The headline this morning on Drudge was as follows: "Democrats Plan Symbolic Votes Against Iraq Plan." This is a complete failure to use the power of the People's Body, the House of Representative, to rein in Bush IIs plans to add 20,000 more troops in Iraq. They also should be worried about and seeking to stop the behind the scenes considerations about widening the War into Syria, in addition to the Administrations giving signals to Israel that bombing Iran would receive US support.
The Administration, and its neo-con philosophical allies, as well as the Arms Industry - all would like the widen the War. Bush II wants to vindicate his flawed decisions, which he keeps refusing to recognize were wrong. The neo-cons have the same basic character flaw as Bush II, the one that caused so much horror in Vietnam - the vanity of a belief that if we just apply more arms and bodies on the sacrificial altar of the War, we can prove ourselves to have been right.
The Arms Industry is mostly about money (and power), for if its voracious appetites are not feed from the taxes on the American People, it dies.
All four, the Democratic Party, the Bush II Administration, the neo-con architects of American Imperialism, and the Arms Industry care not a whit for the American People, or the Iraqi People, whose lives will bear the terror and suffering this escalation of the War will continue. They are all mostly concerned with self interest, and this includes the Democratic Party, which has its eye on the White House in 2008, and will do nothing that puts at risk that opportunity for power.
Meanwhile, the American People clearly do not want a widening of the War. They want the troops to come home. They have no taste for foreign adventures, and while they may not know the ill-logic of the arguments used to continue the War, in their hearts they know the course being taken is wrong.
Before showing what the Democrat Majority could do if it exercised is power, lets deal with one of the main arguments for continuing the War, which essentially takes this basic direction, albeit in a number of different forms. The first proposition of this argument is that the errors and lies that led to the War are now irrelevant. The second is parallel and basically says that having the broken the social stability of Iraq it is now our duty to fix it. Every argument in favor of continuing the War has to use these two propositions, whether stated explicitly or implicitly.
Both propositions fail to recognize a fundamental fact of the American political scene, which is that the holders of government power have seized that power through fraud and artifice, and an abuse of the trust of the American People. For details on this, see my essay Uncommon Sense*: the Degeneration, and the Redemption, of Political Life in America. You can also go to lulu.com and buy a copy.
This means that the America People are entitled to disavow the actions of those that have stolen power and abused trust. We are entitled to demand a change of direction, and are not to be held responsible for the acts of a few, who stole elections to gain power, who lied to sell the war, and who continue to think only of their own advantage.
Neither Party, and certainly not the Bush II Administration, actually represent the American People, a condition which is true in the vast majority of Nation States all over the world. There has long been a disconnect between the heart of any People and its sitting government, which generally has risen to power through violence or other insidious means. It is far past time for ordinary People to begin to assert that the power games played by elites of finance and political power are not our responsibility.
In a way this is not unlike the tough love that is required of those who live with alcoholics and others of like addictions. Power and wealth are addictions - the psychology of excessive and unrestrained desire is the same. No one - No One - needs as much wealth and power that is vainly pursued by so few, who want to abuse so many in the process of such extreme self indulgence. The rich and the powerful are moral children, who are abusing the moral adults of the world, and it is time to no longer consent.
You want someone to clean up the mess? You think the families of alcoholics and drug addicts need to clean up their messes? Do you think not holding such moral children responsible for their actions helps? I don't. I think its time to lead the world into refusing any longer to tolerate or accept in any fashion, the decisions of the elites of wealth and power as binding upon the relevant Peoples. Its time to stop playing their game, and make up one of our own. But that dear friends is a whole other subject (see the forthcoming book: the Way of the Citizen). If the Democrats had "balls", this is what they could do using the power they possess for the benefit of the American People and the world as well.
The Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, in the company of a half dozen new committee chairman (or women), go to the White House and sit down with the Administration, and speak in the following way:
"Here is the People's agenda, and we as the House of the People expect the executive Branch to carry out this agenda. We understand that the Administration needs to save face, and if your cooperation is careful and your decisions just, we will support you. Even so, you must draw back from certain previously made decisions and confess that in the present they are no longer wise, although (in order to save face) you may claim that in the moment they were first made, they were wise.
"This agenda is as follows: 1) immediate disengagement from Iraq and Afghanistan; 2) support for new legislation to take back the abuses of the personal liberties contained in the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, and the policies regarding wiretapping; 3) a review of legislation regarding medical and pharmaceutical needs. 4) a rethinking of the whole idea of the War on Terror. 5) a reinstatement of appropriate taxes on wealth; 6) a revision of policies on interrogation and the civil rights of prisoners of war; [- I think the reader will get the point here. The Democratic Majority can create an agenda that serves the People's real needs. Do I expect them to? No. But here we are not dealing with that question, but rather whether they have the power to force the Bush II administration to act, so lets continue the speech at the White House...]
"If the Administration refuses to support this agenda immediately, within one week's time, the heads of each of these committees will, with the support of the Speaker, begin to investigate every potential malfeasance of this Administration, down into every detail. Subpoenas will be issued to individuals, documents demanded of officials and every other act of investigative power the Peoples Branch has in it tool box will be applied to bringing this Administration before the bar of justice, and to a complete halt if necessary.
"This is is about power, and the Legislative Branch has more power than the Executive Branch, as indicated by the fact that it was the first Branch whose powers were laid out in the Constitution; and, between our investigative powers, and our ability to stop the funding of Administrative actions, we will be uncompromising. You have one week to get on your game face, and make your peace with this, and define what you need to save face, but you will no longer be allowed to run this Ship of State for the benefit of the few, or for your own self serving agendas. This Country belongs to the America People, and we are their true representatives!"
