the Weight of War," Michael Moss, New York Times, December 17, 2006

The Bush administration routinely has underreported the level of violence in Iraq in order to disguise its policy failings, the Iraq Study Group report said.

…"The standard for reporting attacks acts as a filter to keep events out of reports and databases," the report said. "…If we cannot determine the source of a sectarian attack, that assault does not make it into the database. A roadside bomb or a rocket or mortar attack that doesn't hut U.S. personnel doesn't count."

Bush and his top officials have denied the allegations and accused the news media of exaggerating the violence between Iraqi Shiite and Sunni Muslims, minority Kurds and other groups.
--"Study Says Violence in Iraq Has Been Underreported," Jonathan S. Landay, McClatchy Newspapers, December 6, 2006

Along with its many other desperate problems, Iraq is in the midst of a housing crises that is worsening by the day.

It began right after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, when many landlords took advantage of the removal of his economic controls and raised rents substantially, forcing out thousands of families who took shelter in abandoned government buildings and military bases. As the chaos in Iraq grew and the ranks of the jobless swelled, even more Iraqis migrated to squalid squatter encampments. Still others constructed crude shantytowns on empty plots where conditions were even worse.

Now, after more than 10 months of brutal sectarian reprisals, many more Iraqis have fled their neighborhoods, only to wind up often in places that are just as wretched in other ways. While 1.8 million Iraqis are living outside the country, 1.6 million more have been displaced within Iraq since the war began. Since February, about 50,000 per month have moved within the country.

…With many families in such encampments or worse, and many others doubled or tripled up in friends' or relatives' homes, the deputy housing minister, Istabraq al-Shouk, puts the shortage at two million dwellings across Iraq.
--"Crises in Housing Adds to Miseries of Iraq Mayhem," Michael Luo, New York Times, December 29, 2006

Iraq is emerging as one of the fastest-growing refugee crises in the world, with an estimated 1.8 million Iraqis displaced from their homes and up to 100,000 fleeing the country to Jordan, Syria, and other nations amid intensifying sectarian violence, U.S. and other officials testified yesterday.

Yet the United States has allowed only 466 Iraqis to immigrate under refugee status since 2003…
--Iraq Refugee Crises Seen Deepening," Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post, January 17, 2007

The level of corruption in the Iraq Security Forces is staggering. The Iraq Study Group found that $5 billion to $7 billion is lost annually to different types of corruption…

…The most prominent forms of corruption I saw were Iraqi commanders pocketing the paychecks of nonexistent troops in the Iraqi army and officers in the police forces, and customs officials abetting the smuggling of oil and precious rebuilding supplies across Iraq's porous borders.

A United States interagency panel reported in November that oil smuggling abetted by corrupt Iraqi customs officials is netting insurgents $100 million a year, helping make them financially self-sustaining.
--"Losing Iraq, One Truckload at a Time," Luis Carlos Montalvan, New York Times op-ed, January 14, 2007. Luis Carlos Montalvan is a U.S. Army captain.

The United Nations reported that more than 34,000 Iraqis were killed in violence last year, a figure that represents the first comprehensive annual count of civilian deaths and a vivid measure of the failure of the Iraqi government and the American military to provide security.

The report was the first attempt at hand-counting individual deaths for an entire year. It was compiled using reports from morgues, hospitals and municipal authorities across Iraq, and was nearly three times higher than an estimate for 2006 compiled from Iraqi ministry tallies…

…The violence has expanded to the point of leaving hospitals and morgues overflowing with bodies. The report described the discovery of several recent mass graves.
--"Iraqi Death Toll Exceeded 34,000 in '06, U.N. Says," Sabrina Tavernise, New York Times, January 17, 2007

(Wolf Blitzer, CNN "Situation Room") But there is a terrible situation (in Iraq.)

(Vice President Dick Cheney) No, there is not. There is not…

(Blitzer, later in the interview) ...So you're moving forward no matter what the consequences?

(Cheney) We are moving forward.

(Blitzer, returning to the subject later) Here's the problem that you have--the administration--credibility in Congress and with the American public, because of the mistakes, because of the previous statements, the last throes, the comment you made a year-and-a-half ago, the insurgency was in its last throes. How do you build up that credibility because so many of the Democrats, and a lot of Republicans now are saying they don't believe you anymore?

(Cheney) Well, Wolf, if the history books were written by people who have--are so eager to write off this effort, to declare it a failure, including many of our friends in the media, the situation obviously would have been over a long time ago. Bottom line is that we've had enormous success, and we will continue to have enormous successes.
--"Interview of the Vice President by Wolf Blitzer, CNN 'Situation Room', provided by the Vice President's Ceremonial Office, January 24, 2007

SEN. JAMES WEBB'S RESPONSE TO BUSH: FULL TEXT

Guys, I searched all over the world wide web--including Senator Webb's own official website, to find the full text of his response to the State of the Union. Understand that, normally, party bosses pretty much tell the responder what to say--and they tried it with Webb. But the crusty individualist said, Thanks, but No Thanks. I can handle it.

He wrote these heartfelt remarks himself, and when he said, referring to his family's and his own distinguished military service, and to his son, currently serving in Iraq with the Marine Corps--

"Like so many other Americans, today and throughout our history, we serve and have served, not for political reasons, but because we love our country. On the political issues — those matters of war and peace, and in some cases of life and death — we trusted the judgment of our national leaders. We hoped that they would be right, that they would measure with accuracy the value of our lives against the enormity of the national interest that might call upon us to go into harm‘s way. "

--I burst into tears. It was the first voice I have heard out of Washington, D.C., who speaks for US, the longsuffering military families who have paid such a terrible price for this war and who feel so forgotten in any way other than yellow ribbon magnets.

I finally found the full text of his speech in, of all places, the Prescott Herald: The Voice of Rural Arizona. Many thanks to Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo (www.talkingpointsmemo.com), for providing the link.

Here are Senator Webb's full remarks. They were delivered with calm, quiet steadiness. At one point, he held up a photograph of his father, taken in Germany when he was deployed for three years, and said he'd carried it with him for 50 years, that it speaks to him of sacrifice.

I'm not going to comment further on this eloquent and powerful nine-minute speech. I will let it speak for itself.

By The Associated Press 22 minutes ago

Democratic response of Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., to President Bush ‘s State of the Union address Tuesday, as prepared for delivery and provided by his office:


Good evening.

I'm Senator Jim Webb, from Virginia, where this year we will celebrate the 400th anniversary of the settlement of Jamestown ­ an event that marked the first step in the long journey that has made us the greatest and most prosperous nation on earth.

It would not be possible in this short amount of time to actually rebut the president's message, nor would it be useful. Let me simply say that we in the Democratic Party hope that this administration is serious about improving education and health care for all Americans, and addressing such domestic priorities as restoring the vitality of New Orleans.

Further, this is the seventh time the president has mentioned energy independence in his State of the Union message, but for the first time this exchange is taking place in a Congress led by the Democratic Party. We are looking for affirmative solutions that will strengthen our nation by freeing us from our dependence on foreign oil, and spurring a wave of entrepreneurial growth in the form of alternate energy programs. We look forward to working with the president and his party to bring about these changes.

There are two areas where our respective parties have largely stood in contradiction, and I want to take a few minutes to address them tonight. The first relates to how we see the health of our economy,­ how we measure it, and how we ensure that its benefits are properly shared among all Americans. The second regards our foreign policy, how we might bring the war in Iraq to a proper conclusion that will also allow us to continue to fight the war against international terrorism, and to address other strategic concerns that our country faces around the world.

Economy

When one looks at the health of our economy, it's almost as if we are living in two different countries. Some say that things have never been better. The stock market is at an all-time high, and so are corporate profits. But these benefits are not being fairly shared. When I graduated from college, the average corporate CEO made 20 times what the average worker did; today, it's nearly 400 times. In other words, it takes the average worker more than a year to make the money that his or her boss makes in one day.

Wages and salaries for our workers are at all-time lows as a percentage of national wealth, even though the productivity of American workers is the highest in the world. Medical costs have skyrocketed. College tuition rates are off the charts. Our manufacturing base is being dismantled and sent overseas. Good American jobs are being sent along with them.

In short, the middle class of this country, our historic backbone and our best hope for a strong society in the future, is losing its place at the table. Our workers know this, through painful experience. Our white-collar professionals are beginning to understand it, as their jobs start disappearing also. And they expect, rightly, that in this age of globalization, their government has a duty to insist that their concerns be dealt with fairly in the international marketplace.

In the early days of our republic, President Andrew Jackson established an important principle of American-style democracy ­that we should measure the health of our society not at its apex, but at its base. Not with the numbers that come out of Wall Street, but with the living conditions that exist on Main Street. We must recapture that spirit today.

And under the leadership of the new Democratic Congress, we are on our way to doing so. The House just passed a minimum wage increase, the first in 10 years, and the Senate will soon follow. We've introduced a broad legislative package designed to regain the trust of the American people. We've established a tone of cooperation and consensus that extends beyond party lines. We're working to get the right things done, for the right people and for the right reasons.

International affairs

With respect to foreign policy, this country has patiently endured a mismanaged war for nearly four years. Many, including myself, warned even before the war began that it was unnecessary, that it would take our energy and attention away from the larger war against terrorism, and that invading and occupying Iraq would leave us strategically vulnerable in the most violent and turbulent corner of the world.

I want to share with all of you a picture that I have carried with me for more than 50 years. This is my father, when he was a young Air Force captain, flying cargo planes during the Berlin Airlift. He sent us the picture from Germany, as we waited for him, back here at home. When I was a small boy, I used to take the picture to bed with me every night, because for more than three years my father was deployed, unable to live with us full-time, serving overseas or in bases where there was no family housing. I still keep it, to remind me of the sacrifices that my mother and others had to make, over and over again, as my father gladly served our country. I was proud to follow in his footsteps, serving as a Marine in Vietnam. My brother did as well, serving as a Marine helicopter pilot. My son has joined the tradition, now serving as an infantry Marine in Iraq.

Like so many other Americans, today and throughout our history, we serve and have served, not for political reasons, but because we love our country. On the political issues, those matters of war and peace, and in some cases of life and death, we trusted the judgment of our national leaders. We hoped that they would be right, that they would measure with accuracy the value of our lives against the enormity of the national interest that might call upon us to go into harm's way.

We owed them our loyalty, as Americans, and we gave it. But they owed us ­ sound judgment, clear thinking, concern for our welfare, a guarantee that the threat to our country was equal to the price we might be called upon to pay in defending it.

Iraq

The president took us into this war recklessly. He disregarded warnings from the national security adviser during the first Gulf War, the chief of staff of the army, two former commanding generals of the Central Command, whose jurisdiction includes Iraq, the director of operations on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and many, many others with great integrity and long experience in national security affairs. We are now, as a nation, held hostage to the predictable ­and predicted ­disarray that has followed.

The war's costs to our nation have been staggering. Financially. The damage to our reputation around the world. The lost opportunities to defeat the forces of international terrorism. And especially the precious blood of our citizens who have stepped forward to serve.

The majority of the nation no longer supports the way this war is being fought; nor does the majority of our military. We need a new direction. Not one step back from the war against international terrorism. Not a precipitous withdrawal that ignores the possibility of further chaos. But an immediate shift toward strong regionally based diplomacy, a policy that takes our soldiers off the streets of Iraq's cities, and a formula that will in short order allow our combat forces to leave Iraq.

On both of these vital issues, our economy and our national security, it falls upon those of us in elected office to take action.

Regarding the economic imbalance in our country, I am reminded of the situation President Theodore Roosevelt faced in the early days of the 20th century. America was then, as now, drifting apart along class lines. The so-called robber barons were unapologetically raking in a huge percentage of the national wealth. The dispossessed workers at the bottom were threatening revolt.

Roosevelt spoke strongly against these divisions. He told his fellow Republicans that they must set themselves as resolutely against improper corporate influence on the one hand as against demagogy and mob rule on the other. And he did something about it.

As I look at Iraq, I recall the words of former general and soon-to-be President Dwight Eisenhower during the dark days of the Korean War, which had fallen into a bloody stalemate. "When comes the end?" asked the general who had commanded our forces in Europe during World War II. And as soon as he became president, he brought the Korean War to an end.

These presidents took the right kind of action, for the benefit of the American people and for the health of our relations around the world. Tonight we are calling on this president to take similar action, in both areas. If he does, we will join him. If he does not, we will be showing him the way.

Thank you for listening. And God bless America.

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

AMAZING, WHAT YOU CAN GET DONE IN 100 HOURS

House Democrats crossed the finished line Thursday in their race to pass a six-bill agenda in the first 100 hours of the new Congress--getting there 13 hours ahead of schedule.

…"We have delivered on our promise," Speaker Nancy Pelosi said at a news conference…
--"House Democrats Beat 100-Hour Clock," Kasie Hunt, Associated Press, January 19, 2007

…The House has now approved legislation directly addressing public concerns: raising minimum wage, ethics reform, interest rate reductions on subsidized college loans and expanded federal support for stem cell research. It has put in place rule changes to promote fiscal responsibility and adopted recommendations from the 9/11 commission. Today, the House is expected to repeal tax breaks for oil companies…These achievements constitute a modest start toward a saleable centrist agenda for a party too often in the past labeled as extreme.
--"Happy Hours," Thomas B. Edsall, conservative columnist for the New York Times, January 18, 2007

House Rolls Back Oil company Subsidies
--headline, Associated Press, January 18, 2007

House Approves Page Program Reforms
--headline, Yahoo! News, Janaury 19, 2007

Senate Passes Vast Ethics Overhaul
--headline, New York Times, January 19, 2007

The final package is the strongest ethics legislation to emerge from Congress yet. Like the rules changes the House adopted this month, it would bar lawmakers from taking free gifts, meals and entertainment. No longer would lobbyists and private interests be allowed to throw lavish parties honoring lawmakers at political conventions. Travel paid for by private interests would be dramatically curtailed. Lawmakers' cut-rate corporate jet flights would be grounded. The revolving door would be slowed, with lawmakers having to wait two years, not the current one year, before lobbying their former colleagues.

…Senate Majority leader Harry Reid, along with Sens. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill), deserves credit for assembling and passing this package.
--"Real Ethics Reform," editorial, Washington Post, January 20, 2997


Calling it, "common sense legislation that helps to return money to the pockets of the American people and invests in our future and America's future," House majority leader Steny Hoyer announced the sweeping and historical passage of more than six major pieces of legislation passed by the new Democratic House and Senate, delivering on promises made by newly elected Speaker Nancy Pelosi on the day Democrats returned to power last November.

One of the most striking things about this amazing accomplishment is the new rush of emboldened moderate Republicans, who did not bend to pressures put on them by their conservative leadership to block or gum up the works of the legislation, but instead, joined their Democratic counterparts in bipartisan cooperation that has not been seen since George W. Bush assumed the imperial presidency, aided and abetted by a rubber-stamp Republican Congress six long years ago.

As pointed out by Bob Schieffer on CBS's "Face the Nation," today, one of the reasons Congress might start getting things done now is that, for the past Republican years, that rubber-stamp Congress and their non-veto president managed to pretend to govern this nation by only working two or three days a week.

That's right. Congress was only in session two or three days a week the whole past six years.

So the Democrats took over, and the first thing their leadership did was state that, from now on, Congress was going to have to behave like the rest of the country and work five days a week.

One outraged conservative Republican congressman stood up and loudly accused the Democrats of "hating the American family" because they were expecting him to work five days a week.

I'm sure that struck a real chord among all those hard-working American families with two-income households or single parents struggling to juggle job and children.

Speaker Pelosi set this goal for the new congress months ago, but then, the day the new Congress convened, Bush suddenly releases this so-called big new war strategy he has supposedly been thinking about for two whole months, which automatically dominates news coverage and threatens to overwhelm the new Congress with public demands that they deal with it.

I'm sure he and his handlers thought that this would effectively shut down the new Congress, thus presenting Republican opponents in '08 with an opportunity to claim that the Democrats reneged on their 100-hour promise.

Go ahead. Mess with a mom who had five babies in five years and raised them while being an active political volunteer. See where it gets ya.

The new congress is actively involved in dealing with the president's unpopular scheme to escalate the war. But that has not stopped them from getting the job done that the American people elected them to do.

Speaker Pelosi has done an outstanding job in her first 100 hours, as have all the Democrats who worked so hard--AND all those moderate Republicans who were willing, finally, to break out of the Nazi lock-step forced on them by Tom DeLay and his ilk during six miserable do-nothing years--who have also gotten serious about finally getting things done.

They say Bush's State of the Union address is going to be much shorter then usual, and that he is going to discuss things like global warming and health care.

Gee. I wonder why.

It's amazing what you can accomplish in 100 hours with drive, determination, hard work, and the integrity to listen to your constituents and deliver on promises, rather than using that same period of time for personal partisan attacks, power grabs, and the politicizing of life and death issues that effect all Americans.

When Republicans were the opposition party, they used their platform to practice politics of personal destruction, trying to bring down a president who had been elected twice and who enjoyed great popularity in the country. They wasted countless thousands of hours in hearings about the minutia of his sex life, baseless investigations of anyone who worked with or for him, and more than $70 million of taxpayer money and untold numbers of federal agents trying to ferret out any dirt whatsoever they could use in their hateful campaign. (I must say that one of the indirect strengths of Hillary Clinton now is that their tactics have bitten them in the ass--because no candidate ever in the history of our government has ever been more thoroughly investigated and vetted and found to be clean by a Congress bent on his or her ruination.)

When the Republican party then took over the White House, they spent the next six years squandering American treasure in pet projects, shutting down any substantive debate on any issue that could effect their constituents and those of the other half of Congress represented by the opposition party, forcing gridlock in the government, using the power of Congress to stick its nose where it did not belong--the name "Terry Schiavo" comes to mind--never once investigating or even questioning any policy coming out of the White House, no matter how misguided or dangerous, (kowtowing so completely that in six years their fearless leader has only used his veto once), creating a culture of corruption so crooked it sent several members to prison, whipping up war-frenzy that threatened to consume any opponent who questioned it without ever seriously investigating the claims being handed to them on a Rovian platter, and running up a $9 trillion debt while wasting a solid surplus and dragging the government so deep into the red its budget may never be balanced again.

Don't even talk to me about FOUR YEARS of war in Iraq, more than 3,000 American dead and tens of thousands wounded and no end in sight.

(Did you know, by the way, that part of this big "surge" is going to come from pulling AN ENTIRE BATTALION OF DESPERATELY NEEDED TROOPS OUT OF AFGHANISTAN SO THEY CAN BE SENT TO IRAQ? JUST WHEN THE SPRING THAW SETS THE TALIBAN FREE TO LAUNCH NEW ATTACKS ON A COUNTRY THAT IS FAR FROM SECURE? Where is THAT in the so-called "liberal media"? It's a fact. And the only people in congress who think this is a good idea are conservative Republicans and one pseudo-independent.)

But I digress.

There is no doubt that, all things considered, the Democrats in congress--new and old--are also politicians, and we will be able to learn much about them by how they choose to wield power, and how effectively they are able to govern.

But from what we have seen so far, the indications are that they do not wish to repeat mistakes of the past from either party; they are listening to the people who put them in office, and they are going about first, trying to clean up the terrible mess left by their predecessors, and second, starting a brand-new day of solving the country's problems in pragmatic, common sense ways we can all appreciate.

I lift my glass to you all--Democrats and common-sense non-ideological Republicans alike. For the first time in more than a decade--I can't wait to see what happens next.

MUTINY!

The Appeal for Redress of Grievances, which relies on whistleblower protection laws, calls for "the prompt withdrawal of all American military forces and bases from Iraq" and represents the first organized active-duty military movement to oppose the war and occupation of Iraq since Vietnam. To date, over 1,000 active-duty members of the US military have signed it. While signers of the appeal span the ranks from private to rear admiral, the average signatory is a corporal or sergeant and has completed at least one tour of duty in Iraq.
--"Breaking Ranks: Troops Call for Iraq Withdrawal," Charles E. Anderson, truthout.org Guest Contributor, January 15, 2007. Mr. Anderson served in Iraq with the Marine Corps' Second Tank Battalion during the invasion of Iraq. During his nine-year career, he served in infantry, armor, and medical units.

Seaman Jonathan Hutto, co-founder of the Appeals for Redress…and co-founder Sergeant Liam Madden (USMC), joined by sailors, Marines, airmen, soldiers, and veterans of at least one tour of Iraq…will deliver a copy of the signed document to Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio)…

Marine Sergeant Madden calls it "completely legal." The Military Whistle-Blower Protection Act (DOD directive 7050.6) allows active-duty military, National Guard and Reservists, while out of uniform and off duty, to file and send a protected communication to a member of Congress regarding any subject without reprisal…

Madden spent seven months in the thick of it in Haditha, time that he initially refused to talk about, claiming "it has nothing to do with the Appeal for Redress." But then he said that he was one of the "lucky ones, I didn't come home with any physical or mental problems." When asked what his plans are for the future, Sgt. Madden replies, "To keep on with this struggle until this illegal, immoral war is over."
--"Iraq Vets Call on Congress to End War," Stacy Bannerman, January 15, 2007. Bannerman is the author of When the War Came Home: The Inside Story of Reservists and the Families They Leave Behind (Continuum Publishing, 2005). She is a member of Military Families Speak Out.

Majority Democrats are already working on texts designed to attract maximum Republican support. The Senate vote will be especially telling, since Democrats need to find 10 votes among their opponents to gather the 60 needed to defeat the filibuster promised by minority leader Mitch McConnell, a loyal backer of the President. If they succeed, it will be seen as further proof that Mr. Bush has lost control of the Capitol Hill wing of his party, as Republican congressmen and senators facing re-election in 2008 run for cover from a war that sent the party to defeat in November's mid-term vote. "Everybody is scared spitless," John Thune, the South Dakota Republican, told the New York Times.
--"Bush Faces Mutiny Over Extra Troops in Iraq," Rupert Cornwell in Washington, for the British newspaper, The Independent, January 15, 2007.


Back in 1846, President James K. Polk saw a golden opportunity to seize thousands of square miles of land--roughly Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona--from Mexico.

So he trumped up a fake "attack" by Mexican soldiers on American troops stationed on the border and declared war on Mexico.

There were plenty of politicians in Congress who saw right away the bogus ploy, and they had two choices: try to shout down the warmongers, or back Polk's war.

Those who tried to oppose Polk soon found themselves the brunt of furious accusations in the press of not being patriotic enough, of not loving their country, and of withholding support from our brave fighting men. Most of them were cowed by such attacks and backed down.

One young congressman would not be deterred. In a series of rousing speeches, he claimed that, "from beginning to end, this war is the sheerest deception…" and stoutly maintained that, "The president had hoped to escape public scrutiny, by fixing the public gaze upon the exceeding brightness of military glory…that serpent's eye, that charms to destroy."

When the flag-wavers turned vicious, the freshman congressman still held his ground, likening the president's message to, "the half-insane mumbling of a fever-dream…a war of conquest brought into existence to catch votes."

But that war-fever had already been whipped into a frenzy, and not only was the courageous young congressman ignored, but his passion for peace cost him his job. He was soundly defeated for re-election after serving just one two-year term, and returned to private law practice to live a quiet life away from the public eye.

History, however, had different plans for him.

While most of us have no idea of the names of the politicians and newspaper editors who vilified the scrawny young congressman, we do, however, remember HIS.

It was Abraham Lincoln.

Throughout the years, there have been other congressmen and women of principle, who risked their work and their careers to fight for the fighters. Listen to the words of the first presidential candidate I ever voted for:

"Every senator in this chamber is partly responsible for sending 50,000 young Americans to an early grave…This chamber reeks of blood."
--Senator George McGovern, on the floor of the Senate on Sept. 1, 1970, quoted in the article, "Mustering the Courage to End War," Robert Mann, Boston Globe, January 15, 2007. When McGovern was ridiculed for his dissent as a "cut and run" policy, the decorated WWII bomber pilot replied, "Do not talk to the wounded about bugging out or national honor or courage. It does not take any courage at all for a congressman or a senator or a president to wrap himself in the flag and say we are staying in Vietnam, because it is not our blood that is being shed."


There are all different kinds of courage in this world. We all know the kind of courage it takes for a young Marine or soldier to strap on a hundred pounds of gear, body armor, and helmet, pick up an M-16, and head out into the blazing sun or the cold dark of night in a country filled with people who want nothing more than to kill him or her before the end of the day. If their best friend is blown apart in front of their eyes, and they race that friend to the field hospital, and wait and pray, and find that it is too late, and kiss their buddy good-bye forever--the very next thing they do is pick up that rifle and head back out into the line of fire again.

They do this even when they KNOW the cause is lost, and not because they are stupid or blindly obedient, but because this is their LIFE, it is their WORK, and they hope against hope that no matter how bad things get, that somehow, some way, what they do will matter in this world.

It takes the most craven kind of cowardice in the world to keep sending these brave young troops back out into that heat over and over and over again just because you are afraid what will happen to your career or your place in history if you call them back.

And it takes a whole other kind of courage to fight those who would destroy you for no other reason than that you have opposed them.

Although the thousand-plus active-duty troops and officers who have signed the Redress petition did so under a Whistle-Blower's law, we all know the kinds of underhanded things that can be done to destroy a military career by even so much as one superior officer who finds such an action offensive. To put your name on the dotted line, to stand in front of television cameras and speak out, knowing full well that you will most likely be sent back into that very war to fight again before you ever get out of that uniform takes a kind of courage that most people can't even begin to imagine in their lives--most especially, politicians.

They say that wars are fought not for God and country and mom and apple pie, and not for politics, but for, as my son said during his time in the Battle of Fallujah, "for the guy in front of me and the guy behind me and the guys on either side of me."

Guys fight, quite simply, to get their buddies home. They fight to accomplish a mission, yes, but their primary concern is getting home alive with all their buddies.

The men and women who signed the petition for Redress are also doing so for their buddies, believe me.

My son called to tell me that one of his buddies was scheduled to deploy in April but will now be leaving in February, and rather than a seven-month combat deployment--and believe me, no one sees tougher wartime combat conditions than Marine Corps grunts, especially the NCO's like my son and his buddy--rather than seven months of hell, he'll be required to put in the better part of a year.

If he lives that long, of course. And this is his third deployment.

My son also told me how, on base, there are increasing signs of mental and emotional strain among the troops--not just incidents of post traumatic stress and suicide, but domestic violence and divorce.

Bush can feel as brave as he wants to feel as he "stands alone" with his miserable failure of a plan, but he does not know the MEANING of the word, "bravery."

Those who signed that petition have already done their time in hell and know they will most likely be forced to return. They also know that by signing that petition, they may be opening themselves up to all manner of harassment.

Somehow though, this time, I don’t think so.

My son wanted to know how on earth the president could get away with forcing wartime policy on a country where seventy percent of the American people oppose him. He wanted to know how the president could get away with forcing wartime policy on a country when the entire joint chiefs of staff oppose him. He wanted to know how the president could get away with forcing wartime policy on a Congress where the majority are opposed to the plan. He wanted to know how the president could get away with forcing wartime policy on commanders on the ground who do not think this policy will work. He wanted to know how the president could get away with ordering the military into another failed policy plan when a large majority of the military is opposed to the plan.

My active-duty Marine Corps son who has served two deployments to Iraq actually said, "He's acting like Saddam."

My son wanted to know what Congress was doing to stop Bush. I told him that, technically, there was not much they could do under the Constitution to stop the president other than cut off funds to the troops, which no one wanted to do, but that they were working on it.


Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa), chairman of the House appropriations defense subcommittee, said he would not limit funds for the troops already in Iraq but would try to put language in the bill carrying supplemental funds for the war that could prevent the final two U.S. brigades from going over in April and May.

His vehicle would be roughly $100 billion in supplemental funds for the war that the White House has said it would send Congress in February. Murtha said he would use hearings on that legislation to show there are no reserve U.S. troops available in case of conflicts with Iran or North Korea.

Describing limitations he might put on the supplemental bill, Murtha said, "I'm going to build a case that says we're in danger because we don't have a strategic reserve" and that troops would not be sent back if they haven't finished their training cycle. He also said, "I don't know how many troops they can get in the field before we get our bill up and passed in Congress."
--"Democrats Differ on Iraq Bill's Bite; Some See It as a Powerful Statement, but Murtha Would Give It Fiscal Teeth," Walter Pincus, Washington Post, January 15, 2007


Already there are signs that this is a cluster-you-know-what every bit as botched as the initial invasion, in that it is being rushed so fast in order to bypass Congress and any stopgap measures they might put forth, that conditions on the ground are chaotic. For one thing, the plan calls for "twinning" and "partnering" Americans with Iraqi troops and nobody knows what the hell that means. Also, there are no plans for the implementation of supply lines for fuel and ammunition and so on, not just for the added American troops, but for the added Iraqi troops, and that is just the start of the problems….


The signs so far have unnerved some American s working on the plan, who have described a web of problems--ranging from a contested chain of command to how to protect American troops deployed in some of Baghdad's most dangerous districts--that some fear could hobble the effort before it begins.

…"We are implementing a strategy to embolden a government that is actually part of the problem," said an American military official in Baghdad involved in talks over the plan. "We are being played like a pawn."

…The new command structure seemed rife with potential for conflect. An American military official said that the arrangements appeared unwieldy, and at odds with military doctrine calling for a clear chain of command. "There's no military definition for 'partnered,' he said.

…Another concern is that the target of the new Baghdad plan--Sunni and Shiite extremists--may replicate the pattern American troops have seen before when they have embarked on major offensives--of "melting away" only to return later.
--"U.S. and Iraqis Are Wrangling Over War Plans," John F. Burns, New York Times, January 15, 2007


You will hear the plan's proponents raise up the Holy Grail of Tal Afar, and how successful this type of plan was there two years ago. However, Tal Afar was not a mixed neighborhood like Baghdad, and it only had a population of 60,000. Further, American troops basically built a wall around the city to protect it. None of those options are available now in Baghdad, which holds one-quarter of the population of the entire country, in violently segregated neighborhoods at war with one another and ethnic cleansing fully underway.

The bottom line is this: Every single military decision made by this administration since before the invasion has proved to be WRONG WRONG WRONG. Every time they are opposed from within the ranks, they replaced those who opposed them with yes-men who would go along with yet another failed plan.

It's different, now.

Yes, Bush has replaced those who opposed him in his command structure, and muzzled the joint chiefs.

But he hasn't got an eighty percent approval rate now like he did in the beginning, and he no longer has a rubber-stamp Republican congress willing to go along with any travesty in order to please their lord and master. He no longer has the overwhelming support of the American people, and he no longer has the unequivocal backing of the military itself.

By racing to bypass Congress and thrust troops into action before their training is complete, into a ground situation that is not ready for them, he will only find himself caught in his own trap. Even those preening parrots of the punditry who babble whatever they are told by the White House will find themselves speaking in tongues before very much more time goes by. Watch and see.

And the Democrats and moderate Republicans in congress who will receive--TODAY--a Redress petition to end the war signed by brave troops who have already paid a terrible price--those men and women of Congress and the Senate are getting sick and tired of serving in a chamber that reeks of blood.

I hope that all the men and women who are bravely clamboring into their suits of armor before riding off--yet again--to fight the savage dragon…I hope they know that back home, their buddies have their backs, military families who are fighting for them to come home have their backs, and even politicians in power who now have the wherewithal to go into battle on their behalf are also fighting to get them home. We've all got their backs.

We will not forget. We will not give up. We will not be swift-boated. We will not back down.

Abraham Lincoln would be proud.

THE NEW KICK-ASS CONGRESS

"Who pays the price for your decisions? I won't. My kids are too old and my grandkids are too young. You won't. You don't have any children. Nobody in this administration has any children who are fighting in this war. What I want to know is, what is the human impact for these decisions? The cost is too high."
--Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer, questioning Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice at hearings on the president's new plan for Iraq, called by Democratic Senator Joe Biden, who is the new chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

"We are not going to babysit a civil war."
--Democratic Senator and potential presidential candidate, Barack Obama

"I've gone along with the president on this, and I bought into his dream. And at this stage of the game, I don't think it's going to happen."
--Republican Senator George V. Voinovich, to Secretary Rice

(interrupting Rice, who was making the argument that we are "making progress" in Iraq) "You sit there and say that, and that's just not true."
--Republican Senator and potential presidential candidate Chuck Hagel

"I have supported you and the administration on the war, and I cannot continue to support the administration's position. I have not been told the truth over and over again by administration witnesses, and the American people have not been told the truth."
--Democratic Senator Bill Nelson

"I just want the record to show and I would like to have a legal response from the State Department if they think they have authority to pursue networks or anything else across the border into Iran and Iraq that will generate a constitutional confrontation here in the Senate, I predict to you."
--Democratic Senator and presidential candidate Joe Biden

"We will not be swift-boated on this issue."
--new Democratic Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, in a conference call to ranking political bloggers following Bush's speech


It's not very often that I literally jump to my feet, pump my fist, shout "YES!" and let out a maniacal laugh while watching the evening news, as I did a couple of days ago, and let me tell you, boys and girls, it felt GREAT.

What prompted my mini-celebration was a simple statement by NBC Nightly News's political commentator, Tim Russert who, following the confrontation between Sen. Barbara Boxer and a stunned Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, were two words: "PERSONAL PRICE".

He didn't just say them, he repeated them. "The question put to the administration by the Congress today is, quite simply, WHO PAYS THE PERSONAL PRICE FOR THEIR DECISIONS? Only half a dozen congressmen have a son or daughter serving in Iraq, and no one in the administration. The question being asked is, Who makes the sacrifice the president is asking for? Who pays the personal price?" (Forgive me if I paraphrase a bit--I didn't have paper and pen in front of me and was too busy shouting and cheering to write down his comments verbatim.)

What caused my joy was the simple fact that, for six miserable years--really longer, going back to the presidential campaign of 2000, this administration has CONTROLLED THE FRAMEWORK OF MEDIA DEBATE on this war (on everything, really), and Democrats and moderate Republicans have been put ON THE DEFENSIVE. Meanwhile, whatever choice of terminology or framework Karl Rove could think up in his diabolical little mind was automatically picked up by the mainstream media and trumpeted until the hapless opposition was forced to lay back their ears, tuck their tails between their legs, and leave the room whining.

More times than I can count or care to admit to anyone who is not a trained psychotherapist, I have screamed at the television news or the computer screen where I was reading various newspapers, so filled with utter frustration and rage that I could barely function. Not on every single outrage, mind you--I'd be committed to the looney bin by now--but the kinds of outrages that directly affect the men and women who are fighting his endless horror of a war.

I must admit to you that, after these last elections, when ranking Democrats took over control of powerful committees in both houses for the first time in 12 long miserable years, I have come to a point where I have been able to forgive the Democrats and moderate Republicans who, as I crudely pointed out in the early days of the Bush administration, "laid back and spread their legs for Bush."

They just sat there and let him and the Tom Delays of the world, fueled and financed and promoted and empowered by the Rush Limbaughs and Ann Coulters and Rupert Murdochs on the world--get away, literally, with murder.

I wanted sane minds to prevail. I wanted them to FIGHT.

But if there is one pet peeve I have--just in a general standpoint--it is revisionist history. It's real easy now, in this political climate, to wonder WHY they didn't fight harder, but you have got to remember the bilious, poisonous atmosphere brought by the right wing of the Republican party to their reign of terror in the Congress.

I mean, really, when you've got a fine, honorable, brave, and experienced man like Max Cleland, who left half his body in the bloody jungles of Vietnam, when you stand by in horror and watch him get run out of office for not being patriotic enough, just because he had the balls to question this war, then that is all you need to know about the nightmare of the last 12 years.

The reason I've come to forgive the Democrats and moderate voices for remaining silent is that I've matured politically. I've come to understand that, for experienced political hands, when they see such a poisonous political fog settle in over Washington, they know that they have two choices: (1) fight themselves right out of office or (2) wait.

Have you ever seen a cat stalk a mouse? Have you seen how patient they are, how still and silent? How they watch, wait, coil their muscles, prepare to pounce and then WHAM!

A cat knows that, quite likely, this might be its only shot at dinner. I have a big fluffy yellow and white cat I adore named Max, and he likes to try--and try--to catch birds who come up to eat the chicken scratch birdseed I sprinkle around outside our country home. I've seen him choose all sorts of hiding places, but he always pounces too soon, and they always fly away. I am absolutely convinced that some of them, like, say, the flashy cardinals, actually mock him and see if they can provoke him to attack. Then they just casually flutter off, laughing.

My daughter's cat, Annabelle, is far more patient. I've seen her bring down field rats almost as big as she is. She will sit in one prime location for hours, perfectly still, until they are fooled into venturing forth. Then she gets 'em.

I'm seeing now, how seasoned veterans who KNOW how to weild power, NOW HAVE THEIR SHOT, because they were patient, with a kind of patience I can not even begin to imagine, since the day Newt Gingrich first smirked for the cameras.

Had they stood and fought, as I naively wanted them to do for many years, they would now be out of office, and inexperienced rookies would have their jobs.

Just as some things are well worth fighting for, so are some things worth waiting for.

In the beginning, I have always said that the American people were suffering from post traumatic stress from 9-11, and this reptilian administration knew just how to prey on the nation's fears, how to make them worse, how to symbolically set themselves up as saviors, how to befuddle the issues, how to, not just annihilate any opposition, but destroy it.

Karl Rove and Tom Delay and their ilk were never satisfied with ruining someone's career. They wanted to ruin their lives.

By setting up standard opponents as enemies, they created an atmosphere of the worst repression I have ever seen in all my many years of being a political junkie. People who worked in Washington for a lifetime said they had never seen anything like it.

By iron-fisted talking-point rule, they forced robotic obedience of not just their party, but their media hacks as well, which means they controlled the information that was put before the American people, and by controlling what the American people were told, they controlled the world.

I'm not sure when the citizenry first began to see through the fog and begin to realize that the emperor had no clothes. God knows it wasn't this debacle of a war. It was, I think, the birthday-cake photo op of Bush and McCain hamming it up for the cameras in Arizona, while Katrina was busy slaughtering a great American city.

Remember Saddam's spokesman, Tarik Aziz, in the first week of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, claiming that Saddam's forces were clearly winning, when the whole world could see otherwise? Well, I think the whole "heckuva job, Brownie," was the first in-your-face proof to the American people that they had been and were being manipulated.

That they were, in fact, being lied to.

Or maybe it was that whole weapons of mass destruction thing. There not being any, I mean.

It was an accumulative effect, but once it got started, it became an avalanche.

By the time the election season of '06 rolled around, when a smug and swaggering Rove/Bush tried all their old bullshit tactics and were SO SURE those tactics would work and SO SHOCKED when they didn't--by then the public had become like a man or woman who has stayed too long with a lover who is so bad for them that all their friends and family can see it, but they seem blind, putting up with abuses and slurs and disappointments for far too long, and then some precipitating event occurs--sometimes it's small and seemingly insignificant, and sometimes it's huge--but in any event, suddenly, THEY'VE HAD ENOUGH.

After that, it's over.

Bush and his minions are claiming that by escalating the troops now, we can bring them home sooner. But people aren't buying Bush Snake Oil any more, and there's a good reason for that.


"A majority of the American people, a majority of you listening to me, are for the withdrawal of our forces…The action I have taken tonight is indispensable for the continuing success of the withdrawal program."
--President Richard M. Nixon, in a televised speech about Vietnam in 1970, after he had expanded the war into Cambodia


Bush tried all his old PR tactics after his big speech, like presenting a Medal of Honor to a grieving family in the Oval Office--which his sadistic handlers knew would bring forth tears for the cameras--and then traveling to a military base to preen for more cameras with the troops he was getting ready to send into hell for their third deployment, two months early, who had just learned they'd be staying four months longer than originally scheduled.

Only this time, not even the longsuffering soldiers bought the dog-and-pony show. For one thing, his half-hour long speech was only interrupted by a smattering of polite applause three times, and that was when he mentioned things like a former Medal of Honor winner from that unit. So there were no smiling cheering GIs to mug for the cameras with their fearless leader.

Then--and even more telling--the base general refused to let any of them speak to the press, and ushered the press out IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING the speech. Later, when the press howled about that, he offered to present them with a few "select soldiers" for a preprogrammed interview, but by then, even the media was no longer fooled.

What does that tell you?

Polls the day following Bush's Last Stand showed that seventy percent of the people polled were not impressed by the so-called "new strategy" and do not approve of Bush's policies in this war, overall.

Although Bush likes to compare himself to Harry Truman, and to think he's actually brave to "go it alone" the way he is, and that eventually, he will be vindicated by history, like dear old Harry, well, the American people aren't buying that, either.

We knew Harry Truman. Harry Truman was a friend of ours. And you, sir, are no Harry Truman.

They say the White House was stunned by the vigorous opposition presented by not just Congress, but by THEIR OWN PARTY. The fact that they are surprised at all is yet more weary proof of just how out of touch this bubble-administration really is.

Even their favorite conservative columnists are abandoning ship, much to the bubble-boys' surprise:


The enemy in Iraq is not some discrete group of killers. It's the maelstrom of violence and hatred that infects every institution, including the government and the military. Instead of facing up to this core reality, the Bush administration has papered over it with salesmanship and spin.
"The Fog Over Iraq," David Brooks, conservative columnist for the New York Times, January 11, 2007


If Bush and the bubble-boys were surprised at the political push-back from Congress and the American people…Well baby, they ain't seen nothin' yet.


"I think what occurred her today was fairly profound, in the sense that you heard 21 members, with one or two notable exceptions, expressing outright hostility, disagreement, and or overwhelming concern with the president's proposal."
--Democratic Senator Joe Biden, following Rice's appearance.

Our new Democratic Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, said that he not only had the votes to pass a resolution that amounts to, basically, a vote of no confidence on this new Bush folly, but he even had the votes to override a threatened right-wing filibuster as well. "It will mark the beginning of the end of the war," he said.

There's blood in the water, folks, and for once, it's not that of American men and women in Iraq.

It's Bush's blood. And the sharks are circling, biding their time.

THE BATTLE OF LITTLE BIG BUSH

"A great war leaves the country with three armies--an army
of cripples, an army of mourners, and an army of thieves."
--German proverb
President Bush will unleash the latest formula of folly in Iraq: the "surge" doctrine, embroidered with a theme of "sacrifice." Voices of the dead scream in silent sorrow, and the world watches aghast at the fiery failure…The coming speech matters little…The words will be nothing more than the rush of wind and the tinkling of brass, because in the end this is the ghoulish price of the Iraq War.

Three thousand dead--plus one gaping hole in the heart of New York City and America. It is an abyss deep enough to bury truth and sanity in the ink-stained darkness of fear, with the echoes of hollow men who seek to capitalize from such catastrophic pain.
--"Three Thousand Plus One," John Cory, truthout.org, January 10, 2006


This war is not worth fighting. And if there were ever serious talk about enacting a draft or raising taxes to fight it, you'd see quickly enough that the vast majority of Americans would not find it worth fighting.

There must be a leader somewhere who can shake the U.S. out of this tragic hypnotic state, who can see that it is beyond crazy to continue our involvement in this war indefinitely, to sacrifice another 1,000 young lives, and then another thousand after that.

All of the tortured, twisted rationales for this war--all of the fatuous intellectual pyrotechnics dreamed up to justify it--have vaporized, and we're left with just the mad , mindless, meaningless and apparently endless slaughter.

Shakespeare, in "Henry VI" said, "now thou art come unto a feast of death."
--"Another Thousand Lives," Bob Herbert, New York Times, January 4, 2007


According to the BBC and a rather gushing series of carefully choreographed White House leaks, the president's speech tonight is supposedly going to state as its centerpiece that Americans should be prepared to continue making greater sacrifice for the global war on terror--(read, Iraq)--for the sake of our nation's security. He's going to talk about a temporary "surge" of troops--(read, escalation of more than 20,000 troops for up to two years, just before the next elections)-- to secure Baghdad so that the baby government there can survive and go on to build a thriving democracy that will protect American interests--(read, oil)-- in the Middle East.

He's going to say that "victory" is still possible (he says that's "a word Americans understand," as opposed to, say, "quagmire" or "stalemate"), and that this time it's going to be different because he has a whole new bunch of generals to fight this war and because he will be implementing all these great new ideas to stabilize the country politically--expect him to use such words as "microloan," which recently drew worldwide media attention when a Nobel-prize-winning economist implemented microloans in Indonesia, to great success.

Expect him to make a big deal of enumerating all the experts he has met with in his "listening tour," (which, by the way, was a term coined by Hillary Clinton when she first went around upstate New York, listening to potential constituents at places like county fairs and coffee shops, prior to her first election as a U.S. Senator in 2000.)

Expect him NOT to mention that, in spite of all the people he supposedly "listened to," the only ones he actually HEARD were the same neocons who got us into this debacle in the first place, but I'll get into that later.

Expect him to sing the praises of the new command structure he has put in place to run the war; expect him NOT to mention that, although their retirements were due, he hastened the departure of generals who publicly disagreed with him on escalating the war, and put in their place generals and an admiral who like the idea. Sound familiar?

I've spent the past several weeks reading everything I could get my hands on about the so-called new strategy. I've read stuff by such neoconservative voices as William Krystol, Frederick Kagan, and General Jack Keane, moderates like Democratic Senator Joe Biden, and some liberals, such as New York Times columnist Bob Herbert.

I have deliberately avoided even READING things by such inflammatory liberals as Cindy Sheehan and Michael Moore, because I wanted my consideration to be fair and even-handed. I was looking for facts, not emotional rhetoric--on either side.

As I have stated soooo many times on Blue Inkblots; I have my opinions about this war, and I keep hoping and praying that I might be proved WRONG.

My son fought with honor and bravery in that bloody desert country; once during the now-famous Battle of Fallujah in November of '04, and again more recently, in locations scattered throughout the Anbar province. He saw one friend get both legs and an arm blown off, another lose a hand, another get killed by a bullet to the head, and more horrors than he would be comfortable knowing I was writing about in such a public place. He also once drove a Humvee over an improvised explosive device that blew up beneath him. He was medivacced out, checked over, and sent back into combat.

Now, he's finding out that Marines like him who are "short-timers," completing their final year in the service, are being badgered and harassed and downright threatened in an attempt to force them to go back to Iraq, even if their own unit is not scheduled to do so. Marines in Dustin's unit, for instance, are being told that if they don't re-enlist in order to deploy with their own units (which aren't scheduled to go back until they are out of the Marines), then they must actually join other units that are scheduled to return soon.

Younger, more vulnerable Marines succumb to such pressures, and now, due to the new "surge" policy, those Marines will be deploying a full month ahead of time and held over for FIVE MONTHS longer than their usual tours. (If, of course, they survive that long.) And they won't even be with their buddies they served with before and upon whom they have come to rely for their lives, because they were pressed into another unit that was due to deploy soon.

This is happening because the Marines are being pressured to come up with thousands of troops THEY DON'T HAVE for this so-called, politely-worded "surge."

I don't blame the Marines. I blame their commander in chief.

When Rumsfeld finally left, when the Iraq Study Group came out with their recommendations, when the Democratic party was returned to power in a clear voter mandate of protest against the way this war has been prosecuted, I even felt a few days of peaceful hope that maybe, at long last, we could come to some sort of resolution over there that would make it all worthwhile.

For instance, when I first read of the proposals for such measures at the microloans, I felt even a glimmer of hope that maybe Bush was, at long last, onto something. I'm sure many folks listening to his words tonight will think the same thing.

This is why I chose to write now, before the speech, to let you know ahead of time that (a) there is nothing new here (b) it's all been tried--IN IRAQ--before and (c) it's too little, too late.

I am not trying to be obstructionist here just because I don't like George W. Bush.

I am trying to point out what needs to be known, for anybody out there who cares to educate themselves, because my son's life hangs in the balance, and the lives of his buddies, and all the other buddies and all the other sons and daughters who have been forced to sacrifice so much more than they ever dreamed when they took their oaths.

There isn't a whole lot Americans can do to stop a commander-in-chief if he is bound and determined to fight a war of ego. One need only to look back at a Democratic president--Lyndon Johnson--to know that. There isn't a whole lot Americans can do when a president chooses to fight a war for political purposes--just look toward Richard Nixon. There isn't a whole lot Congress can do, frankly, and they know it.

But I will not stand silently by while he lays on platitudes and patriotism and layers the sugar-coated frosting over a stale and rotting cake, and watch while Americans get hypnotized into going along once more.

All we can do, in the long run, is raise our voices to the rafters, and create such a howl and such a noise that those craven slavering politicians who will say or do anything to get elected will realize that they're not GOING to get elected until they stand up to the madness.

It starts with us.

I am going to divide this blog post into five sections: Surge, Sacrifice, Strategy, Surrounding & Stopping Bush, and Bush's Last Stand. You can scan down and read what interest you, or study the whole thing. It represents weeks of research and the best information I can find.

You can agree or disagree with my conclusions. The facts, well, they stand alone.


SURGE


Those who've sacrificed the most--America's Army and Marine ground forces and their families--will be asked to continue bearing the burden and paying an even higher price in dead and wounded for a president's ego and intransigence.

The very troops who will make up the temporary bump in U.S. forces in Iraq are those who've already paid that price over and over. They'll be found by a sleight-of-hand maneuver: ordering units already tapped to return to Iraq to go there earlier than scheduled.

That isn't even robbing Peter to pay Paul. It's robbing Peter to pay Peter.

George W. Bush believes that he can buy another couple of years of violent stalemate so he can hand off the disaster to whoever succeeds him in the White House on January 20, 2009.
--"More Troops for Iraq--Bush's Next Flight from Reality," Joseph L. Galloway, editorandpublisher.com, January 6, 2007. Joseph Galloway was awarded the Bronze Star for actions in Vietnam, and was co-author of the book, "We Were Soldiers Once…and Young."

The report calls for accelerating the arrival of four Army brigades and two Marine regiments that are already preparing to go to Iraq in early 2007 and delaying the departure of the 15 brigades now in Iraq by three months each. That is not a surge of new troops. That is a three-month overlap of scheduled troop departures and arrivals.

The report…has no concrete plan for 2008 and beyond. Only then will the real damage from the American Enterprise Institute proposal surface…

If the AEI recommendations become reality, the balance will tip, readiness will spiral downward, and the cost and time to reset units will spiral upward. In exchange for one last rush at the objective, this proposal risks our ability to fight the long war necessary for success in the region. The report suffers from THE SAME CASUAL DISMISSAL OF UNDESIRABLE OUTCOMES THAT CHARACTERIZED POST-COMBAT, RECONSTRUCTION PLANNING IN IRAQ. (emphasis mine)
--"The Troop Surge that Isn't," Kevin Ryan, Boston Globe, January 6, 2007. Kevin Ryan is a retired Army brigadier general and a senior fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Under the plan, for instance, Army brigades would leave for Iraq sooner than planned, meaning soldiers would have less than 12 months at home to train and rebuild between tours--a "red line" that outgoing Army chief of Staff Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker said he did not want to cross, according to a senior military official.
--"Critics say 'Surge' is More of the Same; Past Troops Buildups Have not Quelled Iraq," Michael Abramowitz, Robin Wright, and Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post, January 7, 2007.


The bottom line, here, is that, once again, the White House has dominated the terminology in use for the media, and once again, most of the media has trotted along like loyal lap dogs, providing the frame for the administration's latest pretty picture.

This is no SURGE. Get that idea out of your head. Even Senator Harry Reid, the new Democratic majority leader, said a couple of weeks ago that he was okay with a surge if it just lasted "a couple of months or so."

It's not going to be a "couple of months." It is going to be AT LEAST 18 MONTHS TO TWO YEARS.

The strongest proponents of troop escalations to Iraq, such as Sen.. John McCain and Sen. Joe Lieberman, as well as the neocons at the American Enterprise Institute who dreamed up this war in the first place and still have the president's ear--all say that the escalation SHOULD BE LONG AND SUSTAINED.

Understand. They want MANY MORE THAN 20,000 TROOPS. IT'S JUST THAT WE DON'T HAVE THE TROOPS TO GIVE THEM. John McCain has said he wants 100,000 additional troops. General Keane, who has planted this seed in Bush's mind, wants 75,000.

The only reason Bush is asking for slightly more than 20,000 is that we still haven't filled the slots left from the LAST 20,000 we sent to Baghdad, just last summer. The military doesn't have them. So they have to send over early the ones already slated to deploy and keep others in-country when they are scheduled to go home, like they did to the army's Stryker Brigade last summer.

Army troops, told they'd be deployed a year, are now going to be deployed fifteen months. And Marines, who typically are only deployed for seven months because their deployments are so grueling and are under almost constant combat conditions, will now be asked to remain in those combat conditions for a full year. This, on top of multiple deployments most all of them have had already.

So there is no surge. There is an escalation of the war. And the only people making sacrifices are the very same people who have had to make the sacrifices all along.

The bottom line is this, and it is a crucial one: HE HAS TO ASK FOR MORE TROOPS FOR BAGHDAD BECAUSE THE IRAQI ARMY FAILED TO SEND FOUR WHOLE BRIGADES OF IRAQI ARMY TROOPS THAT WERE REQUESTED WHEN WE ESCALATED INTO BAGHDAD THE FIRST TIME, LAST SUMMER.

WE HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO "CLEAR AND HOLD" BECAUSE THE IRAQI ARMY REFUSES TO DO THE HOLDING.

SO WE HAVE TO COME IN AFTER THEM AND DO THEIR JOB FOR THEM.

HENCE, THE "SURGE."

My question is this: If we are fighting their war for them now, then what happens when we do leave? And if the same thing is going to happen now or five years from now, when we do leave, then how many more Americans have to die for us to admit that and just get the hell out?


SACRIFICE


"The fatal flaw was when, right after September 11, the president asked everyone to go on with their lives. That set the stage for no one sacrificing," said a Special Forces team sergeant who recently served in Iraq. "That's why they aren't behind it, because they don't have a stake in this war. They aren't losing or gaining anything. If you don't see it, smell it, feel it, how are you connected?"
--"With Iraq War Come Layers of Loss: As Troops Lives are Forever Changed, Much of U.S. is Largely Unaffected," Ann Scott Tyson and Josh White, Washington Post, January 2, 2007.

The only real question about the planned "surge" in Iraq--which is better described as a Vietnam-style escalation---is whether is proponents are cynical or delusional.

Senator Joseph Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, thinks they're cynical. He recently told the Washington Post that administration officials are simply running out the clock, so that the next president will be "the guy landing helicopters inside the Green Zone, taking people off the roof."

Daniel Kahneman, who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science for his research on irrationality in decision-making, thinks they're delusional. Mr. Kahneman and Johnathan Renshon recently argued in Foreign Policy magazine that the administrations unwillingness to face reality in Iraq reflects a basic human aversion to cutting one's losses--the same instinct that makes gamblers stay at the table, hoping to break even.

Of course, such gambling is easier when the lives at stake are those of other people's children.

…Iraq has become a quagmire of the vanities--a place where America is spending blood and treasure to protect the egos of men who won't admit they are wrong.
"Quagmire of the Vanities," Paul Krugman, New York Times, January 8, 2007

It has gotten many of us used to the idea--the virtual "white noise"--of conflict far away, of the deaths of young Americans, of vague "sacrifice" for some fluid cause too complicated to be interpreted except in terms of the very important-sounding but ultimately meaningless phrase, the "war on terror."

And the war's second accomplishment--your second accomplishment, Mr. President--is to have taken money out of the pockets of every American, even out of the pockets of the dead soldiers on the battlefield, and their families, and to have given that money to the war profiteers.

Because if you sell the Army a thousand Humvees, you can't sell them any more until the first thousand have been destroyed.
--"Countdown with Keith Olbermann: Special Comment about 'Sacrifice,'" Keith Olbermann, msnbc.com, January 4, 2007


A recent very revealing poll in the military's own Army Times, showed that, for the first time, an overwhelming majority of active-duty American troops now believe that this war was fought for all the wrong reasons, that this administration has completely screwed up the fighting of it, and that it's time for them to come home.

When I hear anybody from the White House DARE to use the word "sacrifice," when not a single damned one of them has the faintest notion of the meaning of the word, I get almost hysterically angry. I have to literally take deep breaths and calm myself down.

NOBODY is making ANY sacrifices for this war, except the SAME FAMILIES, OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

If you don't think that is true, just compare the state of college campuses during the Vietnam war and now. Yes, the country was on fire as college campuses erupted into massive war protests, culminating in the National Guard shooting of unarmed kids at Kent State in 1970, killing four students.

But there was a draft, then. Every young male who turned eighteen was notified by their draft boards that they were being considered for military service. Yes, students had deferments--which Dick Cheney took full advantage of--FIVE TIMES--but should their grades ever dip below passing, they were snatched up and almost always sent off to war, where 58,000 of them died. When my husband was deployed as a young lieutenant combat platoon leader with the 101st Airborne Division in 1970, the death rate of lieutenants was 50 percent.

But there is no draft, now. Now, all most college kids care about is the latest kegger or whether or not this ipod is better than that one. They say they care about the war but they really don't. It just does not affect their lives one way or the other.

Yes, this is a volunteer military, but the vast overwhelming majority of enlistees come from impoverished backgrounds; most of them are from patriotic red-state rural areas. MANY of them signed up after 9-11, thinking they'd be fighting al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

Nobody volunteers to be sent over to Iraq again and again and again. If you don't think that is true, consider the Marine Corps' own policy. Any Marine who actually VOLUNTEERS to return to Iraq for a fourth deployment is immediately ordered to get a psychiatric evaluation.

In other words, even the Marines think you are crazy if you volunteer to return again and again to Iraq.

Taking battle-exhausted troops who are due to go home and force them to remain in-country for months and months longer is CRIMINAL. Yanking them out of training early to send them to war is CRIMINAL.

It is not a "surge" of fresh troops. It's the same worn-out ones.

That is not patriotic. It's criminal.

Here's a sacrifice for you from the family values people who brought us this war:

More than 56,000 marriages have been broken by the Iraq war, according to a 2005 Defense Dept. report, which does not include Marines, Navy sailors, or Air Force airmen.

Divorce rates have skyrocketed since the Iraq war began, with a 28 percent increase in enlisted, and a whopping 80 percent increase among officers…Experts estimate that there will be at least 100,000 war-related divorces by the time this war ends.

The cost, in taxpayer dollars, to the American people, of disability claims from wounded soldiers and Marines over the course of time will bring the cost of this war to ONE TRILLION DOLLARS.

How's that for sacrifice?


STRATEGY


Some administration officials consider the economic package the most important of the three components. But, even if it's not too late, it seems clear that projects of this type will be largely useless without security and political reconciliation. And the al-Maliki government seems paralyzed to confront these realities.

As to the nature of the economic initiatives themselves, there is certainly nothing new or innovative here. These kinds of projects have been used by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) virtually since the agency was founded more than 40 years ago.

Short-term work programs that would follow up a military sweep by immediately hiring people in the neighborhood to clear up trash or do other small civil-affairs jobs…might prevent some Iraqis from joining armed gangs, but it is unlikely to change the allegiances of the thousands who have already made that bloody decision.

…Will microlending, for instance, work in war zones, where vendors are afraid to take their handicrafts and other wares to the markets that are prime targets for suicide bombers and IEDs? Will it work in towns where there is no electricity to, say, power the sewing machines needed to turn out the inexpensive T-shirts and other garments that are traditional products made with microloans?

……Most of these initiatives--and many others--have been tried before, only to go down in flames under supervision of the inexperienced, ideologically driven political appointees sent to Iraq to supervise the "reconstruction" of the country--at a cost well in excess of $20 billion.
--"This Strategy is New?" William Fisher, truthout.org, January 3, 20007. William Fisher has worked for many years in international aid programs worldwide.

Many officials at the State and Defense departments also doubt that the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is capable of making the necessary reforms, given its track record of promising but not delivering…and despite Maliki's assurances in a speech yesterday that he would hold Iraqis accountable for implementing a new Baghdad security plan.
--"Critics say 'Surge' is More of the Same," Michael Abramowitz, Robin Wright, and Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post, January 7, 2007

Mr. Bush has previously promised to remake American reconstruction efforts in Iraq, most notably in December 2005, when he said that the United States had learned from the failure of efforts to rebuild major infrastructure, mostly run by American companies. But subsequent efforts to focus on programs that would bring more immediate benefits to Iraqis have also faltered.
--"Bush Plan for Iraq Requests More Troops and More Jobs," David Sanger, New York Times, January 9, 2007

At first, when I heard about the microloans and the small work-crews coming in after the military to clean up after battle, and the reopening of former state-run factories in Iraq to employ some of the hundreds of thousands of angry young Iraqi men, I thought, now THIS makes sense.

That was before I started digging deeply into it, and discovered that every single one of these ideas has been tried, and has failed, in Iraq.

Now, in fact, the security situation is so dire that if anybody DARES to work for anything that remotely smacks of American involvement, they are kidnapped, tortured, and killed, and their families are threatened.

The truth is that Maliki does not want more American troops, and when he heard that Bush was sending more, he presented a "plan" of his own, which basically calls on Americans to help the Iraqi army fight the Sunnis around Baghdad--which is just what they did in an eleven-hour pitched battle in the Haifa area of Baghdad yesterday.

Which means, of course, that we are choosing sides in the civil war.

Watch for Bush to say that he is pressuring Maliki to meet certain "benchmarks" of things they've been talking about for many months, namely, reworking the constitution to be more fair to Sunnis, involving more Sunnis in the government, and spelling out how much oil the oil-poor Sunnis will get in the new government.

Maliki has been promising to do that for more than a year. He will no doubt keep promising.

Meanwhile, when American troops TRY to enforce any kind of justice or discipline or law on Shiite areas--particularly those controlled by Moktada al-Sadr, their archenemy but a Maliki ally, Maliki shuts them down.

The Shiite prime minister turns out Shiite prisoners who have been captured, runs off American army troops from Shiite neighborhoods, and even sent some Shiite Iranian terrorists back home rather than let the Americans deal with them.

Expect him not only to manipulate any troop "surge" to benefit the Shiites and kill off Sunnis, but know that any money that the Americans pour into these reconstruction projects will disappear into the boiling cauldron that is Iraqi graft and corruption.

And Bush wants $8 billion now, but utlimately, he's going to need up to $100 billion more for his war. And that is by no means the total of what will be needed on top of what has already been spent. And at risk of sounding like a flaming liberal in this instance, I have to ask--have you really checked recently to see how many Katrina victims are still waiting for help from FEMA, are still processing claims, still living in trailers, still fighting with homeowners insurance policies that refuse to pay claims? Have you seen how many schools they lost? I'm no isolationist, and I understand all about winning hearts and minds in the Middle East, but the money being flushed down the toilet of Iraq as we speak could damn sure help out here at home.

And don't even get me started on the woeful losses in the REAL war on terror--in Afghanistan--boots on the ground and treasure siphoned off and squandered in Iraq. The Taliban is already moving back in, and the opium trade is stronger than ever. Think what Afghanistan might have looked like by now if we'd stayed the course there instead of chasing after a fool's dream in Iraq.

"Strategy."

"Sacrifice."

They're all just rosy-sounding words, meant to placate a restless American people that there really is a new strategy, when really, it's a do-over. A mulligan. A repeat.

And you know what they say about somebody who does the same thing over and over again, expecting different results.

They say that person is crazy.


SURROUNDING AND STOPPING BUSH


Democratic leaders who had hoped to emphasize their domestic agenda in the opening weeks of Congress have concluded that Iraq will share top billing, and they plan on aggressively confronting administration officials this week in a series of hearings.
--"Democrats Revise Agenda to Deal With War in Iraq," Jonathan Weisman, Washington Post, January 8, 2007

This is a political decision, not a military strategy," said Representative Neil Abercrombie, a Democrat of Hawaii who is set to chair a key House subcommittee on the military.

"Bush appears to be taking advice from the very same people who advised him in 2002 and 2003," said Chris Preble, director of foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute.
"Top Democrats Balk at Troop Surge," Bryan Bender, Boston Globe, January 6, 2007


There isn't a whole lot anybody can do. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid sent a strong letter, signaling that they did not back a troop surge. On "Face the Nation," Pelosi even said that they would separate funding in Congress, sending all the money the troops in-country need, but not funding any new troops. This isn't possible, not the way the "surge" is being conducted, by keeping troops in who are already in. In any event, he will have deployed them before Congress will even have time to discuss it.

And, by the way, do you THINK it's any accident that after weeks of supposedly conferring and thinking about this, Bush ACCIDENTALLY picked the VERY DAY TO MAKE HIS BIG SPEECH THAT THE DEMOCRATS WERE PLANNING TO LAUNCH THEIR 100-HOUR DOMESTIC P0LICY INITIATIVE?

It is positively diabolical. Sure, it knocks the Democrats' agenda off the front pages, forces them to debate Iraq rather than take care of the business they promised the American people, which then gives Bush and his minions ammunition to taunt them in '08, saying that they did not do what they'd promised in their first 100 hours.

It's brilliant, really. Talk about a strategy. What I want to know is how many boys and girls died waiting for Bush's perfect political timing for his speech?

Senator Ted Kennedy wants to pass a resolution that would require all of Congress to sign on their support or opposition to this course, a stinging political pill to swallow for those worried about getting re-elected. Again, that would be symbolic, not anything with real punch behind it.

Withholding money for the war would work, and has been done before, but nobody really wants to do it in this war.

All that can be done is that the American people rise up and ignore Bush when he blames THEM for the war going badly, by saying things like, We will achieve victory in Iraq if the American people just have enough will to stick it out.

Look for the word "will" to be used as often as "sacrifice." And don't buy either one.

As I was updating this post, my son called and said that he was getting frustrated because, if it was true that the American people really did not want a surge, and every news source from Time to Newsweek (which he reads) maintained that it was not a good idea, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff and most of the Pentagon was opposed, then why weren't the Democrats fighting harder to prevent it? "I'm getting frustrated with the Democrats," he said.

I explained that there wasn't much they could do, and I explained what they WERE doing. But he indicated to me that he would not mind if they howled in outrage until the cows came home. This is an active-duty service member who actually wants the Democrats to do whatever they can to stop this.

I say this to make it clear: THERE ARE ALL SORTS OF WAYS TO SUPPORT THE TROOPS, AND THEY DON'T ALL INVOLVE YELLOW RIBBONS AND ROBOTIC SUPPORT OF BAD POLICY.

Fight for the troops. Fight for them to be treated fairly and honestly. And let your representatives know they will be held accountable for their actions.

There isn't a whole lot else we can do, frankly. Just don't fall for the lies. Not again.


BUSH'S LAST STAND


But given that nothing in Iraq has gone according to plan, it seems more likely that it won't. That's why many in the military assume privately that a muscular-sounding surge now is chiefly designed to give Bush the political cover to execute a partial withdrawal on his own terms later.

…A retired colonel who served in Baghdad put it more bluntly, "We don't know whether this is a plan for victory or just to signal to Americans that we did our damnedest before pulling out."

There is one more scenario to consider: it may be that Bush won't pull out of Iraq as long as he is president. Whether it works or not, a surge of 18 to 24 months would carry Bush to the virtual end of his term. After that, Iraq becomes someone else's problem. Bush's real exit strategy in Iraq may just be to exit the presidency first.
--"What a Surge Really Means: Can a couple more divisions in Iraq really make a difference? Or is Bush's idea too little, too late?" Michael Duffy, TIME Magazine, January 15, 2007


At any time within the next few days, the Iraqi Council of Ministers is expected to approve a new "hydrocarbon law" essentially drawn up by the Bush administration…the new law will give Exxon Mobil, BP, Shell and other carbon cronies of the White House unprecedented sweetheart deals, allowing them to pump gargantuan profits from Iraq's nominally state-owned oilfields for decades to come. This law has been in the works…since before the invasion…

Bush and his inner circle, including his chief adviser, old oilman Dick Cheney, believe that a bigger dose of blood and iron in Iraq will produce a sufficient level of stability to allow the oil majors to cash in on the…chips that more than 3,000 American soldiers have purchased for them with their lives.
--"New Oil Law Means Victory in Iraq for Bush," Chris Floyd, truthout.org, January 9, 2007. The original article reporting the new oil law was published in a British newspaper, the Independent, last week. So far I have seen nothing about it in the American mainstream media.

War Could Last Years, Commander Says
--Headline story by John F. Burns, New York Times, January 8, 2007
The article goes on to state that the new operational commander in Iraq thinks we may need to stay there for at least five more years. Five. More years.

Chaos Overran Iraq Plan in '06, Bush Team Says
--Headline story by David E. Sanger, Michael R. Gordon, and Jon F. Burns, New York Times, January 2, 2007
The article was the first to begin subtle finger-pointing at outgoing generals Casey and Abizaid, blaming them for failures in Iraq and setting up the media scenario for the new generals to come in and save the day. In truth, the generals were doing what they were commanded to do by the administration.

So it was when the British tried to rule Iraq by giving the country a king, Faisal ibn Husain, who had helped them in the Arab revolt against the Ottoman Turks in World War I…

Sir Percy Cox put it, "The Iraqi government must be allowed to make mistakes and learn by them during this probationary period, provided that such mistakes are not of a nature to lead to disaster, and that British troops and officers are not forced to be instruments of misgovernment."

…At what point are Americans going to be seen as instruments of misgovernment? When does resentment of military occupation trump any good foreign troops can achieve? And how, as Sir Henry Dobbs wondered in the '20's, do we guard that our man is not seen as "a puppet king propped up by our bayonets?"

…When the military tried to appoint a British commander-in-chief of Iraqi forces, the colonial office vetoed it by saying it would run contrary to the goal of "disembarrassing ourselves of Iraq as soon as possible."

So we now have a new cast of characters and a change in strategy for dealing with not only an insurgency, but a civil war in which we risk fighting both sides at once. Unfortunately, a lot more people will have to die before we can disembarrass ourselves of this tragic failure.
--"A Classic Imperial Predicament," H.D. S. Greenway, Boston Globe, January 9, 2007


General George Custer was a man of towering ego and petty vanities who refused to listen to moderate voices that warned him of growing Indian unrest at Little Big Horn. He refused to listen to his own Indian scouts. He trusted in his own brilliance and arrogant sense of father-knows-best when he led a sadly outnumbered Cavalry unit into a massacre that was so overwhelming for United States forces that, to this day, the Battle of Little Big Horn is a term known to most Americans that smacks of the dangers of untrammeled ego in command.

Perhaps if, instead of the politically correct and polite terms like "surge" and "strategy," or the stirring patriotic calls to "sacrifice," the media would simply do us all a great favor if they would refer to this latest Bush ploy as the Battle of Little Big Bush.

People would get it right away. They would understand in one term what took me weeks of research and many hours of writing to get down.

This is not a troop "surge." It is an escalation that will be permanent as long as we've got the troops to supply, and Bush is, as we speak, requesting that the Army and Marines undergo a major expansion in forces, which should be ready to go about the time these exhausted troops are finally free to come home.

This is not a new "strategy." It is recycled old ideas that have been massive failures in the past, and what ideas are good ones--General Petraeus has some good ideas on counterinsurgency that he hopes to implement--are no longer practicable because we don't have the manpower to put the boots on the ground required, and as my Special Forces brigadier general of a brother-in-law made clear, even if we COULD put hundreds of thousands of special forces troops in place in a classic counterinsurgency war, it would take two generations to fully succeed.

This is Bush's Last Stand, and he is not doing it to stabilize the Iraqi government but to SECURE THE OIL FIELDS for Halliburton and others of its ilk. Let's be perfectly clear about that. Will we need the oil in the future? Quite possibly, but we've bungled the job so badly now that in order to TRULY secure it, we are going to need REAL sacrifice--a national draft, hundreds of billions more in treasure, tens of thousands more flag-draped coffins, and blind allegiance to the idiots who caused this problem in the first place.

This is Bush's Last Stand, and he is not doing it to promote democracy and freedom in the Middle East but to preserve his own miserable legacy and place in history and to position the Republican party in a place where, in the next presidential election, they can throw around grenade-words like "cut and run" and "defeat" and "surrender" in order to make themselves look all manly and macho while they frighten the American people with images of blood-eyed al Qaeda terrorists catching a plane in Baghdad for the U.S., and attacking kindergartens in small-town America.

He can say whatever he wants to, but what he will really be saying tonight is, stay the course. I'm sure Custer said much the same thing when wave after wave of Lakota Sioux came pouring over the Black Hills.

This is the Battle of Little Big Bush, and when he goes down, he's taking all the rest of us with him.

Rise up. Fight back. Pay attention. And don't be fooled again.