The False Dilemma
    

Over War Funding

By Hank Edson

Last week General David Petraeus gave his long awaited report on whether President Bush’s troop “surge” plan had achieved sufficient success to reverse the opinion of two thirds of Americans who want our troops brought home ASAP. President Bush then gave a national address in which he was expected to lay out a clear strategy for moving ahead in Iraq based on the success of the surge or for pulling out of Iraq based on its failure.

Of course, what the American people got from the Bush administration was predictable based on past performance. What we got was an artfully vague choreography of political manipulation in which the big picture was hidden from view, a few positive details were exaggerated, change was postponed, and deception was employed by presenting a plan to “reduce” troop levels that merely brought the number of troops in Iraq back to the level they were before the “surge.”

The week was a classic example of how the Bush administration plays politics. The word leadership is never involved. Always, the ball is hit back into someone else’s court. Bush calls himself the “decider,” but he is really the “returner.” When the buck lands on his desk, he instructs a general to return it to Congress. When blame lands on his desk, he instructs his political lieutenants to return it to the “experts” who were hand-picked to tell him what he wanted to hear.

This time, Bush has passed back to Congress literally the "war buck." The key “check” the legislative branch has against the executive branch concerning the Iraq quagmire is to stop funding the war. Typical of Bush’s divisive style of authoritarian leadership, the entire response to the Petraeus report was carefully crafted to force Congress into continuing to fund the President’s stall tactics or else take the blame for any troop casualties resulting from a lack of resources. One after another, the leading Democrats, after pointing out the shameless negligence of Bush’s strategy, basically accepted the buck they were being given and legitimized the false dilemma presented to them.

Democratic Senator Jack Reed said, “ The President's speech tonight offers a war without end. It is a PR stunt to buy more time for a stay the course strategy in Iraq that simply hasn't worked….Now they are hostage to the failure of our civilian leadership to present a thoughtful plan to bring them home.”

Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid said, “After almost five years, tonight was just more of the same. It's not progress nor is it the strategy for success our troops deserve. And as long as President Bush keeps them in harm's way without clear purpose or achievable goals, Democrats will keep fighting to responsibly end this war.”

Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives, said, “The choice is between a Democratic plan for responsible redeployment and the President's plan for a 10-year war in Iraq.”

Presidential front-runner, Hillary Clinton said, “ What the President told the American people tonight is that one year from now, there will be the same number of troops in Iraq as there were one year ago. That is simply too little too late, and unacceptable to this Congress and the American people who have made clear their strong desire to bring our brave troops home….I continue to implore the President to change course, bring our troops home faster, and end this war responsibly as soon as possible.”

Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama said, “We must not continue the enormous sacrifice of our troops, our military readiness, our treasury, and our standing in the world just to keep the violence at the same unacceptable levels it was at in 2005 and 2006. That is why I have proposed an immediate and sustained removal of 1 to 2 combat brigades each month to conclude by the end of next year.”

Presidential candidate John Edwards urged Congress in the wake of Bush’s failure to present a responsible plan to stop funding the war, stating, “ No timeline, no funding. No excuses. It is time to end this war.”

In all of these responses, our leaders in the Democratic Party needlessly legitimized the President’s stand-off with Congress by accepting the burden of forcing withdrawal by cutting off funding. Even though several Democrats reassured the public that any Democratic plan would insure the safety of our troops, this qualification offers little strength to the Democrat’s position. On one hand, ensuring safety means taking longer to bring our troops home. On the other, any attempt to force troop withdrawal, even at a safe rate, is certain to be met by accusations from the Bush administration, that the Democrats are jeopardizing our troops.

House Minority Leader, Republican John Boehner set the tone we are likely to hear from Bush loyalists as attempts to pull our troops out of Iraq move forward: “While American troops are fighting radical Islamic terrorists thousands of miles away, it is unthinkable that the United States Congress would move to discredit their mission, cut off their reinforcements, and deny them the resources they need to succeed and return home safely.”

Such rhetoric does exactly what Senator Jack Read said Bush’s plan is doing; namely, it holds our troops hostage in Iraq as a means of extorting war funding from the United States Congress. All Senator Clinton’s imploring of the president to change course and all Senator Reid’s “fighting” to responsibly end this war do nothing to change the dynamics of this hostage situation. Nor do Senator Obama’s plan “to withdraw 1 to 2 combat brigades each month” or candidate Edward’s demand that Congress move immediately to stop funding the war do anything to change the dynamics of this hostage situation. The President has our troops in Iraq and we can either pay for their safety or watch them die.

But this is a false dilemma.

This is a false dilemma and our Democratic leadership has no excuse for legitimizing it. Congress has another check on the legislative branch that will go to the source of the problem and empower the Democrats to set a definite timeline to bring our troops home: Impeachment.

We have so many grounds on which to impeach President Bush and Vice President Cheney, but this week they gave us one more. They are holding our troops hostage in Iraq in a war that was never declared by Congress as it should have been under the United States Constitution. With two-thirds of Americans calling for an end to the war and Congress setting clear expectations, conditions, and consequences for the failure of President Bush’s requested troop surge, Bush’s failure to provide a clear timeline for troop withdrawal constitutes an impeachable offense: holding our troops hostage to avoid complying with his responsibilities under the agreement that enabled him to get his troop surge in the first place.

The time has come for Congress to stop negotiating with the President for his hostages. The time has come to take out of office the villains who are making the lives of our troops into a political ransom. If we impeach Bush and Cheney, Speaker Pelosi will be elevated to the Presidency and can set a firm time table for ending the war.

It’s time for advocates of impeachment to appeal to the two-thirds of the nation that want our troops home. It’s time for the anti-war movement to make impeachment its dominant and constant call to action.

And it’s time for Democrats in Congress to discover the power of principled political discourse. Democrats in Congress have never tried to rally the nation to impeachment. Until they use the full power of their collective bully pulpit to demand we take out the hostage-takers from their seat of power, they simply don’t know they can’t get the super-majority of votes they need in the Senate to convict Bush and Cheney.

Even if impeachment failed to obtain a conviction in the Senate, the act itself would create much more meaningful pressure on Bush and Cheney to set a timeline for ending the war. If Harry Reid really intends to fight to responsibly end this war, the time has come for him to rally all Democratic Senators to call for the President’s impeachment. We don’t know how many Republican Senators might be persuaded to vote to convict Bush and Cheney once two-thirds of the nation joins in expressing our outrage that our executive branch should dare to hold our troops hostage to wind out the time on their term of office.

After many months of the President’s “surge,” the Iraqi government is nowhere near showing signs of being able to rule effectively over Iraq. Our occupation of Iraq promises no positive outcome for all our investment of blood and national interest. Under these conditions, the President was bound to set a firm timeline for ending the war following the Petraeus report. He has failed to fulfill this all important duty and has instead used our troops as hostages to forestall the inevitable failure of his presidency.

The time has come to focus all our outrage as a people on the use of our troops as political hostages. The time has come to use this outrage to remove from office the worst president and vice-president in United States history. Our Democrats in congress must stop buying into the false dilemma of this hostage situation. They need not be limited to funding decisions in finding a way to bring our troops home.

If our Democratic leadership fails to impeach, we must as a people make clear that they had a choice and a way to bring our troops home that did not involve risking their safety. Clinton, Obama, Edwards, Reid, Pelosi, and every other leading Democrat must call for impeachment in response to this stand-off. If they fail to do so, they are not serious about ending this war and they deserve to be abandoned by the anti-war movement.

The dilemma congress faces is completely false. The way forward is very clear.