A response to Ron Suarez’ A New Ann Arbor City Council Resolution to End the War in Iraq?
A response to Ron Suarez’ A New Ann Arbor City Council Resolution to End the War in Iraq?
Note: the antiwar resolution mentioned on Ron’s site was passed by the Ann Arbor City Council in March, 2007.
Ron said:
I received this request from Michigan Peaceworks to support a new Ann Arbor City Council resolution that would hopefully push Congress to bring an end to the war in Iraq…
Here is their [Michigan Peaceworks] Proposed wording for a City Council Resolution:
We urge Congress to move in a bi-partisan way to address war policies in the Middle East. The United States now spends more on military defense than all other nations combined, but the world is less safe than when we embarked on our present policies. It is time for Congress to provide leadership by:
* re-establishing its on-going, joint authority with the President over war powers and war expenditures
* using Congressional appropriations authority to protect our troops by establishing conditions for their mobilization and deployment, conditions and time-lines for their return home, and needed assistance to veterans of our recent wars
* providing international humanitarian leadership
* developing a humanitarian budget to meet non-military needs of the worlds’ people, including our own
* using Congressional oversight to help strengthen international cooperation in peace-building…But, I could use help identifying other government officials who could use a nudge in the correct direction.
John Dingell. He often wears red.
His recent antiwar resolution, HR 3938 sounds good at first in that it reportedly withdraws the use of force authorization. The full text was not yet on Thomas when I wrote this. But the 2009 timeframe is too long. And this is a political cover for Dingell in that it distracts from what matters, which is his votes for the appropriations for the wars. Dingell’s resolution won’t pass both houses, and if it did it would be vetoed. He knows that.
If a majority of the House would refuse any more defense authorizations the war would end. Soon. Maybe some mainline Democrats want the war to continue. It is good for the business of the people who give them money. One hopes Dingell would not be in this category.
We need to focus in the short term on amending or defeating war appropriations. Resolutions like the proposed council resolution and HR 3938 give political cover to mainline Democrats who feel pressure from an increasingly frustrated public. But they don’t end the war. They give it political cover to continue.
What does Peaceworks mean that Congress should “move in a bi-partisan way?” Isn’t that kind of like a three-legged sack race? Seriously are the Democrats supposed to wait to defund the war until the Republicans turn into a pro-peace, anti-war party? This is a poor idea at best.
The Peaceworks resolution’s reference to “joint authority” between the president and Congress over “war spending and war powers” is inaccurate. The Constitution reserves these powers to Congress alone.
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; ….
To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years; …
US Constitution, Article I, Section 8
The president is an executive of the People, who acting through their Legislature, make the laws and raise taxes. We rely on the President to obey and fairly enforce the laws, not to ignore, make, or break them. The president is not a sovereign. Bush is not “King (or warlord) of America”.
We oppose:
HR 2638: Making appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2008, and for other purposes, in committee.
HR 2642: Making appropriations for military construction, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2008, and for other purposes, in committee.
HR 3222: Making appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2008, and for other purposes, resolving differences.
And we need to oppose any more continuing resolutions like Democratic sponsored H.J.RES.52: Making continuing appropriations for the fiscal year 2008, and for other purposes, which Bush signed September 29, 2007.
Bush and the House and Senate Democrats like Dingell and Stabenow are pretending to disagree over the war to appeal to their base constituencies, while they are collaborating in continuing to fund it. I don’t have the same issue with Carl Levin, he and John Rockefeller have been fighting very hard behind closed doors on the war, concentration camps, and surveillance issues for a long time now.
What’s the cost to the citizen? Tens or hundreds of thousands of Iraqi dead; Thousands of American casualties; Military suicides and fragging incidents on the rise; America’s democracy and reputation in ruins; and $8,000 per person in the US through the next ten years. Or, if you want to look at it another way, $80,000 per person in Iraq. We could have bought all of Iraq intact for less than what it is costing to destroy it.
Feel-good resolutions without the force of law are a distraction and an impediment to holding our legislators accountable for real effective actions to end this garrison state of permanent war and neoconservative-neofascist oppression.
A New Ann Arbor City Council Resolution to End the War in Iraq?
Dingell bill sets date for Iraq pullout
War costs may total $2.4 trillion
See also, Bush on Iraq: ‘We’re Kicking Ass’
Letter to the youth of America
Scanlyze tag: Stabenow
Copyright © 2007 Henry Edward Hardy
My Reply to a Letter from US Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) on the Iraq War
My Reply to a Letter from US Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) on the Iraq War
I wrote back on February 3 in this space that I had called Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) regarding an anti-war resolution passed by the local Ann Arbor Democratic Party organization in January 2007. I got this letter in the mail from her today:
UNITED STATES SENATE
Washington, DC 20510-2204
March 12, 2007
Henry Hardy
[address elided]
Thank you…
…for contacting me about the war in Iraq. I share your deeply-held concerns and appreciate hearing your views on this important matter.
In 2002, I was one of only 23 Senators to vote against the Iraq War Resolution. The decision to go to war is one that should be made with great trepidation when out country is at risk and all other options have been exhausted. From day one, the reasoning for this war has been flawed and inconsistent. Our men and women in uniform deserve better.
I believe it is a serious mistake to increase the number of American troops in Iraq. We must do everything we can to support those serving out country. Sending more Americans into combat without a strategy for success will not improve the situation on the ground in Iraq, and it will not bring our armed forces home any sooner. I joined 56 of my colleagues in voting for a bipartisan resolution opposing the President’s escalation war plan, and I am extremely disappointed that it was filibustered by the minority in the Senate.
A free and stable Iraq can only be secured by the Iraqis. They must embrace responsibility for their collective future and decide that living and dying at the hands of sectarian violence is not the future that they want for their children or grandchildren. We cannot substitute American troops for Iraqi resolve.
I am supporting legislation, recently introduced by Senator Harry Reid, that will require the President to begin phased redeployment within 120 days, and a full redeployment of all American combat troops in Iraq by March 31, 2008. We can no longer follow the same failed strategy in Iraq. I remain committed to changing the course that has been set and bringing our service men and women home safely.
Thank you again for contacting me. I hope you will join me in keeping our soldiers and their families, as well as the people in Iraq, in your thoughts and prayers during this difficult time. Please contact me again when I may be of assistance to you or your family
[signed] Debbie
Debbie Stabenow
United States Senator
Having met Senator Stabenow in October, 2006 in Ann Arbor and having briefly discussed with her, her support for the atrocious “Military Commissions Act,” I think it is fair to say that she does not share all of my concerns.
“Our men and women in uniform deserve better.” This is very odd and specious reasoning. In a democratic society, the nation doesn’t exist to serve the military, rather the reverse. If a violent gang was overrunning a neighborhood and destroying it, killing and torturing hundreds of people, we wouldn’t put up signs saying “support our Mafia” or “bring home our Crips”. We wouldn’t say, “our gang members deserve better”.
“A free and stable Iraq can only be secured by the Iraqis”. If this is true, it certainly cannot be accomplished while the country is under hostile foreign domination. No Iraqi government can be regarded as anything but a Quisling, puppet front for the US under the current occupation. The Iraqis didn’t smash their country to ruins, we did. And we then emplaced by force a factionalized and corrupt government and instituted a reign of terror perhaps even worse than Saddam’s, killing, raping, torturing and imprisoning without trial tens of thousands of people. The Iraqis, and the US occupation, even use some of the same prisons, torture facilities, “rape rooms” and execution chambers as the old Iraqi regime.
All the service men and women are not going to be brought home safely. Delaying the withdrawal for another year or more will condemn thousands more Americans, and tens of thousands more Iraqis, to mental trauma, crippling injury, and death. If we wait until the Green Zone collapses and is overrun, thousands of Americans may be held prisoner and be tortured in concentration camps as happened to the French after the surrender at Dien Bien Phu in 1954. As it stands, US forces will have to fight their way out under difficult circumstances even if they started withdrawing today. The sooner the US forces are withdrawn, the better for Iraq and the US both.
There is no mention here in Stabenow’s letter of negotiation. Like it or not, we must negotiate with our enemies. That’s with whom one has negotiations to end a war. Not only is this the best way to salvage something from a disaster, it also provides useful information about the resistance leadership, capabilities, and intentions.
The United States has suffered a stinging strategic defeat in Iraq. There were unforced, critical errors. There were no substantial stockpiles of weaponized NBC agents found, thus undermining the pretext for the war and undercutting any tenuous basis in international law expounded to the UN by former US Secretary of State Colin Powell. Disbanding the Iraqi army rather than continuing to pay them to remain in their barracks was an idiotic mistake. And the de-Baathification law, while laudable in purpose, served to marginalize, alienate, impoverish and radicalize the middle-class and intelligentsia, paving the way for very nasty, regressive and atavistic factions to take power.
The United States accomplished its stated war aims in Iraq some time ago. There were few illicit weapons found in Iraq. And Saddam is dead. Yet the US stays on. There is no further strategic objective there to “win”. The United States can either withdraw in as good order as possible now, or stay in Iraq and Afghanistan until it “loses”.
Stabenow once again presents a moral inversion in her closing paragraph where she encourages “thoughts and prayers,” for “our soldiers and their families, as well as the people of Iraq”. The people of Iraq didn’t do anything to the US to deserve 4 years of bombing, rape, and torture. Why do they deserve second billing in our prayers only after those who are oppressing, raping, and murdering them?
Stabenow and the other right-wing Democrats want the US public to believe they are moving to end the war even though, in fact, they are moving to fund it for at least another year, and laying the groundwork for a permanent US occupation “to fight terror”. Will they fight jealousy, envy, rage, grief and sorrow as well?
It is the US troops in Iraq and the men who sent them there who are the “evildoers” as far as initiating an illegal aggressive war on the basis of lies and propaganda. Do they really deserve our sympathy, or our support? Or should the responsible civilian and military leaders of the US forces be tried for war crimes such as “waging an aggressive war,” “genocide” and “crimes against humanity”?
Follow-up on Resolution calling for Ending the Iraq War by Ann Arbor Democratic Party
Copyright © 2007 Henry Edward Hardy
Follow-up on Resolution calling for Ending the Iraq War by Ann Arbor Democratic Party
Here’s a follow-up to Resolution calling for ending the Iraq War:
This is the text of the letter sent to Senators Levin and Stabenow and to Congressman Dingell on or about January 20 as provided to me by Susan Greenberg, Ann Arbor Democratic Party Chair [minor reformatting to fix word-wrapped lines from email–HH]:
Date: Saturday, January 20, 2007 4:04 PM -0500
From: [address removed for privacy reasons]
To: stabenow@senate.gov
Subject: Ann Arbor City Democratic Party urges end the warAnn Arbor City Democratic Party, P.O. Box 4178, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106
734/480-4986, aadems@comcast.netJanuary 20, 2007
The Honorable Debbie Stabenow
133 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510Dear Senator Stabenow:
It is now time for the Iraq War to end. Despite the election results in
November 2006, the Bush administration seems hell bent on implementing the
McCain Doctrine ? a serious escalation in the number of US troops deployed
in Iraq. The American people, the people of the state of Michigan and
the people of the 15th district in Michigan support an end to this conflict
forthwith.The Ann Arbor City Democratic Party asked me as chair to send this
letter to ask you to strongly and publicly support an end to the Iraq war. No
good can come from the continued US presence in Iraq. No good can come
from the additional loss of life an escalation in the war is likely to
cause.Due to the malfeasance of the Bush administration, the US has no viable
option other than to as swiftly as possible end US military involvement
in this most misguided engagement.We strongly encourage you to use all tools at your disposal to compel
the US government to end our nation’s involvement in the Iraq war.Sincerely,
Susan Greenberg, Chair
Ann Arbor City Democratic Party
I called Senator Levin and Senator Stabenow in Washington to see if they had received, read and responded to the resolution and letter from the Ann Arbor Democratic Party organization regarding the Iraq War. Neither senator’s staff seemed to know what I was talking about.
I got a big run-around from Stabenow’s people, had to call three times and was told the first two that they were too busy to look for the resolution or tell me if Senator Stabnenow had yet seen it or replied. I had to remind them that I worked as a campaign volunteer for the Michigan Coordinated Campaign for six months last year helping to re-elect the Senator and ask if they would prefer that I table a resolution censuring her or asking for her expulsion from the party at this month’s State Convention before they suddenly found the motivation to locate the letter from Chairperson Greenberg they had had for almost two weeks.
Still waiting to hear from Justin at Levin’s office.
Dingell I know got our message because his wife Debbie was there to represent him at the meeting on Jan. 13 and endured some somewhat rough handling on his behalf. She also read a long letter from him which I’ll see if they can/will provide for posting here.
I wrote down some of the things said during the debate (paraphrased and mostly unattributed unless someone can provide me the names):
We support our young men and women in the Army and Navy.
Our children are dying.
I am losing my students to this war.
We urge that this war be ended this year.
No public involved in war wins — both sides lose.
Armies cannot establish democracies or establish societies.
We need to replace US troops with an international force.
We [Democrats] don’t want to own this war.
We ask that you rescind the Iraq War Authorization Act, PL 107-243 [that was me–moving to strike and replace language calling for immediate halt to funding–motion failed]
We ask that the United States government utilize diplomatic means to resolve international issues.
Any mother mourns the loss of her son or a daughter in war equally; wherever she lives; in Iraq or America, be it a grand palace or a hut so rude. [That is my poor paraphrase from memory from a very moving speech from former Congressman Ray Clevenger, D-Mich].
I’d also say many of us had tears in the eyes during this debate and I do now again thinking of it.
We debated passionately for two hours until we were told our room reservation was up and the University of Michigan was kicking us out. Then we voted in the affirmative, with the no votes split about equally between those who thought the resolution too strong and those who thought it too weak. My motion for unanimous consent was shouted down.
I would like to give credit to Dana Barton, Tim Colenback, Kathy Linderman; and Carlos Acevedo; who submitted the two draft resolutions we used to forge the resolution which was passed. And thanks to Susan Greenberg for getting me the copy of her letter as sent.
see also: Resolution calling for ending the Iraq War
Copyright © 2007 Henry Edward Hardy
About Scanlyze
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Scanlyze is an online magazine of essays, commentary, satire, and analysis. Were we half as clever, for inspiration we would take Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, Swift, Montaigne, or Seneca.
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John F. Kennedy, October 26, 1963
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