We've needed someone to care about 'we the people' for 6 years now and counting. I feel I've pathetically had unrealistic hopes of a better world, better America...better everything because I want it desperately for all of us. I'm not a selfish person...I'm willing to share the good times, the inevitable ups...the downs...the highs...the lows...it's second nature to us now...like breathing out and breathing in...we've grown accustomed to our life. (thank you My Fair Lady!) Yet we don't want out way of life at the expense of innocents dying in Iraq. I can no longer face the TV scenes when a car bomb has gone off and you hear the inevitable numbers of the tolling of the dead.
With so much going on we have to pause to take it all in...in smaller proportions to even begin to make sense (if there's any to be had that is!) The bottom line ~ if the Democrats do not vote down the blank check Iraq War supplemental bill they are proposing, they will be complicit in the war, and should expect to feel the consequences in monumental proportions. If you vote for it...you now own it! Russ Feingold said in March..."The realization is growing that the only way to stop this thing is to use our power." But, power is not always used for good...and I know you've read that in some fairy tales in your childhood somewhere.
Now here's a weird situation if I ever heard one. Some politicians are afraid to "take political ownership" of the war by using their power to end it. So, in the meantime as they focus on their particular brand of politics...while people are dying...it becomes clear that Feingold is right. "If the Democrats don't use their power, when we're in the majority in both houses, we're going to start owning this war." Russ Feingold who seems a man of integrity swimming in a pool of sharks also said, “It is George Bush’s war, but if we don’t get serious we’re going to start owning this war.” This is a critical point that many politicians are seemingly forgetting right now. The president may have started the war, and may own it politically, but he was also elected in 2004 just the same...or even in spite of it.
So this brings us to an uncomfortable realization about his being elected...he was elected on honest pretenses as pertaining to the war technically. The Democrats on the other hand...were put into office with a great deal of grassroots effort in 2006...drum roll...because they promised to end the war. So...by their betrayal (that's what it is to me) they've just turned around and become complicit in the very war they promised to stop...which by definition gives them a bigger chunk of ownership of the war than our Fearless Decider...because (and hang in here with me) they have broken their word to "us" and our country. Pure and simple.
A lot of people are bystanders walking way round this issue and say they do not have the ability to stop the war...which of course makes them innocent mostly in their own hearts and minds...but we know the truth about the shape of their spines. November was a heady time of joy and elation that lasted several days. We thought we'd gotten our country back and would soon get it moving toward a better understanding of what the American people wanted and needed. And some of what we wanted and needed was to get out of Iraq and leave those poor people and their families alone. They'd endured enough destruction and death to last a lifetime. And we knew we'd spend a lifetime making it up to them if given the chance. But...Nancy Pelosi said she would vote against the blank check bill...but she won't use her power to actually stop the bill from moving forward. Does that sound like a person with no power?
I've said this myself...and many lawmakers say it also...that the war is Bush's responsibility...not mine...not theirs...he must develop a plan to end the war. But it certainly doesn't mean our lawmakers don't have many ways at their disposal to force him to develop a plan. Through timelines tied to funding is a good example. If our Congress had the guts to brandish its Constitutional power of the purse strings and cut off funding by a certain date...it should force Bush and his so-called military commanders to furnish a much needed redeployment plan.
