Craven Fools

Craven fools. The 22 Democrats and supposed Republican moderates who paid homage to the right-wing slander machine by voting to disavow Moveon.org yesterday once more demonstrated why they're considered sunshine patriots who can't be trusted when things get tough.

This isn't anything new. Republicans, stuck with defending an unpopular president intent on continuing the worst foreign policy debacle in U.S. history, look for ways to distract. Moveon.org published an ad with an unfortunate title — "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?" — but correctly indicting Gen. David Petraeus, the ambitious political general wired to the White House spinners, of cooking the books on Iraq. The Republicans revved up their attack machine, enlisting everyone from Rush Limbaugh to the shameless president, who disgracefully charged that the "Democrat Party" is more afraid of "irritating a left-wing group like Moveon.org" ... than "the United States military."

We've seen this before. This is a patented right-wing ploy. They grab on to a random event, inflate it into a national scandal, intimidate the media, and chuckle as Democrats fall for it. The Republican attack squad in 2004 turned a butchered joke by Sen. John Kerry into a measure of Democratic hatred of the military, and the entire Democratic establishment turned on Kerry. They've libeled Moveon for years because one of thousands of participants in a 30-second ad campaign contest submitted an entry comparing Bush to Hitler. Now, they get 22 Democrats in the Senate and the supposedly independent Republican moderates to line up and waste time passing a resolution condemning Moveon for its newspaper ad. They do this only to prove one thing - that Democrats are too spineless to stand up even for their allies. That they will cut and run at the first sign of fire.

Why would Democrats do this? One hapless aide suggested that they were fearful of the electoral consequences of not disavowing Moveon. Pathetic. Republicans are using filibusters to block majority support for ending Bush's disastrous venture in Iraq, to deny soldiers the guarantee of basic home rotations vital to their mental health and military training, to block restoration of basic habeas corpus rights, to block empowering Medicare to negotiate lower prices on prescription drugs for seniors. They are defending an occupation that has cost 30,000 U.S. casualties and nearly $1 trillion while isolating us from our allies, emboldening our enemies and providing a recruiting boon to a reconstituted al Qaeda. They are wedded to a casino economy that doesn't work for most Americans. They are responsible for so disemboweling our regulatory agencies that our children and pets are being poisoned by deadly imports. Their legislative caucus has made closeted corruption and hypocrisy their trademark. And Democrats are worried about a newspaper ad? Would you want these quails in your foxhole?

Of the presidential candidates, senators Hillary Clinton and Christopher Dodd sensibly stood up and voted against. Joe Biden and Barack Obama didn't vote, Obama describing his absence as a "protest against this empty politics." Liberals in the Senate weren't much better. Led by Barbara Boxer, they wrote their own version balancing disavowal of "an unwarranted personal attack" on Petraeus with criticism for Republicans for Swift Boating Kerry. That garnered the votes of senators Clinton and Obama, raising doubts about Hillary's claim that she knows how to stand up and fight the right, and concerns that Obama's call for a new bipartisanship may involve more retreat than reform.

It doesn't matter what you think of the Moveon.org ad or title. Individually Democratic politicians can say whatever they like. But we're trying to end a foreign policy catastrophe in Iraq. People are getting killed. Billions are being squandered. Our security is being eroded; our military weakened. Minority Republicans are blocking majority support for bringing the troops home. They are denying troops a guarantee of decent home rotations. That Senate Democrats would allow them to consume the time and the attention of the Senate and hijack that debate to vote for criticizing an ad by an independent group is simply craven and foolish.

Comments

[veracity]

This craven, backstabbing treachery of the Democrats is actually a reversion to form, beleive it or not. And the reason why can be found in Michael Lind's book, "Made in Texas: George W. Bush and the Southern Takeover of American Politics." In a nutshell, the 15th Amendment declares "The right to vote _shall not be abridged."_ But for almost 100 years after the end of the Civil War, voting rights for people of "previous condition of servitude" and their descendents WAS VERY MUCH ABRIDGED - by state sanctioned terrorism. Even the very very best jurists, academics, and politicians in the land were powerless to enforce the full extent of the 15th amendment, meaning that the Constitution was subverted and submissive to local politicians and state laws (segregation).
Today's Senate "leaders" - Leahy, Levine, Reid, Durbin, etc, are simply returning to that segregation era precedent of defering to the "moral values!" rhetoric of the segregationist (now disenfranchising, election-swiping) right wing. Lind explains the context and connections far better than this short comment.

[nutmegger]

This is why I will not vote for anyone in the senate who's running for president. They are NOT doing the job they were voted for and will not do it as president. I'm sorry, but it is true. Kuchinich or Edwards - perhaps both on the same ticket.

[Danny]

"Craven fools" by Robert Borosage is the best thing I've read all year.

[TheIndependenceParty]

Senator Reid should have called his team off the court, ... and kept the ball. You don't send your players out when you know the game is rigged.

If Bush wants supplemental funds, ... make him beg. A filibuster by the majority is all the leverage that remains. Cornyn's Resolution was rampant bullshit, ... equivalent to the entrapment Larry Craig claims! It did not mention Move-On at all! It amounted to a claim that the "Senate feels no one should ever bad mouth a person in uniform".

And fools like Specter and Casey from my state said, ... "Well, heck, ... what's wrong with that?"

And I ask them both, ... "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?"

These are the men and women that run our Nation? That Senator Cornyn is such a jokester! Next time he raises a resolution, Mr. Reid, I suggest a filibuster, ... even if he rises to offer a memorial tribute to your own mother.

For buried in his words, I assure you, are some of those same meadow muffins so prevalent in the cattle country of Texas. How'd it taste the last time, Senator Reid? As the punch line goes, ... "Now do you want to buy a toothbrush?"

[MajorKong]

Silly MoveOn! Don't they know you're only allowed to slander a veteran if they have the audacity to run for office as a Democrat?

[Zhonni]

I guess I am not the only one who think the republicans out maneuver democrats a lot of times. They have mastered the art of using outrage to elevate a nonissue.

It pained me when Sen. Kerry apologized. I knew he meant to tell a joke.

The most shameful part was, the shamless President standing in front of the troops lambasting Kerry. Who actually served the country honorably.

[Iownpeterbilt]

It is past time for the voters of this country to pull their heads out of their asses and look around. The ENTIRE CONGRESS is apparently bought and paid for by the corporate military-industrial complex.
VOTE THEM OUT and let a fresh bunch get in, then vote them out before they can get on the take...

[THISTLE]

The Democrats take the bait everytime, they
are now in control but continue to act like
losers. And the Republicans who LOST both
the House & Senate act like they are in control.
In election after election, the Republicans
"warned the Democrats that the American people
don't want negative campaigns." And as always,
the Democrats take the bait, play nice and the
Republicans destroy them with their infamous
slime machine. And now the Republicans fake
outrage about an ad and the Democrats cave.
We really do need a Third Party - the Democrats
are pathetic.

[rasqual]

"They've libeled Moveon for years because one of thousands of participants in a 30-second ad campaign contest submitted an entry comparing Bush to Hitler."

?!

That's the only thing you can imagine that Republicans might find problematic about Moveon?

Good grief. As if such silliness were of more importance than Moveon's more substantive effect among the electorate.

[mrcontinental]

We've seen this before folks:

Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. ...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country. Hermann Wilhelm Göring

Don't let it happen again.

[elleng]

You are right, they are craven and foolish.

I am no longer a 'Democrat,' once adopted to vote in primaries. I return to my ever Independent self.

[rabrophy]

I'm a disabled Vietnam vet and Westmorland betrayed me by becoming a shill for Johnson and Nixon. I got my ass shot up for nothing.

Our troops are being betrayed by Petraeus, who is a shill for Bush and Cheney. And their getting shot up for nothing.

[Zhonni]

Thanks for speaking out and thanks for your service.

I am not sure what the country is becoming when our freedom of speech is coming under attack from high atop the Hill.

This is certainly not what I risked my life for.

[dogman44]

Me either. I would risk it again though, to put an end to this nonsense.

[Verity1025]

I sent MoveOn money last evening and I don't usually support political organizations financially. At last somebody has stood up and spoken truth to power and they apparently are determined to continue to do so.
MoveOn is also talking about supporting people in the Democratic primaries to run against the Democrats who were elected to end the war and are selling us out.

[Timezoned]

As far as the mystery of why the elected Democrats would go along with this, look no further. In comments all over even progressive blogs, there are plenty of commenters just as vehement in attacking the ad, playing right into this Republican ploy you so accurately describe.

Putting the blame for this massive waste of time onto one small progressive group is absurd. There are right wing sources putting out far more foul material daily, but can we even imagine an "anti-Coulter day" at the Senate similar to this? Or more precsiely, a day devoted to just one of her smears? The GOP would laugh it off the floor.

Too bad the Democrats are more easily manipulated and intimidated into going along with such juvenile nonsese, but it's not just the elected ones.

[macmug]

I think Move-On has a lot more dough to spend on campaigns than Coulter does.

[Timezoned]

And? What's the point?

Can you imagine ANY resolution in the Senate condeming any right wing group? Budget of your choice?

The idea is laughable. Which is why it's a perfect reality check.

[Einstone]

It's really getting hard to stomach what has become of our political process. Bush has wasted close to 4 thousand American lives, possibly 1/2 million Iraqi lives, and sums approaching a trillion dollars in pursuit of an agenda that funnels cash to the Republican Part and away from important social programs. Forget WMD, forget Freedom and Democracy for the Iraqi people - the war is just a tool Bush used to force his agenda upon America.
That being said, how does he have the audacity to feign anger over Moveon's ad? Our politics has become pure gamesmanship and has nothing at all to do with reality. You know how one team sees their baserunner as safe and the other team sees the same play and calls out...thats what its become; decisions made regardless of truth and reality. There is no thought of what might be best for the country - only what is best for the party. Democrats had better realize that the game has changed. Republicans are truly at war with the Democratic Party and will do or say anything to win. The Democrats, though they have a better team (in terms of Constitutionally aligned principles and values), are getting whacked because they do not practice the hyper aggressive politics that has become the core of Republican power. The shame that has been heaped on Democrats because of a truthful albeit questionably titled ad confirms their frailty and misunderstanding of the stakes of the game.