A failed state in Iraq would destabilize the entire region, hand our jihadist enemies a major victory and result in a devastating blow to our national security credibility and interests.

Come again? Are you DLC'ers telling Democrats, progressives and independents that if we don't fight them over there we'll be fighting them here?

And you supposed politically astute geniuses are flat out stating that "our jihadist enemies" are not primarily trying to extricate their nation from the consequences of America's self-interest at the expense of the national security credibility and interests of Iraqis themselves?

But the right course now is neither to give the terrorists a victory by withdrawing, nor to continue Bush's failed policies.  We urge progressives to place maximum pressure on the administration to reverse its mistakes and pursue a new strategy linked to clear benchmarks for success in Iraq and in the broader war on terror.

That is neither the talk of an opposition party nor the supposed wisdom of progressive thinking.  No, it's pure unadulterated neocon ideology - the sort of thing we expect to hear from the Republican National Committee and the Weekly Standard. But for God's sake, not someone pretending to be the heart and voice of Democratic wisdom.

You jokers are not speaking for or with the best interests of the people of this country at heart.

Here are three ways the U.S. can do exactly that:

First, we should formally disclaim any interest in permanent U.S. military bases in Iraq; clearly shift the primary responsibility of defending the country to the Iraqi military (with embedded Coalition troops), and adopt a joint military strategy based on proven principles of counterinsurgency. The last point means abandoning Vietnam-style "search and destroy" missions against the insurgency and instead focusing on progressively securing territory where reconstruction can proceed and normal civic life can resume.

Tell me, how is it that we can justifiably recruit our own young flesh and blood and within 6 weeks to 3 months train them "adequately", ship them to Iraq right smack dab into harm's way and task them with the primary responsibility of defending someone else's country

- yet we have failed to justifiably accomplish the same objective with Iraqis themselves - who have to be more invested in the sacrifice on behalf of their own nation?

Why haven't we accomplished this with the more-motived Iraqis also in less than a year?

This logic no longer holds water. DLC'ers are singing a Republican tune.

Second, we should launch a new political strategy aimed relentlessly at winning Sunni support for the new government, and at isolating jihadists. We still have considerable leverage among Shi'a and Kurdish leaders; we should use it to push for confidence -- building measures like the integration of communal militias into the Iraqi army and police forces; a blanket amnesty for former Baathists not implicated in atrocities; and for intensified talks with Sunnis on supplemental protocols to the proposed constitution that would ensure a viable central government and minority rights.

We have lost the ability and justification to accomplish this in any meaningful way. Without your neocon assumptions, this also does not hold water.

This situation is Colin's Powell's "If you break it, you own it" philosophy. Except that the real owners have seen that you cannot fix it to the ideal you propagandized before walking into the establishment with shock and awe thinking of flowers in your paths.

It is screwed up so badly, they just want and need you to leave.

Third, we should muster all our diplomatic resources to create a more supportive international environment for the new Iraqi government. It should not be that hard to establish a UN-authorized international contact group to coordinate political support and economic assistance.

Now you're talking! ... and that more supportive international environment for the new Iraqi government needs to have ceded to it all authority and credibility necessary to create trust inside Iraq and throughout the Middle East.

Republicans and their neocon appointees have made of America the mean drunk whose behavior has been so poor that the drunk needs to walk away and stop trying to fix it by  making it worse.

We should cash our sizable chits with Saudi Arabia and Egypt to work directly with Iraqi Sunni Arabs, using economic incentives where possible, to undermine support for insurgency and encourage political engagement. These Arab states should also push Syria (in conjunction with potential U.N. sanctions) to finally close off travel routes into Iraq for jihadists.

We should come clean with our own populace as to what those sizable chits with Saudi Arabia and Egypt are - how they became sizable and why they have value.

We should come clean with the American public as to what our true investment risk and expected outcome is in these relationships.

Our government should come clean about what the relationship to oil, torture and permanent bases is in connection with Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the rest of the Middle East.

We should formally push for indictment of chief terrorist Zarquawi for crimes against humanity in Iraq, drawing worldwide attention to the vicious anti-Shi'a ethnic cleansing campaign that characterizes the insurgency. All these steps ARE politically feasible, but there's no evidence the administration is taking them.

We should do whatever it takes to acknowledge and then take all necessary measures to address the global indictment of our country for crimes against humanity in Iraq, drawing worldwide attention to our vicious anti-Iraqi nationalist cleansing campaign that characterizes our foolish neocon attempt to impose an American control.

These steps are politically feasible but there's no evidence that neither the administration nor the DLC is interested in taking them.

In calling for this new strategy, we acknowledge that we are asking brave Americans to sacrifice still more for a crucial goal under the direction of an administration that has failed so often to pursue that goal competently or honestly.

We share the anger of most progressives towards Bush's blunders, even as we urge them not to let that anger obscure the very real national stake we all have in taking every step possible to leave Iraq in a condition where it will not become a failed state and a terrorist base for global operations.

As usual, Tony Blair best articulated those stakes, for our people and his, just this week:

"This is a global struggle. Today it is at its fiercest in Iraq. It has allied itself there with every reactionary element in the Middle East. Strip away their fake claims of grievance and see them for what they are: terrorists who use 21st century technology to fight a pre-medieval religious war that is utterly alien to the future of humankind."

That's a reality that all of us, whether or not we supported the original invasion of Iraq, need to keep in mind, holding our leaders most accountable not for their blunders, but for their willingness to recognize them and change course now.

This is the pot calling the kettle black. Quoting Tony Blair reveals more about whose agenda the DLC supports. The DLC is voicing the ultimate arrogantly ignorant assumption that we can ask brave Americans to sacrifice still more for a goal it (the DLC) has failed to describe as different from the administration's neocon stupidity.

The DLC does not share the same anger as progressives towards Bush's blunders so long as they offer only a better way to break more things and cause more damage worldwide.

Deny it as they may, the DLC is assuming that their anger reflects the disapproving American voter opinion in the polls - justifiable anger based on DLC self-interested assumptions - which do not take into consideration the very real personal stake we all have in a peaceful future.

Iraq as a pre-invasion terrorist base for global operations is not something that has been proven or validated.

Iraq as a failed state of forced American design needs to go through the failed state transition - with the help of a supportive international community before we can understand how any country seeking its own independence is doing so purely out of an intent to become a  terrorist base for global operations.

Republicans and the DLC reflect an arrogant assumption that American wisdom, primarily because America entered the 21st century as THE sole superpower, is the best wisdom for global harmony.

It's an assumption based on sustaining those who have the power, Republican or Democrat, who remain part of a minority working to remain permanently in the driver's seat.

Rejection of the DLC is imperative if progressives and liberals are going to unite and take back the country via election of Democratic politicians.

If anything, all citizens should see clearly that groups such as the DLC want a status quo that - precisely as the Republican-controlled government, stays on the wrong course.

She had the power to take an action to protect Joe's son.
Joe Colgan had none.
She didn't do that and hind-sight hasn't justified her not doing that.

Although she does not stand singly guilty nor bear more responsbility than the rest for Democratic passivity regarding this historic American embarrassment, as one of the group of 100 most powerful Americans she excercised the power we gave her but in doing so took a tragically consequential opposite action;

doing so from an unwise and fear-driven political perspective that has come back to haunt her, that has contributed to killing Joe's son and placing thousands more unnecessarily in harm's way.

No, she is not the solitary cause of those deaths. But she is not absolved just because she's up for re-election and slick logicians appeal to a purpose that in reality is not higher nor more noble. Her current attitude and the verbal bone she tossed when Kerry was standing behind her does not merit understanding, let alone forgiveness.

This is not about renomination or defeating Republicans so we can take back the government and eventually some day bring home the troops. We'll do that with or without Maria Cantwell. But if she is not part of it, it won't be because a small minority publicly disputed her own public position.

That sit-in is about the most basic and essential reasons why someone is voted into a position of speaking for the rest of us.

Those sitting-in today were not trying to un-nominate a senator nor advocate for another candidate.

This isn't about that and those who think it is are too shallow and need more civics and less political science classes.

Most of the readers/posters here who DON'T have skin in the game, and we know who they are ...

the college graduates and not-graduates who read-and-write-a-lot, drink loud and liberally but ain't  never-been-there-never-done-that,

the fighting demo keyboard political know-it-alls
with nothing momentous or of value to persuade those few of us not to hold her accountable;

not to hold a cowardly political party's feet to the fire and send Maria and Democratic leadership   a message that they're getting no pass.

Here I come again with points I've already made but points that seem to go way over the heads of people who couldn't or didn't struggle with the 60's and 70's, as late teens or in their early 20's and coping with a very real sucking into a maelstrom of killing,

who never had to use every venue possible to wake up an electorate and bring down liars.

Point One
Maria is going to win her primary easily.

But if someone like Paul Hackett were challenging her for the nomination, all you tip-toers would be standing on shaky crystal pedestals trying to get the rest of us to shut the hell up.

Point 2
If ever in the history of this country there was an opportune time to run against a repuglican candidate - incumbent or otherwise - in the entire U.S.A., 2006 is the year.

If a Democratic Pary cannot whip the majority of the Republican candidates around the country despite gerrymandering and any other swift-bloat tactics, then our party leadership is woefully inadequate and under-qualified. Too many people out there have not only pointed out Republican success tactics, but the flaws and ways to beat those tactics.

Republicans are so incredibly disadvantaged this year.

Our Demo leaders are so cowardly disingenuous in their shameful caution that seems to offer timidity as a strategy in a way that sets up Democratic dissenters as the potential and probable blame objects and fall guys should the long-time losing Demo leaders' dainty, cautious don't-rock-the-boat strategy fail again.

McGavick is no republican charismatic powerhouse who could ride roughshod over Maria due to some sort of sheer intelligence, skill, personality and leadership advantage. If he and his party succeed in building that lie, then it's our own damn fault for letting them get away with lying. Go read the state repug site. They're trying it already and Pelz made the right response.

She's got McGavick hands down right now.

In her first campaign she beat an incumbent for God's sake in a republican year and it really doesn't matter that the margin was thin. What makes anyone think she's so weak or vulnerable as an incumbent that "wise" democrats need to dumb up and shut up and quit expecting senatorial leadership?

She won it in a year when Republicans were kicking lots of Democratic asses all over the country. Gorton was a tough opponent back then but McGavick now?

... an uninspiring stereotypical corporate technocrat - the kind whose lack of leadership style and inability to inspire demonstrate themselves every time he's opened his mouth this year.

This is the time and this is the moment to run for election against a weak party full of weak candidates who have too much to defend and apologize for and too little to justify a vote for them.

Ir is not a time for democrats to act as if it is our party that has to overcome 5 1/2 years of mistakes.

You cannot take back any country that has been stolen from you by asking the Republicans,

"You guys wouldn't mind if we had a crack at governing for a while ... would you?"

That's what your strategies say more loudly than any verbal logic intended to tone down criticism of a candidate.

Trust us, we're noisy but we'll vote the right way.

But she owes this moment of accountability. and if we cannot hold a politician accountable about this kind of issue then we are not truly living in a civic reality. We are living in a world of spin and deception.

Her vote and position on this war have entitled her to the learning experience she's getting right now and the understanding that she is not untouchable;

that in another future venue, she'll experience a greater need for up-front honesty that recognizes the military contributions and sacrifices of a middle class who voted for her ... expecting that she'd represent more little guys and less big assholes.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Iraq War: Cantwell's choice

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD

It must have been a bit uncomfortable for Sen. Maria Cantwell to share the same Seattle stage with Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, not because he is among the Democratic Party's most telegenic rising young stars but because he is critical of the Bush administration's rush to war, while she supported it.

Cantwell has said she doesn't think her vote for the war was a mistake. A few months ago, she stunned the members of this newspaper's Editorial Board by talking of "our successes in Iraq."

Her Republican challenger, Mike McGavick, is unlikely to campaign against a war that is the cornerstone of a Republican administration.

But Cantwell can hardly campaign against a war her vote sanctioned, even though a large portion of the U.S. electorate and a decidedly larger portion of her own constituents are unhappy with the course of the war and President Bush's handling of it. It's a campaign issue that could bleed votes from the traditional Democratic base.

But Cantwell may be able to benefit both her re-election prospects and the nation's foreign policy. She helped lead us into this war; now it's incumbent on Cantwell to help lead us out of it.

If Cantwell is simply wedded to a stay-the-course strategy in Iraq, she's lost touch with her constituents on the central foreign policy issue.

If, however, she recognizes that we're in a quagmire that will continue to drain U.S. blood and treasure, Cantwell should bring a legitimate voice to the debate on how to best get out of Iraq.