Having completed a little tome about the gallons of blood guzzled by Democrats over numerous decades, I was stopped by an AP headline this morning that read, "Anti-war Democrats ponder next step."
Hmm. Must be about Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel anticipating more shit storms on the American horizon -- not that they can do much more than hunker down and weather the falling body parts as best they can, but it's the thought that counts, and style points are always considered. In the end, it's like having a mime plant an imaginary daisy in the mouth of a M1A2 Abrams tank's 120mm M256 smoothbore gun, under a midday desert sun, death metal blasting from within, the lock-and-load kids cruising to Suffocation and Nile. Tank treads in the greasepaint. The rapid beat rips on.
Instead, the names listed are Harry Reid, who voted for war, Nancy Pelosi, utterly worthless, and Russ Feingold, who at least has made a few attempts to highlight statist corruption and war-lust, though when nudged, Feingold will hump the flag to show that his "opposition" comes from a patriotic place. Because don't ya know, peace is so very patriotic, and the Democrats are nothing if not solid patriots.
Where's a veteran muleskinner when you need one?
The AP piece portrays the Dems as naturally antiwar, which naturally they aren't, and quotes the standard mouthpieces and apologists like MoveOn, devoted primarily to electing Democrats, regardless of actual social effectiveness. The current strategy, proposing moving troops around here and there, taking some out, redeploying others, is the typical Beltway shell game, a lot of action that signifies essentially nothing. The Democrats are not going to withdrawal from Iraq, much less Afghanistan; and should Saint Obama become President Saint, there is no way in hell the U.S. leaves. The last thing a newly-minted imperial manager does is undermine, much less destroy, the imperial project. Streamline it? Sure. Re-brand it for domestic consumption? Of course. Trash it? Go back to your meth pipe.
The Democrats are simply looking for election angles, and will be helped mightily by John McCain's utter refusal, or perhaps inability, to improvise around shifting tactics. The veteran butcher of Vietnamese is a godsend to the Dems, that is, if they play it delicately with steady attention to detail. Because in America, you never know when the radioactive winds will turn, and the Democrats have proven time and again that they're not the best storm-chasers around, especially when they're celebrating victory a hundred miles from the finish line. The skies continue to rumble.
And I totally agree with this article. The "front runners" and our leadership in congress is not Anti-War at all. The only dems who are anti-war are the ones being ignored and marginalized. Kucinich, Gravel and maybe Richardson. Gravel is the ONLY candidate running aside from Ron Paul who I believe would pull us out of Iraq IMMEDIATELY. Gravel is the ONLY one who has proven himself and has DONE IT BEFORE. He was responsible for stopping the draft with a one-man filibuster in 71. He released the Pentagon Papers that showed how our govt. lied to get us into Vietnam (sound familiar?).
He's been so marginalized in the press and made to look like a loony. In keeping with what the media usually does to messengers of Peace. They did the same to Kucinich...
If you want to be out of Iraq, choose Gravel.
None of us have missed the bi-partisan support for the war and the fact the Dem frontrunners support continuing the war, no matter what their rhetoric is.
ticket with Ron Paul, so that all the anti-war
Repos can join up with the anti-War Demos.
There will be such overwhelming support, it will
totally blow your mind, fer sure. There won't
be anyone left to vote for the Demo candidate,
hardly.
They'd have my vote in a second over the authoritarian Republicrat party.
Iraq has already wrecked our moral standing.
Iraq is destroying our civil liberties.
Iraq is a RepubliCon dream come true.
Why do the Dems fund it?
To improve their chances in this election.
They are NOT anti-war.
Obama will need a better, quicker exit plan to get my vote.
Getting our people out of Iraq is not going to be easy, but a way will be found to do it, if the Demo candidate is elected in November. If the Repo Man gets back in, we will indeed be there for another hundred years. Take your pick, people.
Now that the campaign rutting season is well underway, it's not surprising that Accentuate the Positive Mode kicks in, and that Obama resonates best in this atmosphere. In short, he's emerging as the most attractive candidate. Even as one who doesn't care for bandwagon rides, I believe that Obama has the spiffiest bandwagon.
But I agree that he's not especially anti-war, and it's not just because of the usual tired strategy/process clichés from the true believers, e.g. "Oh, he's got to campaign to the 'right', but once he gets IN, he'll govern from the 'left'!" (Or worse yet-- in response to the insight that "left/right" dichotomy doesn't fit the chaotic territory the way it used to-- is the belief that he'll TRANSCEND the left/right spectrum AND duopolistic partisanship, and embark on a historic "Third Way" approach to governing.
Yeah, like Bill Clinton.
I expect that President Obama will carefully pay homage to our fine military, our patriotic corporations, and reassure the thoroughly manipulated and hapless yahoos that he will remain Strong in the face of Global Terror. He may tone down the ultra-jingoism and dumbed-down wingnut propaganda, and avoid terms like "Islamofascist", but if you watch his hands instead of his mouth, I believe you'll see very little evidence that he's truly dedicated to deconstructing the vast malignant tumor of the government elites' exceptionalist, imperialist corporate (media)/military nexus.
For well over a century, the US has been spellbound by a circular political logic that insists on requiring presidents (and other political leaders) to prove their warlord bona fides by barking at the world that the president will pop a War Boner to protect its citizens OR intervene in non-US aggression or oppression by promptly exercising just and sufficient military force.
Given all of the above, and given the usual misreading of public will and the fear that even APPEARING truly "anti-war"-- even "anti-Iraq quagmire"-- no Democratic Party candidate will come anywhere close to standing up, much less standing tall, to condemn US imperialist atrocities.
We're already being instructed by the MSM that Iraq doesn't matter as much as the economy. I find it sick and disgusting that Democrats are more concerned about being able to fill up the SUV and motor the kids to the mall than about supporting OR withdrawing our troops in Iraq. Pick one, please, either one, but don't leave them hanging.
That should be our highest priority, but instead it's become one more backdrop for increasingly cynical political theater.
We stay in Iraq, no matter who wins.
and yet recently Pelosi has been strong, standing against GW Bush's push to give telecoms immunity.