Tag: Senate

I'm talking to you, wingnuts, for caring more about a stupid newspaper ad (and yes it was stupid) than you do about the well-being of US soldiers.

I'm also talking to more than a few people in the progressive blogosphere.

Why?  

Because you're talking about the wrong vote today.

There was a vote today that was important and had direct relevance to ending the Iraq war.

But, if one paid attention to the blogosphere's self-interested whining, one would think that the big news was the Moveon vote.

The vote you SHOULD be talking about described below.

Last week I implored Barack Obama to step up on Iraq.

On Wednesday of this week, he will be doing just that.

Context and what to look for below the fold.

An open letter to Senator Barack Obama from a supporter.  

Senator Obama, in your short time in the public eye you have shown great wisdom, judgment, and vision.  Your greatest strength is the ability to fuse pragmatism with idealism.  This often means eschewing traditional showboating and playing for the cameras in order to build consensus that builds towards progressive goals.

However, no single approach works for every problem, and building consensus is not working on the problem of Iraq.  There was a time for Congress to be the steering wheel of our Iraq policy.  Now, someone needs to slam on the brakes.

In his latest front page entry, Markos quotes Dick Durbin saying that he will likely be unwilling to vote against the new supplemental funding the George Bush has requested.

Even opponents of the war, as Durbin calls himself, find themselves likely to vote for the extra money, he said. "When it comes to the budget, I face a dilemma that some of my colleagues do," he said.

He voted against the war "but felt that I should always provide the resources for the troops in the field," Durbin said. "But it's now reached a point where we have got to change the way we appropriate this money."

Though he said he is likely to approve the increased request -- it would accompany a pending request for an additional $147 billion in war funding -- Durbin said he would work to attach conditions to it that would require troops to begin coming home in the spring.

Recent history tells us that we should not be surprised. Nor, indeed, should we look for the Senate to end the war.