Rolling Stone writer Matt Taibbi has
called Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid “one of the biggest pussies in U.S. political history.” While this may be true, I believe there is a deeper explanation for Reid’s timidity.
Democrats cower in fear of being called “soft on terror/national defense/national security by Republicans. The very act of cowering is political suicide because they are confirming the Republican charges.
This doesn’t make sense, because with a little effort Democrats could shove the charge of softness down the Republican’s throat. Sen. Bernie Sanders said that the reason Congress will never cut off funding for the war is that they are afraid, “George Bush would be on TV every five minutes saying that the Democrats betrayed the troops.”
Let us assume that the Democrats actually cut off funding for the war, and that Bush did exactly as they feared: He went on the tube and accused them of not supporting our troops. What follows is an example of what a robust Democratic rebuttal of that charge would sound like:
Mr. President, let us explain to you how one goes about supporting our troops. To begin with, one only sends them into combat where a real threat to our national security exists, such as an attack on our soil by another nation. (9/11 was a criminal act and your exploitation of that tragedy has been unforgivable.) One does not support our troops by sending them into combat on a rickety raft barely held together by 935 lies.
And when one sends them into combat, one does so with the best equipment money can buy. Rumsfeld’s doctrine was that an army goes to war with the equipment it has. This left our brave men and women needlessly exposed to unnecessary death and injury. How many lives could have been saved had every vehicle sent to Iraq been properly armored up?
And you dare accuse us of not supporting the troops!
You have allowed a cabal of bilious old men, who are nothing more than Pollyannas with PMS, to hijack our foreign policy so they could pursue their demented fantasies of power and world domination. In doing so, they have violated every precept that has made this country a beacon of decency and freedom to the world.
And you dare accuse us of disloyalty!
You have degraded and shamed our brave men and women in uniform by sending them off on an ill-fated war of aggression that violates international law just to enrich your wealthy cronies. The shedding of their blood to improve the corporate bottom line is a shameful act driven not by patriotism, but by ego, greed and stupidity.
Your accusations ring hollow, Mr. President. We stand firm in our commitment to end the military disaster you have visited upon the land. We will fund no more madness; we will fund no more slaughter; we will fund no more pipe dreams. Okay, maybe they might want to tone it down a bit, but the above shows that it would not be that difficult to kick the sand right back into Bush’s face. The reason the Democrats won’t do this has to be more than mere timidity.
Contrary to appearances, the United States Congress is not an elected body; it is a corporation. Its shareholders are the corporate benefactors who fund reelection campaigns. A majority shareholder in this corporation is the Military-Industrial Complex.
To the Military-Industrial Complex, peace is not a profit center. Its survival and health depends upon war, or the threat of war. Iraq is the hen that is laying golden eggs at a prodigious rate. The first rule of the Complex is that you don’t make chicken soup out of the hen. This means the main thrusts of this Congress has been to keep the war going as long as possible. It was an embarrassment when the Democrats took over the Congress with the expectation that they were going to end the war. Fortunately, Reid and Pelosi came to the rescue and have been heroic in their efforts to keep the war in good running order.
Tragically, it does not make any difference who wins the 2008 election, nor would it make any difference if the Democrats achieved a veto-proof majority in Congress. As long as their majority shareholder wants this war to continue, it will, and the public be damned.
The general tone of this statement was suggested by Drew Weston, author of The Political Brain, when I heard him speak at the Daily Kos convention last August.
Political satirist Case Wagenvoord blogs at
http://belacquajones.blogspot.com/.
Bayh was among eighteen Senate Democrats to betray working people and join Republicans in support of the Bankruptcy Abuse and Prevention Act in 2005. For the record, so did Vice President Joe Biden, while he served in the Senate. At least Biden though had the excuse of representing a state with workers disproportionately employed by the banks and credit card companies. Bayh had no such excuse in supporting arguably the worst piece of domestic legislation in a generation.
A review of the online Federal Election Commission database with respect to Bayh’s contributions is especially instructive. Below is a bullet summary listing some of the donations Bayh has received over the years:
- Between 1997 and 2005, Bayh received six contributions from the Action Fund of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. totaling $5,500. No more need to be said about that.
I’m not looking to merely attack Senator Bayh. To be sure, the online FEC database also references generous contributiors to him that I find less objectionable such as the AFL-CIO. Also, my home state Senator Charles Schumer is no prize either. That said, Senator Bayh illustrates why liberals must remain engaged and nurture strong counterweights to corporate influences responsible for America’s current cascade of ruin.One such counterweight is Accountability Now founded by Jane Hamsher and Glenn Greenwald. Accountability Now is the netroots answer to special interest lobbyists that buy politicians like Bayh to support their pro-war/pro-corporatist agenda.
Already you’re hearing voices question whether President Obama’s is pushing too much at once on the “system.” These voices sound reasonable when they claim we should “fix the economy first” and worry about health-care, energy and education later. They're enablers of capitalism’s dark underbelly hoping to run out the clock on President Obama’s popularity and continue business as usual.
We in the reality-based community know that America’s can’t be saved until we fix health-care, implement an effective environment friendly energy policy and strengthen public education from coast to coast. America’s salvation stems from a comprehensive overhaul of our priorities and how we divide a rapidly shrinking pie. That is why I am donating to Accountability Now and I hope readers here do the same.
Nothing concentrates a politician’s mind like the prospect of a primary challenge. Accountability Now is a vehicle to obtain leverage and pressure Democrats such as Evan Bayh that opposing progressive change will put their careers in jeopardy. Delivering power to the Democratic Party in 2006 and 2008 was merely Phase One. Phase Two is transforming the Democratic Party as the people’s party rather than simply existing as the lesser corporatist evil in a two party duopoly. That also happens to be the best way to support President Barack Obama. And we must not fail in that endeavor. At stake is nothing less than peace and prosperity.