How many readers recognize the name Tom Hayden? Veterans of the Vietnam Era anti-war movement will likely remember him as an anti-war leader and the author of the “Port Huron Statement,” the idealistic founding statement of Students for a Democratic Society. With Jane Fonda promoting her memoir, younger people may know of him as her second husband, the activist spouse between French movie director Roger Vadim and American media mogul Ted Turner.

The American public should know about Tom Hayden. Not only was he right in his analysis of the Vietnam War, but also his experience (and books) about community organizing still hold relevance. As an activist writer Hayden spoke with moral clarity. And though he was sometimes a little too militant for my political sensibility, he was willing to promote caution when compromise was necessary. Had Robert F. Kennedy lived to win the 1968 presidential election, Hayden would have been one of his advisors. Hayden subsequently became a Democrat and served in the California legislature until term-limits forced his retirement.

One would think that a political analyst of Hayden’s achievements would be in demand as a television talking head. But in our political world, acute analysts are silenced while airheads and blowhards get airtime and political appointments.

Now Hayden has written a respectful but pointed open letter to Democratic Chairperson Howard Dean. In it, he urges Dean and the Democrats to get some backbone and, out of moral and practical necessity, decisively break with the Republican Party on the Iraq War.

Hayden is impatient with Dean and the Democrats for abandoning their critique of the war. It’s understandable that Democrats have decided to take their stand against the Republicans on domestic issues. Defending Social Security and fighting the over-reach of the religious right are winnable issues. But they are not enough.

In framing his open letter, Hayden acknowledges his own position in favor of immediate withdrawal. “I do not believe the Iraq War is worth another drop of blood, another dollar of taxpayer subsidy, another stain on our honor,” he writes. “Our occupation is the chief cause of the nationalist resistance in that country. We should end the war and foreign economic occupation. Period.

“To those Democrats in search of a muscular, manly foreign policy,” Hayden continues, “let me say that real men (and real patriots) do not sacrifice young lives for their own mistakes, throw good money after bad, or protect the political reputations of high officials at the expense of their nation's moral reputation.”

Sharp words, but Hayden understands the political pressures that shape Democratic Party policy and so settles for something less than immediate withdrawal. His open letter suggests a moderate anti-war position that is politically achievable and won’t give the Republicans an opportunity to foment backlash.

Of course, some in the anti-war movement will say: call for unilateral withdrawal and organize a third party, let the chips fall where they may. Veterans of the sixties, at least those of us who hopefully learned something from that history, should be wary of moral and political absolutism. Yet, the refusal of the Democrats to address the Iraqi debacle invites a third party challenge. One thing is certain, however; without Internal Run-off Voting (IRV) the liberal-left has to unite behind one candidate in order to defeat the right-wing insurgency.

Yes, as Hayden says, we should simply wash our hands of the whole affair and just withdraw our troops, leaving the Iraqis to forge peace among themselves. But it’s also true that we are responsible for the destruction of their country. We can’t just walk away from the mess we created. We’ve a responsibility to the Iraqis, especially to those who risked their lives to vote (not for the American occupation, but for the possibility of their own democratic future).

Recalling the 2004 election and the presidential race four years before that, optimism doesn’t come easy. That’s why it’s important that Tom Hayden has opened a discussion. As a Vermonter, I know that Howard Dean is not the natural left-leaning anti-warrior he seemed to be in 2004. The anti-war movement needs encouragement to stake out its position, loud, clear and early.

Hayden opens the discussion by, first, calling for a negotiated end to the war and a near-term date to end the military occupation. I’m not sure who -- Shiite, Sunni, Kurds or the American-led coalition -- would be able or willing to negotiate. In this tribal war (predicted by Hayden and most other opponents of the war, myself included), too much blood has already been spilled. But one has to start somewhere. And the Iraqis, like the Americans, respect military force. It doesn’t make one proud, but our military prowess gives us an influence over any postwar settlement.

To build support for the Democratic position, Hayden calls for public hearings in Congressional districts on the ongoing billion-dollars-a-week cost of the war. The public needs to understand alternative economic priorities. How many schools, job programs, infrastructure projects, and health care initiatives are we losing to the Iraqi budget?

Additionally, Hayden says, Democrats need to unite behind Senator Rockefellers's call for public hearings on the torture scandals. If Republicans refuse to permit such hearings, Democrats should hold them independently. Low-rank soldiers are being scapegoated for criminal activities that the Bush administration has set in motion. "No taxes for torture" is a demand most Democrats should be able to support, Hayden says. And Republicans!

To those who think peace negotiations are folly, Hayden reminds us that “Thirty years after our forced withdrawal from Vietnam, the US government has stable diplomatic and commercial relations with its former Communist enemy. The same future is possible in Iraq.”

The Democrats’ silence on the war is unacceptable. The Party cannot remain quiet on the over-riding moral and foreign policy issue of our time. There is an alternative to Bush’s war on Iraq, and it’s important for the country that the Democratic Party raise it.

Marty Jezer is the weekend columnist for the Brattleboro (VT) Reformer. He welcomes comments at mjez@sover.net. Past columns are archived at http://www.sover.net/~mjez as are information about his books, which include ABBIE HOFFMAN: AMERICAN REBEL and THE DARK AGES: LIFE IN THE U.S., 1945-1960.

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