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Kucinich Urges Colleagues to End 'Longest War in US History'
Challenges Petraeus’ Media Strategy to Delay Troop Withdrawal
The full text of the letter follows:
August 17, 2010
Dear Colleague:
As you return home to your congressional district for recess, it is appropriate to reflect on the commitment of billions of dollars and an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to continue the war in Afghanistan. A recent article published in The New York Times announced that General David H. Petraeus plans to press for a slower withdrawal from Afghanistan in response to growing Congressional opposition to the war.
According to the article, General Petraeus and U.S. military officials are "building the case to minimize the planned withdrawal of some troops from Afghanistan starting next summer." General Petraeus and senior administration officials are arguing that while we've been in Afghanistan for nine years now, we have only just started "doing this right." A quick look at statistics this year reveals that not much has been going right since we increased our military presence in Afghanistan.
Since January of this year, approximately $104 billion has been appropriated for the war in Afghanistan and over 270 U.S. soldiers have died. The so-called cornerstone of our counterinsurgency strategy is the protection of Afghan civilians. Yet a new mid-year report on civilian casualties in Afghanistan by the United Nations reveals that civilian casualties have risen 31% since this same time last year. The report further reveals that civilian casualties at the hands of the Taliban have sharply risen. According to an article published in The Guardian, U.S. and NATO combat operations in Marjah - our military offensive orchestrated to make the case for an increase in troops - "heralded a wave of Taliban abductions, assassinations, and executions."
Afghan President Hamid Karzai announced last week that he was establishing a handpicked committee to review two U.S.-backed anticorruption task forces. This, after it was exposed that almost $4 billion in cash - much of it believed to be U.S. taxpayer provided aid - was being flown out of the country in suitcases by his government officials.
Congress has approved another $33 billion to fund the surge in Afghanistan. Afghanistan war funding has been used to support a hopelessly corrupt central government and it comes at a grave cost. Over 1,000 U.S. lives have been lost and thousands of innocent Afghan civilians have lost their lives or have been gravely injured. In the process, we have weakened our own security and well-being here at home. There is no war to be won in Afghanistan. General Petraeus may try to convince us that more of the same is a good idea. But it is ultimately the responsibility of Congress to decide. Please join me in urging for a timely withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Afghanistan and an end to what is now the longest war in U.S. history.
Sincerely,
Dennis J. Kucinich
Member of Congress
93 Comments so far
Show All...........then he got a ride in a big plane !
That explains why Air Force One landed in Columbus, Ohio yesterday on its way back to DC from the west coast !
Kucinich wants to end the war until Obama tells him to reverse course. He lost all credibility after drawing that line in the sand whereby he absolutely would not, under any circumstances whatsoever, vote for the health care insurance industry profits expansion program. F*** YOU, DENNIS!
If Dennis would run as an Independent, he would garner more votes, but as long as he stays in one of the two war parties, he will go no where. But I thank Him for his work.
Ditto here. I know Kucinich has some shortcomings, but I can still stomach him quicker than the alternatives (one of which is in the White House). In fact I was one of those who voted for him in the January ('08) primaries. I think the man ought to run as an independent in '12; he'd be a better choice than "Obomba" or the GOP's "candidate of the month".
Dennis Kucinich is good man, but he did lose a lot of street cred over the health care issue.
I am going to withhold judgment on the war score: we'll see whether he puts up a real fight against Obomber or caves in again. In my view, this is going to be a major test. If he caves in on this one, he loses all credibility with me.
Ending American wars of imperial aggression in the third world? Please. We have been waging wars, overthrowing democracies, torturing, murdering and bombing in third world countries since 1898, for one hundred and twelve years. Just read books on American history covering the period from 1898 to the present and learn about our the barbaric behavior of our military forces in third world countries.
And let's not forget the genocide of the Native American people upon which this nation was founded.
Like asking a junkie to stop doing heroin.
Still trying to figure out what this war is about except misplaced vengence.
"Afganistan' did not attack the USA
the "Taliban" did not attack the USA
The USA was supposedly attacked by some radical Saudis and Kuwaitis...but is still busy gobbling the knobs of THOSE guys.
Here is how to end the war(s).
National Teachers Strike...
AFL/CIO...STRIKE!
Within days...there will be peace...
Then...
Bring home all the military and give them the same deal to help America here instead of KILLING PEOPLE "Over There"
I really like this idea. I do not know how plausible it is, but I like it.
General Strike.
No work. No taxes. No payments on insurance or mortgages.
It's costly and terrifying, but in the long term it's all we have when are made aware of the fact that our national war machine is controlled by an international criminal syndicate.
In the 'global war on terror' we are all supposed to be dutifully and patriotically 'afraid' and to think 'worst case scenario' at all times. The worst case scenario is that our government, and the war-making apparatus our tax money has created (thanks to the terrorist cold-war propaganda of the last seventy years) is not in our control any longer, and the democratic process is worse than a farce. It is as mythical as God's Justice. At that point all we have is our refusal to participate. Besides, it is illegal to fund terrorists. Every tax dollar, every petro-dollar, every mortgage payment, is money spent in support of terrorists.
I'd be interested in hearing a better option, but I'll be darned if I can think of one.
Indian author Arundhati Roy made this comment in one of her political essays: (essentially) Why play their game, where they make all the rules and have all the power. Why not design our own game, using our own power to force them to play by OUR rules?
Do you think she had GENERAL STRIKE! in mind?
In Oct. 2007 issue of Harper's Magazine writer Garret Keizer proposed:
SPECIFIC IDEA: GENERAL STRIKE
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2007/10/0081720
Like asking a junkie to stop doing heroin.
Still trying to figure out what this war is about except misplaced vengence.
"Afganistan' did not attack the USA
the "Taliban" did not attack the USA
The USA was supposedly attacked by some radical Saudis and Kuwaitis...but is still busy gobbling the knobs of THOSE guys.
I thank Dennis Kucinich for his courage to speak out. What was he supposed to do for the health care plan? If he voted no, do you really think that we would be better off? I am so glad that there is at least one voice speaking out against the Afghanistan war which is wasting blood and money. If we stay in Afghanistan does anyone really think that the Afghan or Americans will be better off? Kucinich is a working congressman for the people. I appreciate his efforts. But he is only one man and the health care plan with a public option required many more people like Kucinich to make a difference. He had no choice as far as doing something to help give us a decent health care plan. No one would stand by him. All they do is mock him and his followers like Gibbs when he said that, they(progressives) won't be satisfied until they have no Pentagon and Kucinich is president. If Kucinich was president we would not need a pentagon.
Dennis is marginalized by The Mass Media.......In 1942 The Army blasted away at UFO's over Los Angeles.....Then there were UFO sightings in many places and by pilots.....DOD's strategy was to call anyone who claimed to have seen UFO's "nutcases, crazy, on drugs etc"....
After the attacks of 9/11...No one, in the media questioned NORAD's 5 practice exercises that left the Northeast void of protection on 9/11/2001 and who decided to run those exercises was never interrogated under oath......A guy in a cave could not have gotten NORAD to plan those exercises that would prevent the interception of 4 hijacked planes and without those exercises, the attacks could not have been accomplished.
On the morning of 9/11/2001 eyewitnesses and reporters were reporting explosions in the lower levels of World Trade Center Buildings....Later, scientistis found evidence of nano-thermite in the ashes.
Yet, anyone who questions "The Official Version of 9/11" is labelled, "lunatic, crazy, on drugs."
The Mass Media has been a co-conspirator in the cover up of the attacks of 9/11 and is a co-conspirator in the murders of hundreds of thousands of unarmed civilians.
We get to blow off steam by writing, but Commondreams still prevents an open discussion of 9/11 and the lies that created the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.
I commend Dennis for fighting the fight, but when you have Senators like John Kerry buying his 7 million dollar yacht and accumulating wealth from his investments in the Military Industrial Complex and reconstruction projects in Iraq, there is little hope and the Mass Media is with Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski on "Their New World Order":
Thank you for mentioning UFOs here. It was brought up in the primary debates when he was still running. I remember that. And he didn't back down. Actually, that alone would make me vote for him.
Now if only he did the same about health care.
Oh, what the heck. He is a nice man. Although i met an old time activist last year who said that when he was working for kucinich campaign in DC, D.K.'s highly attractive wife came in and was very, very bossy and took over the operation of which she knew next to nothing about.
I just thought i would throw in an anecdote for the hell of it.
peace.
Any time Elizabeth Kucinich wants to take me over, I'm hers.
Michael F, ;-)
Double thanks on the saucer mention.
We need to have a sober, adult, fact-based conversation on this ultra-important topic and the role it plays in the governing of our country.
John Podesta, who worked for both Clinton and Obama, has publicly called for UFO Disclosure.
Here's the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2Sz-MgoFos
Cygnus-X1-isaHole, i am so happy to see your post here.
(i am guessing your name is a reference to a black hole at the center of.....)
I too think it plays a much larger part on many levels regarding that is going on. I could tell you many a tale. Have you read or listened to Timothy Good?
We do need an adult conversation on the topic. And Chinese astronomers are disclosing - beginning to. And the Brazilian government called for open discussion and further investigation last week. French astro physicists held meetings last year on how to proceed. And it is very above board in Russia, who makes no apologies whatsoever and feels it is time to get honest.
It seems that the U.S. is the hold out and we are the ones that are in charge here. I found out, incidentally, that Britain needs u.s. permission before it can use nuclear weapons, while listening to Mr. Good's interview. He is highly intelligent and i trust him.
When asked who probably knows in the u.s., he talked about a journalist friend who was speaking with Bush and mentioned the space program and worked ufos into the conversation. He asked if he knew anything, as Pres. Clinton was very interested in the subject. W. Bush answered, "You'd have to talk to Cheney".
Good was saying that as far as he knows, those who would definitely be in that loop - Bush Sr., Kissinger, Cheney. That is what i remember.
rita
Yes, the black hole, not the Rush album.
I believe I read Above Top Secret 20 years ago.
If I could suggest only one author I'd recommend Jacques Vallee. His books are at least thirty years old yet still represent the most intelligent thinking on the subject.
Perhaps this will interest you as well.
http://www.presidentialufo.com/
i saw jacques Vallee speak in philadelphia around thirty years ago.
I was a very avid reader of his research when i was quite young. Close Encounters made a big impression on me, and the character of the researcher (french), was based on Vallee.
I also have a feeling about John Mack. The late director of Harvard psychiatry who they tried to fire because of his research into this issue and his advocacy for disclosure. You know the story, i am guessing.
I just ran into Tim Good's interviews from last year. Really excellent information. I wrote to him after listening and was surprised to get a response. That was a couple of months ago. I would recommend giving a listen.
Thank you, genie, for making a calm, articulate response...and saving me from having a temper tantrum on this thread. I disagree with you somewhat on the health care vote. I think he got thoroughly conned by Obama into doing the wrong thing in good faith and spewing the Obama-bilge afterward. I wish he would admit it publicly and apologize. We'd all feel much better. Meanwhile, there's noone in the Congress quite like him. And all these incredibly, spotlessly, incorruptibly perfect people...well, thank you again.
I wish he would admit it publicly and apologize.
He came up with a rash of inane excuses. Couldn't even read them....he now seems like an impersonation of (the former image of) himself. :(
Seems like forever that Dennis Kucinich has been dismissed by the media and discounted by the public, at least to a certain extent because he doesn't have a lot of sex appeal. He's not flashy, not especially handsome, he's NEVER going to be featured on the cover of GQ.....and, to be blunt, he's exceptionally short.
He's a very good speaker, has good ideas, and he works very hard. But he only ever gets so far because, in part, the system is stacked against him, people don't give him an equal opportunity simply because he's got no charisma.
Now, you'd think the bold-faced injustice of this would piss him off. That in his own life, he wouldn't respond to people within the format of that adolescent, teeny bopper, sycophantic and surfacy reaction to celebrity.
But, OOOOOh, no, you'd be wrong. Dennis goes weak in the knees in the presence of celebrity. His pupils dilate when he's anywhere near the axis of power. Not sure how much of this is related to the catholic response to authority, but I think at least some....
I can only imagine what he must have been like on that fateful ride on Air Force One. Hard to guess if they threatened him or he was simply so besotted that he lost his nerve.
You sort of feel sorry for him, like the teenage girl that gives it up for a few minutes of attention from the popular boy and comes home pregnant. The change of heart he had after the ride cost him a lot.
I'm glad Dennisis working to end the war in Afghanistan. He's an effective poloitician. For a long time I thought he was the most authentic 'left' legislator in the country. And it never mattered a whit to me that he was short.
But after Air Force One, I'll never be able to look at him the same way again.
I can name a whole dumptruck load of gop who make Dennis look like a love god. A start to the list: Tom DeLay, Loius Gohmert, John Boner, Dick Chainey, KKKarl Rove.....
iowapinko, i have to say this is a good post. I cut him slack as well, though. Seems a nice man.
But i agree with all you have said here.
As soon as we finish building that big fucking military base in Afghanistan
www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/08/15/opinion/main6775854.shtml
like the ones we built in Iraq
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002878828_iraqfuture21.html
we'll be moving on to Pakistan
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10227/1080296-82.stm
but keep talking Dennis, maybe somebody's listening
Some people will never forgive DK. But I think for most, their anger will eventually blow over and peder out.
Over the long haul, it takes a lot of effort to maintain anger.
And after all, DK does espouse left ideas popular to progressives and liberals and others.
But if you don't want to go back to voting for DK and others like him--and you don't want to carry your anger around year after year either--then you have to look beyond DK or Obama or whoever is the next to betray progressives/liberals and take a hard look at the kind of thinking behind progressivism and liberalism.
Or not. You can attribute it all to character flaws and keep on voting for those liberals/progressives.
Better yet, blame the Democrats and the Republicans!
Let's not join Kucinich and 0bama. They could not be farther apart.
Let's not condone betrayal, and let's blame both Republicans and Democrats when they are blameworthy -- which is more or less Monday through Sunday.
There is a considerable difference between Kucinich's backing down under extreme and very palpable threat and 0bama's pretending to harbor progressive ideas, apparently only because he found it convenient to do so.
I don't mean 0bama put a gun to his head on the plane, though I wasn't there. More likely the threat was lack of support in the election and deep-sixing whatever other projects he was trying to push through. He made a decision he found practical at the moment. He was probably deeply mistaken, but again, I wasn't there, and I don't know what the deal actually was.
0bama, on the other hand, has worked against every progressive goal and aspiration since the day he took office. This is not compromise. This is outright, full-on, absolute betrayal.
Kucinich deserves our work, our attention, and at times our complaints. 0bama deserves a fair and speedy trial by a jury of his peers.
"Let's not join Kucinich and 0bama."
Let's.
Obama and Kucinich are both part of the fake left.
Therein lies the problem.
I don't buy it.
Kucinich was all over the media stating he would vote against the health (deform) bill. If he kept his trap shut giving no opinion and just voted "no" he wouldn't have given Obama the opportunity to "Air Force One" him.
After all, a few Dems-albeit very few did vote no--he could have been one of the few and THEN gone on a media tour to to say why.
Dennis is window dressing for the Democratic Party.
He's a paper tiger.
The LONGEST war in US history is the one in Korea. Time to leave that one too.
Actually, the longest war in American history is the one fought by the Federal government against native Americans.
The longest war in history is the rich against the poor.
Kucinich says he will not challenge Obama in 2012.
http://tinyurl.com/24vk77v
You've made a mistake on your suggested site. Correction, please?
I've just double checked it and it worked for me.
Here's the long URL instead.
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2010/08/obama-wont-face-dem-primary-
challenge-from-kucinich/1
Mullah Omar was never close to Bin Laden.
Omar expelled, at the USA's request, Bin Laden from Afghanistan before 9/11 but gave Bin Laden his requested grace period and during this grace period is when 9/11 occured.
The letter looks appealing enough to make maybe a few members think twice before passing another spending bill but he could have added suggestions on what to spend in place of wars. I had read up on RichM's analysis of Kucinich and the Democratic Party from yesterday's discussion on another thread. The letter Kucinich wrote leaves us more questions than answers and I wouldn't be surprised if skeptics said that he has no intention of either creating a Dept of Peace or fighting for health care not warfare.
Dennis mentioned about the passing of $33 billion in war spending but instead of urging Congress to cancel it, he urges for a timely withdrawal and is vague on the meaning of the word timely. Again, I would not be surprised to see people angrily calling him a cowardly supporter of the war upon reading this letter.
Kucinich, like any politician who still formally belongs to the Democratic party, will only go so far and then stop cold. Barack Flopco and the quislings who control the party are well aware of this. They know they have nothing to fear and can turn the screws on these people whenever necessary. Staying in the party, as Kucinich does, may or may not be the savvy thing to do, depending on what happens in the future. Right now, however, and for a long time to come, Kucinich must continue to wear a raincoat to protect himself from all the urine that Obama and the whole DLC mafia is pissing on him 24/7.
I don't quite get it ...... if the lobbyists, the wealthy, the Saudis and others can buy off our politicians, why can't we do the same with our money. What's all this crap about spending money to kill them ...... just buy them off!
This is the same suggestion I made on these boards three years ago. We should all get together to form a corporation of "We the People", ok? Then, the "We the People" corporation would make contributions to campaigns and send lobbyists to Washington just like the other corporations. And we cajole/seduce/bribe whatever-you-want-to-call-it our representatives to do what we want them to do. In other words, as the saying goes, it you can't beat 'em, join 'em.
Here is link to where I initially made this suggestion:
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/04/2289#comment-47262
A more involved discussion on "We the People" Inc. took place here:
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/07/3686/
Check out ezeflyer's extensive post on his thoughts on this here (September 10th, 2007 1:47 pm):
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/10/3733/
As some point out the people in charge are still acting behind the scenes, --Bush sr. Chaney and Rice. Bush jr.'s regimes was the same as his father's and Obama was chosen to finish what Jr. didn't. The reason to invade Afghanistan by the blaming bin laden, was out of revenge for not allowing the pipe line, & the illegal one of Iraq against Saddam, was out of revenge for not playing along with Bush Sr in the Kawaiti scheme.Israel tried to conger a war with Iran useing Bush's help for 8 yrs., & now Obama. I just heard Israel plans action on Iran's borders. Meaning, if one war stops, another begins, because it is what Israel wants,--- so who are the real terrorist?
Randy Newman got a lot of flack over his satirical song 'Short People' yet Kucinich is easily dismissed in the media due to his height.
Dennis Kucinich should be our president. In politics the smart better man doesn't always get to lead. We could have had a gorgeous first lady though
We know that the inner circles decide too many things. So Obama can talk convincingly (to the right people) and the Dems thought he was very charismatic, well he was, but they didn't see everything. I voted for Obama but what else was there?
John Kerry has a big yacht. Mrs. Kerry is extremely wealthy but the Heinz foundation is well run and helps a lot of people and she does work in this. She inherited her money but uses it well.
Also, did the UFO's have anything to do with our going into Iraq? Hm!!
Another ride on Air Force One and Obomber will change his mind.
Where are the jobs? Why did Barry pick those Conservatives who are out to destroy Social Security to study Social Security?
That seems to be the general trend .....
The usual knee-jerk response of a Right winger. Blah, blah, blah, but no solutions.