community-based, non-corporate, participatory media
community-based, non-corporate, participatory media
Take the War Into the PA Primary
by Carl Davidson
Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2008 at 7:51 PM
carld717@aol.com Raccoon Twp
The PA primary is pivotal for the mass insurgency using the Obama campaign to stop the war. Our Gov is already making news by suggesting white folks in this state don't care for Black candidates. This piece was written with the PA primary in mind, but offers a way for antiwar activists not happy with any candidate to enter the fray and make themselves heard nonetheless. .
Getting Organized, Getting Engaged:
Independent Antiwar Intervention
in the 2008 Election Campaigns
By Carl Davidson
Keep On Keepin’ On
February 13, 2008
If our peace movement wants to make some far-reaching gains in the 2008 election cycle, it doesn’t have much time to waste. Super Tuesday is over, the remaining campaigns will end in November, and critical events are moving at a rapid pace.
Most important, ending the war in Iraq needs to be a greater part of everyone’s political decisions in 2008 than it is now.
In mid-February, we’re down to four main candidates, plus the Greens—two Republicans who promise to win the war, whatever the cost, even if it takes decades, and two Democrats who promise to end it, with less than desirable timelines and qualifications.
Large numbers of Americans critical of the war have decided to enter this arena in one way or another—but they are not necessarily part of the one million or so who have taken to the streets to date. Most have not. The most obvious is the insurgent wave of youth taking up Barack Obama’s cause, seeing him as their favored instrument to end the war and advance other progressive causes. They may make other choices later, but they have chosen to enter the fray this way, whether anyone else thinks it’s the best way or not.
Yet we, the more seasoned core of the antiwar movement, are not as engaged as we could be. Tom Hayden has elsewhere argued forcefully—‘After Super Tuesday, Time for Peace Movement to Get Off the Sidelines’--on why the peace and justice movements need to deploy more of its forces. At the risk on repeating some of his points, I’ll focus on some of the key ways it can actually be done, although just about any way would be better than doing nothing.
Political Intervention. With all the various ‘plans’ regarding Iraq being floated, it’s important that the peace movement stake out its position, and the one shared by the antiwar majority among the people themselves, of immediate withdrawal of all US forces from Iraq and their return home. Every candidate of every party needs to be directly confronted with this at every public forum. While there are important differences among them, not one of those remaining completely shares this perspective. They are either lagging behind the electorate or opposing it. Those who claim to want to end the war, at whatever level they are contending, need to be openly informed that they only gain support by taking a stronger stand.
Ballot Intervention. We can also directly put issues on the ballot, as well as into the discussion. Near West Citizens for Peace & Justice, for example, put a cutoff of funding for the war on the ballot at its township level in a working-class suburb of Chicago in the recent primary, where it won by 77 percent. Since electoral law varies, this may not be practical in some areas, but wherever it can be done, it’s a great nonpartisan, non-endorsing tool to bring antiwar votes to the polls.
Expanding the Electorate. This is already shaping up to be an historic election with a record-breaking turnout, if for no other reason than the likelihood of the ‘White Guys Only’ sign being taken from the Oval Office. Growing numbers want to be part of that history, and not just watch it. Still, the sharper the differences are drawn with the unabashed defenders of prolonging the war, the greater the potential turnout. But it has to be organized. Some new voters register themselves, but many do not until they are encouraged, especially among young people. The antiwar movement has everything to gain from registering voters in a nonpartisan fashion, so that the contact list with the new voters belong to it, rather than any party. Most states make it easy for volunteer organizations to get new registrations on their own and turn them in. There’s nothing standing in our way but our own lack of initiative.
Shaping and Informing the Electorate. A few years back the average voter was a 60-year-old retired economically liberal but socially conservative blue collar woman in a ‘white’ working-class suburb. But everything changes, especially in times of crisis, and there’s no law of the universe or even demographics that says it has to remain that way. Expanding the electorate comes in many flavors—the promoting more war and injustice crowd certainly works on expanding it in their direction, and there’s no reason we can’t do it our way. Moreover, an electorate more educated on the war—disabused of notions that Iraq caused 9/11 and other such lies and illusions—is more likely to vote rationally on the war, and to make educated selections among the candidates on their own, with an assist from wide distribution of candidate position survey and score cards, candidate night debates, and so on.
Identifying the Antiwar Electorate. Knowing that a majority of the electorate is critical of the war is one thing. It’s quite another to know all the names and addresses of voters in your precinct who are opposed to the war, support the war, or waver in between. The additional information is empowering to those who hold it, and there’s no reason it shouldn’t be in the hands of our neighborhood-based peace and justice groups. But you have to do old-fashioned, door-to-door organizing to get it. Fortunately, a voter registration drive in an election cycle is an excellent way to do it. And it’s an additional plus that the same information is more than useful for mass mobilizations and other projects beyond Election Day.
Mobilizing the Electorate. Potential voters who are registered and antiwar but don’t make it to the polls don’t help much. There’s no reason we can’t organize nonpartisan GOTV—Get Out The Vote—events, not only ourselves, but with all our allies among churches, schools and unions. This way the relationships and ties belong to you after the election, not to any party. No one’s campaign reaches far enough into every corner; there’s always work to be done in areas where it’s not crowded but important to us nonetheless. Again, you can get your antiwar voters to the polls without endorsing anyone. They’ll figure out what to do.
Protecting and Securing the Vote. Perhaps I’m biased by my years in Chicago, but, yes, this is crucial to know how to do. Getting all sorts of voters to the polls doesn’t help much if you can’t get a fair and reliable count. There’s lots of justified concern about electronic machines these days, but in the 1980s, I went through an excellent three-hour training on ‘100 things to watch for’ to prevent stealing the vote when all the ballots were paper. (One was to look for long, sharpened fingernails on those handing out ballots. A wink from the precinct captain would get an unfavorable person’s ballot ‘nicked’ for later removal). It’s definitely worthwhile getting a number of people trained and positioned as poll watchers and election judges, for the future as well as the present.
Staking Claim to the Vote. It’s not very convincing to politicians or anyone else for us to claim a positive gain from an election we had nothing to do with, save for cheerleading on the sidelines. But to the degree we can reasonably claim responsibility for favorable results and turnouts in one battle, it enhances our independent ‘clout’ in future battles, inside and outside the electoral arena. It enhances our ability to ‘counter-spin’ the outcomes and post-election battles from those who would marginalize us. Most important, no matter who is elected, the need for an ongoing, independent and election-savvy ORGANIZATION is going to be more needed than ever in the dangerous ‘end game’ to Bush’s disaster in Iraq.
There are different sets of rules for doing all the above, depending on whether your local group or coalition is a 501C3, a 501C4, a straightforward public interest group with a bank account and no tax exempt status, or just an ad-hoc group of volunteers. If you are in doubt as to what can or can’t be done, and have a status that needs defending, consult a lawyer with some experience on the topic. But don’t fall for the claim that you can’t do anything.
There’s a lot that can be done, preferably completely independent of any party or campaign. If your imagination fails, you can always get to the organizations of the candidates or party of your choice, but do it now. You don’t want to tell your grandchildren that you sat on the sidelines in the Election of 2008.
[Carl Davidson is author, together with Marilyn Katz, of ‘Stopping War, Seeking Justice,’ available at lulu.com/changemaker. He was founder and director of Peace and Justice Voters 2004 in Chicago, a national committee member of CCDS, and a member of the steering committee of United for Peace and Justice. See carldavidson.blogspot.com for more information.]
go away
by @
Friday, Feb. 15, 2008 at 7:37 PM
No, seriously carl...
go away, and dont go back to chicago either.
Can't take it?
by Carl Davidson
Friday, Feb. 15, 2008 at 11:35 PM
carld717@aol.com
Go away? Naaaaw. My roots are too deep here, took me about a week to get my Raccoon Township drawl back.
And I'm having a great time discussing the war, elections, health care, high schools, taxes and a batch of other things on the Beaver County Times site. It's working out, too, making connections both on the union front and the antiwar front.
Fortunately or unfortunately, it's much livelier and more real there than here on this site. You guys need to lively up and lighten up a bit. I'm trying to lend a hand.
But what's the problem? Don't you like a challenge from a third wave Marxist? Or are you worried that you're not quite ready to play with the big kids yet?
Seriously, as you surely know unless you're locked in a closet somewhere, the youth revolt has erupted in the form of the Obama surge, whether you and I like it or not, and Pennsylvania will be a major battleground on issues beyond hustling votes. You can 'tsk, tsk' on the sidelines if you like, but your peers themselves, especially the Black Hip Hop youth, will leave you in the dust.
Those who have ears, will hear.
Obama, Ending War in 2009, and McCain Danger
by Repost by CarlD
Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008 at 8:59 AM
carld717@aol.com Raccoon Twp
[This is pretty much on target from Tom. It reveals both the gravitational effect of the antiwar Obama insurgency pulling the debate leftward, and thus generating stronger mass support for Obama, while revealing the harsh blowback ahead from McCain and those around him. Time to get very clear on the main danger, and act accordingly. --CarlD]
This article can be found on the web at
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080303/hayden
'End the War in 2009'
by TOM HAYDEN
[posted online on February 20, 2008]
In his victory speech in Texas Tuesday, Barack Obama promised to end the Iraq war in 2009, a new commitment that parallels recent opinion pieces in The Nation.
Prior to his Houston remarks, Obama's previous position favored an American combat troop withdrawal over a sixteen-to-eighteen-month timeframe. He has been less specific on the number and mission of any advisers he would leave behind.
Ending the war in the first year of his potential presidency, therefore, is the strongest stand Obama has taken thus far, and one he will be questioned on sharply by the Republicans and the media. As Juan Cole noted last year, the Bush-Cheney team is preparing a "poison pill" of disorder and blame for any future President contemplating an Iraq troop withdrawal.
Did Obama mean it? Was it only rhetoric? Perhaps, but as Obama has said over and over lately, words make a difference. He may be asked to square his 2009 goal with his previous eighteen-month timetable. To avoid inconsistencies or missteps, he might claim that he will publicly declare in 2009 that he is ending the occupation but bringing the troops home on his longer timetable. Who knows? But these were words worth holding the candidate to. The astonishing thing is that antiwar sentiment among Obama's base is running strongly enough to push the candidate forward to a stronger commitment. By comparison, in The Audacity of Hope (2006), Obama wrote that "how quickly a complete withdrawal can be accomplished is a matter of imperfect judgment based on a series of best guesses."
The Iraq war, and the so-called war on terrorism, are now guaranteed to loom large in the likely battle between Obama and John McCain. The American experience, first with Vietnam and now with Iraq, provides a strong reservoir of support for Obama's skeptical position from 2002 until the present time. But McCain's personal experience as a tough Navy pilot and prisoner of war makes him much more formidable than Hillary Clinton as a "national security" advocate against Obama. McCain's remarks last night were focused entirely on Obama's lack of experience in foreign affairs, and should be a wake-up call to the peace movement to become more engaged in the presidential election.
Obama faces two immediate tests aside from the primary contests ahead. First, sometime in April, General David Petraeus will be testifying in Washington that the conditions are improving in Iraq and that the United States must "stay the course." Petraeus will be acting as a de facto surrogate for McCain in domestic politics. Obama will have to respond to the general's serious claims without retreating from the commitment he has given to early withdrawal.
Second, the questions of Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan could intensify as a symbol of America's current policies towards terrorism. McCain has already absorbed both neoconservative doctrines and the neoconservatives themselves in his campaign against "Islamo-fascism" as the greatest threat in American history.
First, the neoconservatives will push for Obama's (and the Democrats') acceptance of their terminology to control the debate, or berate their opponents as weak for not recognizing "Islamo-fascism" as the new equivalent of the Communist threat during the cold war.
Next, they will attack Obama for proposing to pull the plug on Iraq just when the tide is turning.
Finally, they will question Obama's experience in pushing for diplomacy towards Iran, and draw him out on why he favors more troops in Afghanistan and a pre-emptive strike against Pakistan if there is "actionable intelligence." They will probe, too, into Obama's commitment to Israel.
It will be messy and ugly, with right-wingnuts calling Obama by his middle name as often as possible.
Weeks before Obama became the front-runner, the New York Times hired William Kristol as another in-house neoconservative, as Kristol was blasting the Democratic Party for becoming "the puppet of the antiwar groups." The Times's own "objective" news commentary adopted the right-wing frame that the Democrats would "seem unpatriotic" by cutting funds for American troops while "under intense pressure from the antiwar faction [read: majority] of their party." Wedge politics virtually dictates that splintering the Obama campaign, the Democrats and the antiwar movement, while uniting the right and center around "experience," will be the strategic agenda for Republicans through November. If he is not the vice-presidential candidate, Joe Lieberman will be employed as the primary ally of the Republicans in trying to make inroads into the American Jewish community as well.
But there are Republican weaknesses to expose too, beginning with their attempt to perpetuate an endless trillion-dollar war in Iraq. MoveOn and others will strike hard at that Republican vulnerability. According to counterinsurgency doctrine, the current Iraq war is expected to last throughout the next presidential term, longer than most Americans can imagine supporting it. On Iran, the recent National Intelligence Estimate has dampened any White House plans for an American strike, though the Israelis may act as a dangerous surrogate before December.
Then there is the quagmire of Afghanistan, where no military solution is in sight. And finally, in Pakistan, $11 billion invested in the Musharraf regime was swept away by the voters yesterday. The Pakistanis do not want to be pawns in the American war on terrorism. They know that a military fight with the Taliban or Al Qaeda is also a bottomless battle against Pashtun nationalism with implications for Pakistan's stability as a whole.
The danger for Obama lies in being challenged by McCain, the neoconservatives and the right-wing conservatives to prove his credentials as a militarist or face being painted as another Democrat too weak to be Commander-in-Chief.
The opportunity for the peace movement is to engage in open political and intellectual battle, from precincts to public forums, against the neoconservative agenda for a permanent war against Muslim radicals and on behalf of American access to oil with dire consequences at home.
--
Keep On Keepin' On
Carl Davidson
http://carldavidson.blogspot.com
http://ussen.org
http://solidarityeconomy.net
Question for Carl
by Sam
Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008 at 2:45 PM
How, exactly, will we be able to help stop the war by voting for a candidate that has voted to fund the war time and time again?
Just think it through...
by Carl Davidson
Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008 at 6:30 PM
carld717@aol.com Raccoon Twp
So what?
If you think it makes no difference whether we have a president who's asserted he'll end the war in 2009 and a president who's asserted he'll keep fighting for 10, 100, 10,000 years, and take on a few more countries to boot, then nothing much I can say will help you here.
And this doesn't even count where they stand on other issues, such as choice, etc.
You don't have to endorse Obama, Hillary or anyone. Just be a little creative. All you have to do is register new young antiwar voters and get them to the polls. They'll figure it out, even if you can't. You don't have to have anything to do with the Democratic party. In the meantime, if that's too 'rightwing' for you, just make some big signs that say 'Stop the War, When? Now!' and 'Cut War Funds, When? Now!' and organize all your friends to show up at ALL campaign rallies of ANY candidates, but especially McCain's and his supporters, since they're the main danger. That's let them ALL know the war is front and center.
Of course, you can ignore the whole thing. But I'll guarantee you that your base, or hoped-for base, among the more insurgent, minority young people in this town will not.
Not quite.
by har
Monday, Feb. 25, 2008 at 6:59 AM
Carl, you maybe want to come up with some hard facts and figures to back up this claim about the Obama "youth insurgency" emerging as a "huge new component in the antiwar movement"? Something more substantial than an exercise in sclerotic wishful thinking among Hayden and others among your peers?
As the good folks at Black Agenda Report [ http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php ] point out:
"The Obama campaign is heavy on symbolism, and long on vague catch phrases like "new leadership," "new ideas," "a politics of hope," and "let's dream America again" calculated to appeal to millions of disaffected Americans without actually meaning much of anything. Corporate media actively bill Obama as "the candidate of hope," and anointed representative of the "Joshua generation." There are good reasons campaign placards at Obama rallies say "change we can believe in" instead of "stop the war --- vote Obama" or "repeal NAFTA - Barack in '08." The first set of messages are hopeful and vague. The second are popular demands among the voters Obama needs against which his past, present and future performance may be checked. When the comparison is made, the results are dismaying to many who want to support Barack Obama."
"To cite the most obvious example, the Obama campaign cynically bills itself as “the movement”, the continuation and fulfillment of Dr. King's legacy. But the speeches of its candidate carefully limit the application of all his troop withdrawal statements to “combat troops” and “combat brigades”, omitting the six figure number of armed mercenary contractors in Iraq, along with “training”, “counterinsurgency” and other kinds of troops. Obama also presses for an expansion of the US Army and Marines by more than 100,000 troops and a larger military budget even than the Bush regime. The fact that both these stands fly in the face of the legacy of Martin Luther King, and flatly contradict the wishes of most Democratic voters is utterly invisible in the establishment media, and in the discourse of established Black leaders on the Obama campaign. The average voter is ill-equipped to read Obama's statements on these and other issues as closely as one might read a predatory loan application or a jacked up insurance policy, trying to determine exactly what is covered."
Ironically, the support of some Sixties antiwar veterans for Barack is already becoming part and parcel of the right's smear campaign as this little gem from Politico underscores [ http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8630.html ] How long will it be before Obama's handlers roundly jettison any association with today's antiwar movement or "Tom Hayden Democrats"
Reply to HAR, via Chicago IMC
by Carl Davidson
Monday, Feb. 25, 2008 at 2:08 PM
[This is aimed at some of my old buddies at Chicago IMC, who decided to liven things up here with the comment above. And as for their concern that Obama will have to distance himself from 1960s new leftists because of the latest round of red-baiting attacks on him, it's rather silly. They have a dilemma. On one hand, Obama is a left-liberal, turning on old Reds. On the other hand, he's a neo-conservative warmonger. But in a shit-slinging contest, any handful will do, I suppose. They've even now lined up with Hillary's latest stunt, Obama in Kenyan headress. As for hiding behind TBAR, just go into any gathering of African Americans in this town, or any high school kids for that matter, and take your own poll. You don't have to listen to me or 'HAR' and crew.]
Hard facts and figures?
You've got to be kidding. It's in front of your nose.
Why don't you come up with some showing its NOT the case.
But save yourself some time in the stacks, and just go to the next Obama rally anywhere near a campus or inner city high schools, the Black Agenda Report and the Black Commentator notwithstanding. You might note, however, that a good chunk of the BC editors there, are backing Obama--Bloice and Fletcher, and more. And even those against Obama on the harder-line BAR usually touch base with reality and acknowledge the mass turnaround in the Black community, and that its generational. They just think its terrible, as you apparently do, too, that these people, along with the white youth, are deluded victims of (name your favorite conspiracy or enemy here).
Or read the Des Moines Register piece on the poor Lincoln High lone friend of Hillary noting that he was outnumbered 100-to-one by Obama kids in his school, mainly because of the war.
It's instructive, but somehow I think it won't matter, and while you're digging for your 'facts and figures,' the whole opportunity for some important new alliances will pass you by.
Finally, it shows Finney was on to something when he pushed us to invite Obama to Oct 27. Looking back on that, we may have been too cautious, rather than too outrageously 'right wing,' as you guys thought.
You really need to get out more...
Sometimes I wonder why I'm trying to convince you, though. Maybe it's better for you folks to stay stuck in your 'left bloc' cul-de-sac, and leave this new generation of activists to us, while you debate the fine points of Guy DeBord, Alex Cockburn's latest missives of which armed faction in Iraq we need to take door-to-door, Bakunin or Trotsky's transitional program.
Debate on Obama in the Black community
by har
Thursday, Feb. 28, 2008 at 4:07 AM
Rather than take Davidson's assessment of sentiment in the Black community or the debate raging among Black progressives about the Obama campaign, why not read and listen what those actually participating in that debate have to say? Worth the effort.
Black Agenda Report
[http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php ]
The Black Commentator
[ http://www.blackcommentator.com/ ]
Fletcher: And Now Obama?
by martin
Thursday, Feb. 28, 2008 at 4:21 AM
Fletcher's support is not exactly unconditional.
And Now Obama?
-- Bill Fletcher, Jr. BC Executive Editor
( http://www.blackcommentator.com/264/264_african_world_and_now_obama.html )
The withdrawal of the candidacy of former Senator John Edwards, coupled with the outcome of the Super Tuesday primaries, established that within the Democratic Party, there is a two person race for the nomination. The Super Tuesday results, more than anything, demonstrated that Senator Obama was clearly competitive with Senator Clinton. While Senator Clinton won the states she was expected to win, Senator Obama captured thirteen states, including locations where one would never have expected a victory, e.g., North Dakota.
So, let’s look at the scorecard and see where we are. No, not the delegate count, but the political scorecard. On the major issues, there is no significant difference between Obama and Clinton. Yes, there is some nuance, and, yes, Obama opposed the Iraq war. But as readers of my commentaries know, I have not discovered particularly fundamental differences.
Despite this, there is a clear Obama-mania underway and there are two aspects to this that we must address head-on. On the one hand, Obama is inspiring millions with the notion of “change.” Now, the “change” that is mentioned in speech after speech is very vague. When Obama speaks in concretes, e.g., attacking Al Qaeda bases in Pakistan unilaterally, there is nothing new and different about that approach. Yet what seems to be happening is that the disgust with the Bush years, combined with a reassessment of the Clinton years, is leading many people to look for something very different. This is in part generational, but actually much deeper than that. I emphasize this point because it is easy to write off the excitement as being naiveté. There is an unfocused desire to break with what the USA has been experiencing, both domestically and internationally, and it has come to be personified in Senator Obama, almost despite himself.
The other aspect, however, is more complicated and a bit unsettling. There has been a tendency, including among some progressives, to attempt to fashion Senator Obama as something other than what he is. Over the months, I have heard progressive commentators describe Senator Obama as if he were the second coming of the Rev. Jesse Jackson and his ’88 campaign. Surprisingly, Senator Obama is rarely challenged by credible progressives for the weakness of his platform and the lack of depth of his call for “change.” It’s as if we close our eyes, click our heels together, and repeat something to the effect of, the “change” will be progressive…the “change” will be progressive…
So, we are faced with this enigma. Some people, including some writers for The Black Commentator, are adamant that Senator Obama should not be supported and that he is a fraud. Others, including some writers for The Black Commentator, argue exactly the opposite. I am not going to argue the position of Solomon and suggest splitting the baby, but I will argue that critical support of the Obama campaign is an appropriate approach to take. Let me suggest why.
*First, and not in order of importance, the reality of the US electoral system and the state of progressive movements, is that we are a ways off from having a candidacy that is anti-racist, anti-sexist and anti-empire - at least a candidacy who can win. Unfortunately, we are in a period where we are compelled to address the lesser of two evils. In that sense, while I do believe that we could have had a winning candidate who was better on the issues than is Senator Obama, no such candidate prevailed in the primaries.
Second, there is little question but that Senator Obama has helped to ignite excitement and an electoral upsurge, though I would not describe it as a movement, at least not at the moment. This becomes a space in which progressive-minded people can and should be pushing the content of progressive change, rather than relying on mere rhetoric.
Third, the color line. While I adamantly object to those who yell - in support of Senator Obama - that “race does not matter,” the reality is that a successful Black nominee, not to mention an elected Black president of the United States, lays the foundation for a different discussion on matters including, but not limited to, race. This does not mean that a Black person automatically makes the environment more progressive (does anyone remember the name Clarence Thomas?) but it does mean that an individual who is liberal-to-progressive can open a door for discussion. We should not expect that he will walk through that door, but others of us may very well be able to.
My conclusion, and I offer this with great caution, is that critical support for Obama is the correct approach to take. Yet this really does mean critical support. It means, among other things, that Senator Obama needs to be challenged on his views regarding the Middle East; he must be pushed beyond his relatively pale position on Cuba to denounce the blockade; he must be pushed to advance a genuinely progressive view on the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast and the right of return for the Katrina evacuees; and he must be pushed to support single payer healthcare.
As I emphasized in an earlier commentary, it is up to the grassroots to keep the candidates honest. Silence, in the name of unity, is a recipe for betrayal. What we have to keep in mind is something very simple: the other side, i.e., the political Right, always keeps the pressure on. If we do not pressure, in fact, if we do not demand, the reality is that the Right will come out on top.
To do the right thing, we must assess and appreciate Senator Obama for who he is and what he is - politically - rather than engage in wishful thinking. To do anything else is to be disingenuous to our friends and our base. Senator Obama, if elected President, will be unlikely to reveal himself to have been a closeted progressive. Yet, with pressure from the base, he may be compelled to do some of what is needed, despite himself and despite pressures to the contrary.
-- Bill Fletcher, Jr. is Executive Editor of The Black Commentator. He is also a Senior Scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies and the immediate past president of TransAfrica Forum. Click here to contact Mr. Fletcher.
Obama, Clinton, Dems – Show Leadership, Make Change, End the War Now
by Kevin Martin, Peace Action, repost
Thursday, Feb. 28, 2008 at 4:25 AM
Obama, Clinton, Dems – Show Leadership, Make Change Happen, End the War Now!
Next year, or more likely 2010, will be too late for the thousands more who will die or be maimed in Iraq
I must confess a dirty little secret - I don’t care what presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama say they will do to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq if they become president next year. Thousands more Iraqis and hundreds more U.S. troops will be dead by then, and for what? I want to know what Senators Clinton and Obama are willing to do to end the war this year. Surely I’m not alone in this desire, am I?
While George Bush, aided and abetted by a supine Congress, does his best impersonation of an extremely unpopular yet omnipotent emperor, especially on Iraq and foreign policy, Obama and Clinton are far from powerless in their current positions. As Senators, they could lead a filibuster to end funding for Bush’s occupation of Iraq. This would show real leadership, and if they succeeded, two grateful nations would sing their praises for generations, regardless of whether either ever became president.
Even better would be for there to be no bill for them to have to filibuster. Obama, Clinton, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman John Murtha and other Democratic leaders should agree to simply not draft a bill to continue the war. They should tell Bush, “Sorry, the bank is closed; you’ll get no more of the taxpayers’ money to continue your quagmire” other than funds to safely and swiftly withdraw all of our troops and bases if money already appropriated needs to be augmented for this purpose (the merchants of death, I mean contractors, can pay their own way home from the windfall profits they’ve made in Iraq).
Furthermore, as a down-payment on the enormous debt we owe the people of Iraq and our veterans, the money that otherwise would go to continue the occupation (and Bush is expected to ask for well over $100 billion more for this year alone, on top of the more than $600 billion already spent over the last five years) should instead be appropriated for an interim United Nations or Arab League peacekeeping force (if the leaders of various Iraqi factions agree it is needed), reconstruction of Iraq’s devastated infrastructure and economy, and greatly enhanced health care and other benefits for our returning veterans. Besides being the right thing to do, peace is cheaper than war.
Unfortunately, it looks like a war funding bill will be put forward by the Democratic “leadership,” so we need senators to step up and lead a filibuster, which would require only 41 senators to sustain.
Many allegedly anti-war Democrats, including some who voted against the war (unlike Senator Clinton of course) in 2002, have voted to appropriate every penny for the war and occupation of Iraq, cowed by Bush , Cheney and the Republicans’ smear that they would be “abandoning the troops” if they vote against war funding.
My advice on dealing with this despicable political blackmail is to get over it. Senators, you know how to do photo ops - stand on a flag-draped stage in front of the Iwo Jima statue with leaders from Iraq Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Military Families Speak Out, the Appeal for Redress (comprised of active duty military personnel who oppose the war) and retired generals and military officials to announce you are ending funding for the occupation, and dare Bush, Cheney and the chicken hawks to call you abandoners of the troops. C’mon, you can do it!
My main purpose is to end the occupation of Iraq, not to get Democrats elected to the White House or Congress, but it’s no-brainingly obvious that in this case, with a historically unpopular president, a solid majority of the country against the war, and a presumptive Republican presidential nominee, John McCain, who thinks it would be fine if our troops remained in Iraq for 100 years (!), good policy is also good politics. Obama and Clinton should be tripping over each other running to the well of the Senate to announce they will filibuster to end funding for the war. The first to get there would doubtless become president in a landslide. It would be easy political ju jitsu –make Bush, McCain and others defend their indefensible desire to perpetuate an endless, bottomless (money-wise) occupation, instead of your having to defend doing the right thing, ending it.
Senators, get your act together. March 19 will mark the fifth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. The Iraqi people, our troops and their families can’t wait another year, or longer, to end this calamitous occupation. And seriously, wouldn’t you rather have this problem resolved before one of you becomes president?
-- Kevin Martin is executive director of Peace Action and Peace Action Education Fund, the country’s largest peace and disarmament organization with over 100,000 members.
On the same page
by Carl Davidson
Thursday, Feb. 28, 2008 at 9:56 AM
carld717@aol.com Raccoon Twp
By all means, read the BC and TBAR. But read all of it.
Fletcher and Martin are on the same page with me and many others on this, so their points are well taken.
But best of all, just go out and TALK TO PEOPLE to get an idea of what's going on, in the Black community or any other, encourage everyone opposed to the war to register to vote, and to go to the polls. You don't have to tell them who to vote for or endorse anyone. They're figure it out.
![[masthead]](/images/masthead_140.png)