I spent some of Wednesday with a worried mom from Idaho Falls, Idaho, whose only son is in the National Guard. Once a month he drives 200 miles to train, then he drives 200 miles back home again. (All for $200, most of which is spent on gas.) He served in Bosnia. Will he be deployed to Iraq?
"I was counting on the Democrats to stop this war," said Marianne, blue eyes blazing. So were thousands of other mothers.
It's time to turn this story around. Rove's wrong. This so-called "supplemental" isn't about supporting troops; this blank-check bill is about sacrificing them.
At the current rate of fatalities, another 200-300 US troops will have been killed by the time the Congress votes on funding again. Ten times that many Iraqis will have perished. Squandering human lives and health for Exxon and Chevron's wealth is not supporting the troops. It's sacrificing them.
By voting more money for Bush's war, the Congress will be sacrificing more lives to a president who has no plan, for a cause he can't explain, at a cost that none of us can count.
The bill your Senator and Representative are likely to vote on today is about sacrificing lives in a country whose people want us gone, where our presence is only inflaming extremists and speeding on theocracy.
Once upon a time, the president said something about bringing "democracy" to the middle east. It's sends quite a message to the world that the people's majority in the most powerful democracy in the world doesn't give a damn about the people who voted them into office. Vote and still you die.
The only way to support the troops is to fully fund their withdrawal now.
Call your representative today: 202 224 3121.
Vote against the Sacrifice the Troops bill. Stand up for Marianne and the millions of moms -- US and Iraqi -- who were counting on the American peace and justice movement to stop this madness.
Laura Flanders is the author of Blue Grit: True Democrats Take Back Politics from the Politicians, from The Penguin Press.
