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jrtomThere's been a lot of debate about the recent Congressional push to set a specific end date for our troops' involvement in Iraq. In particular, the Bush administration and supporters have been equating 'refusing to pass an "emergency" (emergency my ass, but that's another rant) spending bill without such an end date rider' with 'refusal to "support the troops"'.
If Congress refuses to allocate money for Bush to keep troops in Iraq, this does not mean that we leave them all there to die, or even give them less food or ammunition (unless, of course, Bush so orders it, at which point I would fervently hope that Congress would finally summon the spine to impeach his not-nearly-sorry-enough ass for treason). It means that we bring them home. No war funding? Stop war. Not a difficult concept.
Furthermore, insisting that the troops come home by a specific time is not second-guessing the generals. The generals' jobs are to decide the best ways to use military force to achieve the ends that are given to it by our government. They are not the ones who decide what those ends will be.
More simply: we're not proposing to tell the generals how to do their job. We are telling them that we're done with this job, and it's time to stop trying to do it.
Somehow, the Democratic leadership, and others who are publicly opposed to further operations in Iraq, are not getting these messages out, despite their utter simplicity. Instead they're allowing Bush and the hard-core war supporters to frame the debate their way, and making themselves look like they're anti-military in the bargain.
(The first point, at least, has recently been prominently made by Doonesbury (this past Sunday) but not (as far as I know) elsewhere, so I thought it was time to try to get it some more air time.)
If Congress refuses to allocate money for Bush to keep troops in Iraq, this does not mean that we leave them all there to die, or even give them less food or ammunition (unless, of course, Bush so orders it, at which point I would fervently hope that Congress would finally summon the spine to impeach his not-nearly-sorry-enough ass for treason). It means that we bring them home. No war funding? Stop war. Not a difficult concept.
Furthermore, insisting that the troops come home by a specific time is not second-guessing the generals. The generals' jobs are to decide the best ways to use military force to achieve the ends that are given to it by our government. They are not the ones who decide what those ends will be.
More simply: we're not proposing to tell the generals how to do their job. We are telling them that we're done with this job, and it's time to stop trying to do it.
Somehow, the Democratic leadership, and others who are publicly opposed to further operations in Iraq, are not getting these messages out, despite their utter simplicity. Instead they're allowing Bush and the hard-core war supporters to frame the debate their way, and making themselves look like they're anti-military in the bargain.
(The first point, at least, has recently been prominently made by Doonesbury (this past Sunday) but not (as far as I know) elsewhere, so I thought it was time to try to get it some more air time.)
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Re: Framing the debate
Date: 4 April 2007 21:14 (UTC)Ah. The nature of my supposed naiveté was unclear.
Just to clarify, I don't particularly expect the Democrats to pick up what I've said here. However, I figure that the chances of them doing so are greater if I say something (in this public, if not widely read, forum) than if I don't. They would be greater still if I called up my senators and passed this along, so I might do that.
In any case, if you feel that this is a useful idea, feel free to disseminate it, with or without attribution. Again, it can't hurt, and it might help.
As to your first point...IMO, the Democratic elected representatives are not, by and large, individually incompetent as politicians, or they wouldn't have been elected. (I won't comment on their competence otherwise.) I would instead argue that they have lacked leaders--or at least a common goal--and that this has diluted their influence. I don't think that their competence will change as a result of their thin majority, but I do think that the fact that their stated goals are reasonably congruent with what a solid majority of voters are shouting for will make it more likely that they'll manage to accomplish something.