Is the Senate ready to set a “hard and fast deadline” for U.S. troops withdrawal from Iraq? This morning Sen. John Kerry said that this week he will submit a resolution to the Senate asking for an up or down vote on such a resolution.
Senator Kerry spoke in the ballroom of the Washington Hilton as part of the Take Back America conference, at which I am an exhibit. Right now I am back on display in the Exhibit Hall, sitting next to sister exhibit Liza Sabater.
The morning speakers were Sen. Hillary Clinton, who was 15 minutes late; Rep. Nancy Pelosi, and Sen. Kerry. All of the speeches were good and enthusiastically received, but Kerry’s speech clearly beat the competition on the fired-up voltage meter.
I’m not going to hazard a guess on audience size. The Washington Hilton ballroom is a huge room in serious need of redecorating. The ceiling reflects a retro-Jetsons-space age look, the walls are mauve (aka “baby shit pink”), and the carpeting is a style I call faux baroque — ornate, but disconnected from any known historical period. Or any known color palette, for that matter. If you can visualize that, add some styrofoam coffee cups scattered on the floor and rows of conference attendees in gilt, scrollworked chairs. Now you’re as good as there.
Senator Clinton spoke first, and she launched her speech on the topic of voter rights. She called for a returning integrity to voting systems and taking voting away from Harris, Blackwell, and their ilk. She also touched on the topic of “fiscal sovereignty,” which is something I want to blog about at some length in the future.
Not to give short shrift to the Congresswoman, but I am about to run out of blogging time — Senator Kerry’s speech focused Iraq and was the speech he should have given during the 2004 campaign for the Democratic nomination. He argued that if indeed the President means it when he says “as Iraqis stand up, we’ll stand down,” then the Iraqis need a firm deadline for standing up. The White House gave the Iraqis firm deadlines for elections and adopting their constitution, so why not a deadline for taking responsibility for their own security?
Earlier, Senator Clinton had also spoken on the subject of Iraq. She is opposed to an open-ended commitment of troops, she said, but does not support setting “a date certain.” This inspired some boos, as well as applause.
Characteristic of chameleons, how did Hillary’s faux baroque skirt and space age hairdo look?
Well someone went and said it , so now I have to reply…someone went and used the “w” word(withdrawl)…..
Now look, you know I was no fan of the whole Iraq invasion.I knew it was wrong before our country went in (how is it a dumb gal from Iowa could figure out there were no WMD and the powers that be couldn’t is beyond me)…and I have thought since the rest of the world caught up with me in realizing there were NO WMD that we should have said we were wrong and asked NATO to step in to stablize the country…
But now we are hearing calls for a pull out.While I can’t dispute the logic, the timing is REALLY bothering me.It plays right into bushco’s hand.There is a lot of talk that we cannot “hit” Iran because our troops are bogged down in Iraq…if we work NOW to unbog them we will be unbogging them straight into Iran….I am concerned what we are really doing is giving bush a way to free up the troops so he can use them elsewhere.bush couldn’t be better at killing off our troops if he sent them hunting with cheney, I don’t think he needs our help.
Don’t misunderstand me.Iraq is still 100% wrong. And no one wants those troops home more then me.I have lost 2 in-laws and I have 3 more serving in Iraq as I type.With that in mind understand me when I say I think my in laws are safer in Iraq then they will be going into a Iran that has been freshly nuked.
bush has long ago decided we are going into Iran.No one will be able to stop him, but I’ll be damned if I want to help him justify freeing up the troops to do it.So for me all this stomping about a pull out is making me nervous…Sure it will make Kerry feel like a winner when he gets his way and there is a pull out but the pull out may send thousands of our fine men and women to their deaths in Iran.The “victory” for anyone wanting a pull out would ring so hollow.Ever heard the saying “Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it”?………My in laws tell me the objective they see as they sit in Iraq is to get oil fields secure enough for hand over to private security companies.They are not worried about the country we all wring our hands about with every troop death or kidnapping or car bomb… they are worried about OIL my friends,and the jest of it is we will stand at gun point while that oil pumps profits into the “have mores” pockets , like common criminals knocking off a quicky mart.. enough of our troops will stay to loom a threat over puppet government set up in Iraq but a bulk of the security for the oil will be turned over to private firms paid for with tax dollars so we can have our troops freed up for “other missions”……
Our calls for withdrawl give bush the excuse he was looking for to speed the plan along.So ask yourself do you want the troops in Iraq or in Iran….Neither is not a choice…..I hope I am wrong…
Thanks for letting me get that off my chest..it’s been bugging me for awhile. 🙂
Troops are never going to go to Iran. Too many dead troops would be the result, which would be politically costly. Instead if theyu decide to use force, they’ll just bomb the shit out of anything that even smells like it might have something to do with nuke tech.
Unfortunately, the likely result will be that any unradicalized shi’a in Iraq will BE radicalized, which means a HUGE increas of insurgent activity in Iraq, which means more dead troops.
This will happen no matter what the troop levels are like in Iraq.
-me
I hope your right Ian… but my family members in the military on the ground in Iraq are saying that is where they can expect to go next.Their e mails paint a pretty upsetting picture…. I said it before, I will say it again.. I hope very much I am wrong…. I agree with you about the end result however,, more death is the only certain outcome.
It’s all rhetoric!
Problem with Iran is that it’s a LOT bigger than Iraq, with terrain a LOT more rugged, with a MUCH larger population, most of whom are MUCH more committed to the Iranian leadership.
Plus, they’ve been building up their military for the last couple of decades, while Saddam never had the chance.
We probably don’t know where all their nuke sites are, and of the ones we do, we probably couldn’t destroy everything … but we could destroy enough to put a very severe crimp in their nuke-bomb-making plans.
Which means from any strategic standpoint, we should absolutely NOT put boots on the ground in Iran. It makes no sense to do so.
So if we end up doing it, it’ll be for a purely political reason. However, if it IS a purely political reason, the fact that we will suffer so many losses in the doing of it would tend to negate whatever political benefit comes of it. So it makes no sense to do so from a political standpoint either.
Now, the Pentagon will for sure know what the cost of a ground invasion would be. We just have to hope the Pentagon actually tells the president the right answer when he asks about it, and that the president actually listens to the Pentagon.
Ya know … put like that … I’m starting to get worried too…
-me
Ian,,,, I agree with everything you say in comment 6…on top of all that add in Irans oil…which opens a all new world wide can of worms..Countries depend on that oil to flow…economies depend on it….a lot is at stake….Certainly to me the loss of life is all that really matters… but this oil is a huge factor to consider in all of this because interrupting the flow to other nations is sure to add more nations to the growing list of those who really don’t like us very much right now….
bush, IMHO, is nuts……lets hope he is not that nuts…..and for the record,, his daughters should enlist.
Justme, I’m really glad you shared your views on this, esp as they come from family in the field. I’ve suspected the very same thing.
Sadly, Bush and his people are crazy enough to expand the war to Iran, making things much worse for our troops, our country, our planet. I believe he thinks he’s on a mission from God.
I was reflecting today, that apart from $3 plus gas prices, and the loss and maiming of several thousand of our troops, the Iraq debacle really has not impacted the average American’s life in a personal way. The music still plays, the World Cup is on TV, and we can still go to our jobs and pay the mortgage and buy groceries.
Going into Iran will change this in a very dramatic way. If you want to have some nightmares, read this chilling scenario, This is The Way It Ends, posted at DailyKos a few weeks ago. I warn you – it will scare the crap out of you. The guy who wrote it should get an award – it was his first diary.
Alyosha you are so right, it did scare the crap out of me..made it hard to sleep last night…..but thanks for the link…. GREAT first diary, however!
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