Washblog

It gets frustrating to see that the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq as a political priority is declining.

It gets frustrating to realize that such a decline is artificial in that news organizations can exaggerate other concerns by merely changing emphasis on things that might sell more - sell because they are either new or less embedded in America's entertainment boredom.

It is always frustrating to share opinion with folks for whom Iraq is now merely one of several political campaign abstractions around which to build strategies.

These are strategies more governed by consultants and spinners who are paid by candidates to teach them how to say what voters want to hear rather than come anywhere near a legitimate straight-talk reputation.

These are strategies presented with straight-faced declarations about patience with bloodshed;

... that ending bloodshed in Iraq must wait while America's political cycle moves slowly toward it's next phase.

This is true whether buying into Mrs. Clinton's Bush-like refusal to acknowledge past errors in judgement,

... whether buying into Mr. McCain's pretense of truth-telling that deteriorates into a fixed and rigid Westmoreland view on the contribution of America's military blood to foreign policy

or to Romney's absolutely naive and un-informed pretense at understanding foreign policy, military matters and their relationship to Constitutional Values.

The success of the current surge has the same credibility as the smirking smile that presented his 7th SOTU.

Now take Kelly Dougherty, Former Sergeant,Army National Guard, Executive Director, Iraq Veterans Against the War;

Can you imagine McCain, Clinton or Romney trying to oppose in an effective and persuasive way the views of this military veteran?

In this regard, not even McCain could pull rank on Dougherty.

In THIS time and in THIS conflict a "Patton Slap"wouldn't get it.

Iraq Veterans Against The War - there's more of them organized. Up from  last year's 8 chapters nationwide to 37 chapters.

January 10, 2008
By Kelly Dougherty,
Former Sergeant, Army National Guard,
Executive Director, Iraq Veterans Against the War;IVAW

In just over a year, America will have a new President.

We will have endured a year of campaign commercials and attack ads.

We'll have watched debates devoid of any real discussion of the withdrawal from Iraq that a growing number of Americans now call for.  We'll have waited, for yet another year, for our leaders to find a way to say what we know in our hearts: we must leave Iraq.

But what will have changed in the next year that will make that happen?

We must face this fact: we run the serious risk that one year from today we'll be right where we are now, but with another year's worth of casualties, a year's worth of grieving families, a year's worth of Iraqi anger and suffering built on our occupation of a country we now know was no threat to us.

Ending this war in a year is different than ending it now, just as ending it now is different than ending it a year ago, or a year before that.

There is a price to pay for every day that we wait.

As a veteran who served in Iraq as a military police sergeant, I see our continued occupation of that country as more than simply a list of numbers.

On daily patrols through Baghdad and other cities, your glance darts from one window to the next and you look with suspicion at everyone you pass, waiting to be attacked.

Every time you drive, you anxiously scan the roadways and gutters, anticipating the explosion of a roadside bomb that will send burning shards of metal through both vehicles and flesh.

Indiscriminate home raids at all hours of the day and night become a common experience, as do the mass detentions of terrified and angry Iraqis.

You spend hours at checkpoints, with your finger on the trigger, prepared to make life and death decisions in a country where the line between civilians and combatants is blurred and in constant motion.

   These things take a toll, on our soldiers, their families, and the Iraqi people.

As members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, we know these things and many of us still face them on a daily basis.

Despite what you see on TV, or read in the paper, this is daily life in Iraq.

A year from now, will we have moved any closer to withdrawal?

Or will our leaders continue to push such a decision off into the future, where, like so many decisions made by the powerful, the price to be paid rests squarely on the shoulders of the next generation?

We are at a crossroads: we can focus our energy exclusively on an election in which no viable candidate is committed to rapid withdrawal, or we can spend the next year ensuring that whoever takes office, Republican or Democrat, will face a country mobilized to the cause of bringing our troops home.

The veterans and active duty troops of Iraq Veterans Against the War represent the generation that is living with the pain and consequences of our leaders' daily decision to continue this war.

We have watched our closest friends be killed and injured, we've seen innocent people dehumanized and destroyed.

   We are first-hand witnesses and participants of an illegal war and occupation and we are here to tell you that we have had enough.

We have come together, as members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, with this message: It is time to put this awful chapter of our history behind us.

It is time to do the right thing for the people of Iraq and the people of America.

It is time.

If at the end of the cycle you and I will more than likely still be discussing when we can start withdrawal,

... whether or not America should maintain a jillion military outposts in Iraq,

... whether or not our oil companies deserve control of Iraq's oil,

... and whether or not some new on-going "surge"-ical politico-military tactic requires patience,

then we all are mere fiddling Nero's watching Rome burn

and we are all tragically guilty, responsible and accountable for the tears

... because we had it in our power to stop the carnage and refused to do so

...  because politicians and spinners

glorying in and playing with their newly won power

led us to believe there was a better way while telling us to keep fiddling.