Fall of the D.C. Democrats

By Jan Frel, AlterNet. Posted November 22, 2005.

What's powerfully obvious after John Murtha's speech last Thursday is that John Kerry and a host of other D.C. Democrats who have publicly "regretted" their Iraq votes and made calls for incremental withdrawal since the 2004 election are now standing in a political wilderness. The political premium on being identified as "against the war" has moved down the field, requiring politicians to actually -- gasp! -- call for total withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq if they don't want to be like George Bush.

John Kerry's comprehensive new strategy to reduce the number of troops by 20,000 before the year ends comes off as completely fatuous in light of what Murtha proposed. Kerry could have said what Murtha did anytime he liked, stretching back to the moment before he cast his fatal vote for the Iraq war resolution in 2002. Employing a politics far more cynical than George Bush's, Kerry has been just fine with the invasion; only afraid to come out and say so, like most of his colleagues in Washington.

However bankrupt Rep. John Murtha's Iraq views happen to be -- and I'll get to those in a bit -- Democrats who want to be viewed as against the war will be forced to use starker language that reflects the terminology Murtha used in his speech and in the resolution he introduced in the House of Representatives:

* Section 1. The deployment of United States forces in Iraq, by direction of Congress, is hereby terminated and the forces involved are to be redeployed at the earliest practicable date.

* Sec. 2. A quick-reaction U.S. force and an over-the-horizon presence of U.S. Marines shall be deployed in the region.

* Sec. 3. The United States of America shall pursue security and stability in Iraq through diplomacy.

Murtha in his speech referred to U.S. troop presence in Iraq as an "occupation." He also defined freedom in Iraq as a condition where U.S. troops are absent. The massive attention Murtha's speech received ensures at least a rhetorical shift for Democrats on Iraq. Blame-shifting re-evaluations on the Iraq resolution vote like California Sen. Dianne Feinstein's, "I would not have voted if I knew what I knew now," and apologies like Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin's, "It was one of the biggest voting mistakes of my career" won't last much longer as sufficient "positions" on Iraq, and they never should have in the first place. Viewpoints on What to Do in Iraq will necessarily require a standpoint on whether to withdraw.

Alternet

Jan Frel put one in there, I bet, your challenge is to snuff it out. Find the thesis!

ken mehlman commercial only with leftist trappings:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x5431434

I am tiring of Alternet attack-from-the-left-w-the-same-thing-the-GOP-is-saying-only-with-a-leftist-spin-with-the-end-result-being-fewer-democrats-in-congress. For goodness sake now that it is finally coming out the degree to which bushco distorted, lied, bullied and withheld info, alternet wants to go on a big Dem purge.

As to Murtha, Dems worked with Murtha, they strategized w him, and they are supporting him.

Newsweek story on Murtha and Pelosi working together on this

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10118733/site/newsweek /

,snip

Now, Murtha mused, it was his turn to confront a president with harsh truths.

Which was precisely what the Democratic leadership wanted Murtha to do. A close ally, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, was anxious to open a second axis of attack on Iraq—and was aware of his growing antagonism toward the war. The two met and agreed that he would make his case in private to the party conference. After that, on his own, he would introduce a resolution calling for withdrawal of troops from Iraq "at the earliest practicable date."

snip

Maybe people are just sick of the game playing and want to see an actual stand on something.

all I see are words of support

Withdrawal isn't the only game in town. There is also the need to state, as Kerry did, that the troops need to be pulled back and Iraqis have to do the policing of Iraq as quickly as possible. This didn't get the troops home, but it got them out of a lot of the most troubled sections of Iraq. The request for this wasn't made for some vague future date, Kerry said it needed to happen immediately.

I would also like to see the Dems stand behind Kerry's statement that the US has no plans for permanent bases in Iraq. We do not plan to have permament forces in IRaq and are not building up to that. Murtha never said this and I think it's important.