‘I don’t think 20,000 more troops is Democratic, I don’t think [it’s] Republican. I think it’s stupid’

February 8, 2007

On the Hill, conservative war supporters have a reflexive, knee-jerk reaction to any disapproval of the president’s policy — critics are weak and cowardly. It doesn’t matter whether the conservative avoided military service and the critic didn’t; Bush backers believe in “strength” and “courage,” and his detractors might as well be terrorist sympathizers.

It’s why I enjoyed hearing about VoteVets.org’s appearances on the Hill yesterday. No one in their right minds are going to accuse these guys of anything but “strength” and “courage” — and their criticism of the war is no-holds-barred.

When Iraq war veteran Jon Soltz accused Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) of “aiding the enemy,” the Democratic senators gathered around him yesterday did not wince. Nor did Democrats object when Soltz, the chairman of a group called VoteVets.org, called President Bush and Vice President Cheney “draft dodgers.”

In the United States Congress, where decorum usually holds sway, Soltz and his small band of veterans are saying things many Democrats would like to express but can’t. And as the politics heat up over the Iraq war, Democratic leaders increasingly are being drawn to Soltz and his angry soldiers.

VoteVets.org appears to be the most active group trying to influence the debate about the president’s plan to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq…. The veterans are selling a blunt message: The Bush strategy in Iraq is a failure, and adding troops sends more young men and women to their deaths. If you care about the military, they told lawmakers, vote against the troop increase. Legislators who are stalling debate on the matter are “cowards,” they said.

For reasons that I’ve never fully been able to grasp, congressional Dems just aren’t comfortable using the kind of language congressional Republicans use. When it comes to national security, they’ve been bullied into the defensive. It’s why Dems must have been thrilled to have the VoteVets.org reps making all the arguments publicly that they’re too-often tepid to make.

In several news conferences, Soltz accused McConnell of “aiding the enemy” by allowing the Bush administration to build up troops in Iraq at the expense of the hunt for Osama bin Laden. “We are not fighting the war on terrorism, we are in the middle of a civil war,” he said, referring to Iraq. “Meanwhile, the guy who attacked this country on 9/11 is living in a cave in Afghanistan.”

Soltz called Cheney a “draft dodger,” repeating charges he made last month when he disparaged a “president who frankly knows nothing of war and a vice president who knows even less.” He said: “Senators on the fence have a choice. They can stand with veterans like us, or they can stand with the draft dodgers down the road.”

Democrats said they will not muzzle the veterans. In many ways, the former soldiers and Marines are expressing sentiments the lawmakers want broadcast, and they help inoculate Democrats against Republican claims that opposing the president’s plan undermines the troops. […]

Soltz said the group is pro-military and not a front for the Democrats. “I’m a conservative,” said Soltz, who volunteered on Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign. “I don’t think 20,000 more troops is Democratic, I don’t think 20,000 troops is Republican. I think it’s stupid.”

More of this, please.

Post Script: For what it’s worth, some Dems seem to be coming around to showing this style of rhetorical toughness. Take Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin’s (D-Mich.) comments from yesterday, for example.

“What emboldens the enemy is the almost 4 years’ presence of Western troops in the middle of a Muslim country’s capital, which causes over 70 percent of the residents of that country to oppose our presence.

“What emboldens the enemy is the open-ended presence of Western troops, which serves as a magnet for extremists and gives a propaganda club to our enemies.

“What emboldens the enemy is invading Iraq without the support of the international community.

“What emboldens the enemy is lawlessness and looters ransacking public buildings and institutions in Iraq.

“What emboldens the enemy is invading Iraq without a plan for the aftermath of the invasion.

“What emboldens the enemy is increasing the number of American troops, which results in Iraqis taking less responsibility for providing security for all the citizens of Iraq.

“What emboldens the enemy is the creation of Green Zones protecting Iraqi political leaders, in which they pursue a winner-take-all political approach.”

Good for Levin.

and does the oh so bright carl levin believe that the enemy will not be emboldened by driving us out of Iraq?

  • Makes me wonder what it will take for Dems to get a spine, and if they’ll lose it when the drums beat louder for the coming war with Iran.

    I seriously doubt if our side really has the guts to stand up for us, but I hope I’m wrong.

  • The Bush crowd in the Republican party think and act with moral certainty, (at least as far as they are concerned). As such, they know they are right and their “adversaries” are wrong, so much so, they excuse their own bad behavior, make excuses for their own ignorances, and work to clobber anyone who may have a difference of opinion. The last one, (the clobbering one), is so anti-democratic it is worth nothing to our heritage. In fact, these neocon/faithbased Republicans have been ratching up the political rhetoric for the past 15 years so much, some must believe by now that the only way to save our democracy is to destroy it – truly a troubling turn of events for our beloved nation. Anyway, in the recent words of one of my favorite Republican Democrats, the Honorable Senator Jim Webb, we will have to show Mr. Bush and his ilk the way when it comes to taking back our democracy. -Kevo

  • Apparently, tweedledee and tweedledem, you believe that there is still hope for a ‘victory’ in Iraq.

    We have lost. Your guys lost it, and they cannot fix it.

    Accept it, and move on with the rest of us in trying to limit further damage to all.

  • Tweedle is right, but it doesn’t matter. The choice isn’t between being driven out or not. It’s about when. Because the chance to win the war has passed. It slipped through our fingers a few months after we invaded when the enemy realized we didn’t know what to do next.

  • No one in their right minds are going to accuse these guys of anything but “strength” and “courage” — and their criticism of the war is no-holds-barred.

    After the RNC called Maj. Tammy Duckworth a “cut and runner” (she lost both of her legs when her helicopter was shot down in Iraq) when she ran for office we know the GOP isn’t in their right minds. Or maybe they are in their Right minds.

    But that was a race for a seat in the HoR so I don’t think the GOP will break out the attacks when the whole world is watching. It will be interesting to see what, if any spin BushCo (TM) can put on this. I suspect it will be empty platitudes about how much this country owes this soldiers or, suggestions the members of VoteVets.org are being “used” by the Democratic Party.

    Followed by Soltz giving them another earful, yipee!

    But I’m hoping BushBrat will finally blow a fuse in public.

    Slightly OT: I only watched parts of the Stupor Bowl, but I did catch the VV.org ad. I was surprised they aired it.

  • tweedledee and tweedledem, by your logic how do you explain lack of any decrease in attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq over all this time?

    You sound like an idiot.

  • tweedletroll of course will never realize that by sending too few troops into this quagmire without a plan, Bush guaranteed us an emboldened enemy. (and if he had asked for more he wouldn’t have gotten them, so the whole thing would be moot). If we send more of our troops to die, we not only extend Bush’s initial error, we embolden all our other enemies by making ourselves weaker than we already are.

    If we withdraw now while we still have some fighting forces left, we keep a deterrent force. If we continue to squander it in Iraq, we don’t.

    And do sign up for the Army as soon as you can, OK? Better yet, just head over there with a bowie knife and show them who’s tough.

  • tweedle is right if you think you need to stay stuck somewhere extremely dangerous where you’re accomplishing nothing to prove you’re not a coward

  • tweedle is the type of guy who, after accidentally sticking his hand into a kitchen sink trash disposal that’s turned on continues to hold it there so that the trash disposal won’t be emboldened.

  • It’s why I enjoyed hearing about VoteVets.org’s appearances on the Hill yesterday. No one in their right minds are going to accuse these guys of anything but “strength” and “courage” — CB

    And you’re making the assumption that anyone on the right is in their right minds on which particular speck of evidence…?

    Clearly, VoteVets’ Soltz has lost his nerve (or “stomach” to use DeadEye’s term). Or he lost his mind, when an IED exploded nearby and shook his head, scrambling his brain. Or VoteVets are a fringe movement, in pay of the fringe left….

    Lots of perfectly good “spins”, even without tiddly twit’s. I just hope that, when the right starts spinning, the Dems won’t start backpedalling “we never edorsed such intemperate language”.

  • What can the warmongers say when their own turn against them? Nobody knows war like those who have been there, and even the asshats running this fiasco know that. I applaud the veterans for having the spine that seems to be lacking in Congress. As I sit here writing this I am looking at the folded flag and the framed letter from that lying sack of shit we are calling a president thanking me for my dead son’s service to his country. These vets are saying what my son can’t. I only wish my congressmen and women would say it too.

    Bush must be stopped. Every day, more families are going through the hell of this loss, for nothing more than ego and oil. What are we waiting for? What more does Bush have to do to prove his impeachability? 50,000 more deaths? We wouldn’t win this war with a hundred thousand more. Bush knows it, that’s why he’s agitating against Iran. His solution to an impossible mess is to go make another one, hoping to distract our attention from the first one. He’s like a con-man bilking one victim after another, only instead of stealing our life’s savings (although he’s trying his best to do that, too), he’s taking our lives.

    What I’m hoping to hear from Congress is just one word: IMPEACH!

  • This war has done the impossible: Jim Webb who would not shake hands with John Kerry for twenty years for speaking out about Vietnam is now in the same party with him. That sort of shows you how INCREDIBLY stupid the war in Iraq is.

  • Tweedledick
    As usual you wingnuts fail to address the problem of just who is the enemy. The Shia? The Sunnis? The Kurds? Are we going to kill all the thousands of Iraqis who are in the army and the police by day and then fight with their tribe/militia by night. There is no finite group of terrorists, whom, once defeated, will allow a fledging Western style democracy to flourish. There is no democracy. Only a civil war, involving the vast majority of the Iraqi people. So, the victory you espouse is not going to happen. The surge isn’t going to help, and people who see this are not cowards or stupid. When are you cretins going to wake up?

  • What will someone who now spends his days trying to kill American soldiers do when there are no more Americans around left to kill. He’s going to have to get a frickin’ real job.

    If Moqtada al Sadr declares himself victorious after all is said and done, he’ll inherit the messed up electrical grid, the gasoline shortages, the destroyed oil infrastructure, the broken sewer system, the unemplyment problems, the security issues, that small group of strange foreigners calling themselves al Qaeda in Iraq, the destroyed transportation infrastructure and all the other f-ing problems America helped create in Iraq. Good luck buddy. We’ll see how much money you have left to buy AK’s for your militia when all your new subjects are looking to you to fix everything.

    Back to the real post, it’s a Rovian tactic to keep your own hands clean while having designated attack dogs do the dirty work. While I want to see the Dems speak more bluntly and louder in their criticism of the heinous mistakes of the past six years and the two to come, offering public forums for others who won’t bow to the rules of “conservative correctness” is a good start.

  • The neocons are hanging on for their evil lives and as long as Bush has even a little power, they have their puppet with his finger near the nuclear button.

    Cheney in so close to his goal of having his puppet states, he is actually losing what little sanity he has left. If he can just get his hands on the nuclear toys!

    Bu$h is playing games with everyone. Will I nuke Iran, or won’t I? I’m sending 21,500 people to their possible deaths, will I, or won’t I feel anything? Guess it depends if there’s a press conference. Uncle Dick is so cute when I tell him I’m not ready to attack Iran yet, he turns such a lovely shade of purple!

  • No one in their right minds are going to accuse these guys of anything but “strength” and “courage” — and their criticism of the war is no-holds-barred.

    The Republicans who will make these claims don’t care what is right … they only care about what they think will mobilize their base. George Bush can skip out on his military service, but all that matters to his base is that he opposes abortion and gay rights. They don’t care that thousands of people have been wounded or killed for an unjust cause. They only care about the “unborn” and what some people do in the privacy of their bedrooms.

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