Anger at the Democrats
The following is a comment that I posted this morning on Common Dreams, in answer to an article titled "Iraq War Funding? 'Compromise' or Sellout'?" by Robert Naiman, published yesterday.
Actually, the question as to whether Democratic support of continued war funding without a timeline is a sellout or a compromise is a moot point, as the vote is really an accurate reflection of the tolerance of the U.S. public for the highly grievous suffering and destruction that has been going on in Iraq ever since the Bush invasion of 2003 and even earlier. You can take all the polls you want about the public’s disapproval of the war, my impression is that Iraq is not of much concern to Americans as a whole. How many discussions do you ever hear about Iraq in everyday life? Very few I would bet.
During the Vietnam mess there was a draft. It did nothing to “win” that war, but it did heighten American awareness that the war was going on, because of the fact that so many young male relatives and friends could be snatched up and dropped into that slaughter willy-nilly. But in the present instance there’s no danger of that, and those dozens of Iraqis and the several Americans who are being maimed and killed daily are true “expendables,” over whom few tears are being shed on this side of the globe. So a majority of presentday Americans can just keep scratching their oversized behinds and coveting their neighbors’ spouses and otherwise keep bopping along in relative comfort and do not have to think about Iraq. And they can’t and won’t nudge Congress because that body is just a big, ugly reflection of their own ice-cold indifference to the suffering overseas.
A century ago Mark Twain said that the U.S. Congress is the nation’s only true criminal class. That continues to be true, though in the several years since 2001 the malady has been thoroughly injected into the other branches of government as well, and it makes one wonder about those who sent those office-holders, mainly Republicans, to infest all the big buildings in the Gray Zone of downtown D.C.
Meanwhile the Democrats must have reasons for following the Republican lead in voting to prolong the American contribution to the agony in Iraq, maybe for years more. Neither in this thread nor in the news have I seen such reasons as yet. Maybe those people know something that we don’t know, though I absolutely doubt it.
Most of the other commenters were outraged by the decision by the Democrats to support more war funding without imposing a timetable for withdrawal of the American troops, and they made all sorts of attacks and threats against the Democrats.
That reaction troubled me at least as much as the vote. It reminded me of the reaction of so many erstwhile liberals at the O.J. Simpson decision, when, absolutely certain of Simpson's guilt, they were outraged at the reaction of so-called "black" people in cheering the decision. In retaliation they made a big thing of jumping off the liberal train, just as these people were promising to do with the Democrats. It made me wonder if all along they had been waiting for just that sort of chance to jump the Civil Rights ship, just as today these people seemed glad for the excuse the verdict gave them to desert the Democrats . I know that that anger gladdened the hearts of Republicans everywhere, while to me it suggested that the commitment of these people to progressive thought and action was only skin deep after all.
==Because the question I've asked in the past in other situations like this remains the same today: what else is there, other than the Democrats, between us and the sinkhole of neo-Facism that still threatens this country just ahead?
Actually, the question as to whether Democratic support of continued war funding without a timeline is a sellout or a compromise is a moot point, as the vote is really an accurate reflection of the tolerance of the U.S. public for the highly grievous suffering and destruction that has been going on in Iraq ever since the Bush invasion of 2003 and even earlier. You can take all the polls you want about the public’s disapproval of the war, my impression is that Iraq is not of much concern to Americans as a whole. How many discussions do you ever hear about Iraq in everyday life? Very few I would bet.
During the Vietnam mess there was a draft. It did nothing to “win” that war, but it did heighten American awareness that the war was going on, because of the fact that so many young male relatives and friends could be snatched up and dropped into that slaughter willy-nilly. But in the present instance there’s no danger of that, and those dozens of Iraqis and the several Americans who are being maimed and killed daily are true “expendables,” over whom few tears are being shed on this side of the globe. So a majority of presentday Americans can just keep scratching their oversized behinds and coveting their neighbors’ spouses and otherwise keep bopping along in relative comfort and do not have to think about Iraq. And they can’t and won’t nudge Congress because that body is just a big, ugly reflection of their own ice-cold indifference to the suffering overseas.
A century ago Mark Twain said that the U.S. Congress is the nation’s only true criminal class. That continues to be true, though in the several years since 2001 the malady has been thoroughly injected into the other branches of government as well, and it makes one wonder about those who sent those office-holders, mainly Republicans, to infest all the big buildings in the Gray Zone of downtown D.C.
Meanwhile the Democrats must have reasons for following the Republican lead in voting to prolong the American contribution to the agony in Iraq, maybe for years more. Neither in this thread nor in the news have I seen such reasons as yet. Maybe those people know something that we don’t know, though I absolutely doubt it.
Most of the other commenters were outraged by the decision by the Democrats to support more war funding without imposing a timetable for withdrawal of the American troops, and they made all sorts of attacks and threats against the Democrats.
That reaction troubled me at least as much as the vote. It reminded me of the reaction of so many erstwhile liberals at the O.J. Simpson decision, when, absolutely certain of Simpson's guilt, they were outraged at the reaction of so-called "black" people in cheering the decision. In retaliation they made a big thing of jumping off the liberal train, just as these people were promising to do with the Democrats. It made me wonder if all along they had been waiting for just that sort of chance to jump the Civil Rights ship, just as today these people seemed glad for the excuse the verdict gave them to desert the Democrats . I know that that anger gladdened the hearts of Republicans everywhere, while to me it suggested that the commitment of these people to progressive thought and action was only skin deep after all.
==Because the question I've asked in the past in other situations like this remains the same today: what else is there, other than the Democrats, between us and the sinkhole of neo-Facism that still threatens this country just ahead?
posted by Carl (aka Sofarsogoo) | 10:20 PM
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