Sen. Feingold Statement On House Iraq War Funding Vote

The U.S. House Just Voted $50 Billion More for War

Submitted by davidswanson on Thu, 2007-11-15 01:44. Activism
Organizations and individuals who fail to criticize this new funding vote will relinquish the right to criticize the occupation of Iraq. If you silently support funding it, you oblige yourself to remain silent on the horrors of it. We are citizens, not partisans, and only as citizens will we survive this ordeal. If this passes the Senate (or is altered in a conference committee) and is sent to the White House, Bush will have the option of accepting $50 billion more for his ongoing crime. If Bush vetos, or the Senate rejects, or the $50 billion runs out, we'll be back in the House - and with what strength to press for an end to these bills? What strength remains after caving in completely this evening? What peace pledge? What Out of Iraq Caucus? What Progressive Caucus? What opposition party? The silence of millions of Americsns who have demanded an end to funding for the past year or for the past five years is absolutely deafening. It's the sound of our tombs. Speak now, people, or forever forget about peace.

UPDATE: 15 Democrats voted No: Allen, Baird, Barrow, Boren, Cooper, Kucinich, Lampson, Marshall, Matheson, McNulty, Michaud, Snyder, Stark, Tanner, Taylor. Only Kucinich and Stark were among the 90 who had signed the peace pledge. The other 88 lied to us.

UPDATE 2: Over in the Senate, not a single Democrat is willing to filibuster this war money, although dozens of them whine and moan about the war non-stop. Their latest plan is to give the Republican pro-war senators a giant microphone by "forcing them" to actually talk all night if they filibuster the bill. So many senators, so little intelligence. And the party-before-sanity crowd is cheering for this. In a similar vein, Senator Bernie Sanders recently said he wouldn't filibuster war funding, but he would introduce war funding bills containing enough weak little nonbinding nonsense to get them vetoed, and he'd be willing to reintroduce and pass such bills over and over again, going without sleep and voting on these bills day and night. Masochist or fraud, and does it matter?

UPDATE 3: Feingold Rejects House Bill. Senator Feingold released the following statement.

Statement of U.S. Senator Russ Feingold

On the Weak Iraq Proposal Passed by the House

Washington DC - U.S. Senator Russ Feingold released the following
statement today as the Senate prepares to take up legislation passed by
the House yesterday that would fund the war in Iraq with only a "goal"
for redeploying troops by December 15, 2008.

"The Iraq spending bill passed by the House is too weak and doesn't
require the timely redeployment of our troops from Iraq. If the Senate
does not strengthen the bill, I will oppose it. The American people
want more than a "goal" of redeploying troops, which is why I intend to
offer the Feingold-Reid legislation requiring the safe redeployment of
our troops by June 30, 2008, as an amendment. Congress needs to end
this disastrous war and refocus on fighting al Qaeda and its affiliates
around the globe, which are the greatest threat to our national
security."

Feingold, with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, has introduced the
Feingold-Reid legislation to require the vast majority of U.S. troops to
be redeployed from Iraq by June 30, 2008. Feingold will seek to amend
the House bill with the Feingold-Reid legislation when the Senate takes
up the measure this week.

But when it comes down to it, will Feingold or any other Senator put a hold on the bill or filibuster it? Talk is cheap, Russ. Time for action!

:shrug:

ruin of this country. We should stop fooling ourselves that it is about making money for the corporations and barons with rewards to the politicians, reverends, media honchos and owning Iraq.

I think Feingold is trying. I believe he's sincere. No one will speak the truth about why we're there, so many are left to believe that it's about defending the country.