Letters to the Editor
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Some whiner wrote:
Most posts are the same whine...
Yes. So STFU, Sh**ter. Go get yourself your own miserable blog where everyone can (and will) ignore your vacuous whining. Thanks in advance.
Cheers,
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Lloyd Doggett I
Dear Casual Observer:
As you know from my earlier correspondence, I again spoke out this morning against the President's surge on the floor of the House of Representatives. I have attached the speech below, but you can also view it here:
http://www.house.gov/doggett/speeches/09102007IraqSpeech.wmv
Shortly, at 11:30 am CST, General Petraeus will present the President's latest report on Iraq before a joint meeting of the House Armed Services and the Foreign Affairs Committees, with questioning continuing until 5:30 pm CST. In anticipation of that testimony, I have also sent the communication attached below to my Democratic Colleagues along with Paul Krugman's recent column from last Friday.
I welcome your continued good counsel.
Rep. Lloyd Doggett
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"SURGE FAILS"
September 10, 2007
The troop surge in Iraq has clearly failed to achieve its purpose. The troop surge has failed not because of our troops-but because of politicians in Iraq and in Washington, who have not done their jobs. The President's surge is as successful as the President's boast to capture Osama bin Laden "dead or alive."
We now have three reports from entities at least somewhat independent from the heavy hand of the Bush propaganda machine that confirm the obvious. The National Intelligence Estimate provided the thinking of the intelligence community that instead of getting better, the situation in Iraq will get worse-"the Iraqi government will become more precarious over the next 6 to 12 months."
The Independent Commission on the Security Forces concluded that the Iraqi Interior Ministry is "dysfunctional." And the National Iraqi Police is in such dire shape that it cannot be fixed and should be disbanded.
The Government Accountability Office's report card on Bush's policies judged by his own criteria is a resounding F, a clear failure, a fatal flop, a fiasco, with only 3 of 18 benchmarks met.
Today, General Petraeus can cite whatever selective statistics that his political bosses may permit him to disclose, but the facts are that each and every month this year has involved more deaths of American troops than each month, including August, last year. And despite the ethnic cleansing that has already displaced 3 million Iraqis, the increased violence continues to inflict an increasingly deadly toll on Iraqi families.
What is life like for those who survive? Almost half earn less than $1 a day, 70% lack access to adequate water, and one third remain in dire need of emergency food aid.
When the surge was announced, the White House said: "wait til summer." As summer approached, the cry was "wait til September." Now that this much overrated September has arrived, the new cry is "wait til next year."
The only real mystery about President Bush's September decision, has been what new excuse he would offer to justify staying the same old failed course. And as the American people have seen through the duplicity of every other excuse, the President has returned to his original ploy- invoking 9/11. Coincidentally we get this new report on the anniversary of 9/11. He claims that "the same folks that are bombing . in Iraq were the ones who attacked us in America on September 11." That is false, and he knows it is false. But fear with deception is all he has left to rationalize the pain of so many, the sacrifice of the brave, and the loss of $3 billion every week on this debacle.
As usual, this President is dead certain and dead wrong. What he seeks is war without limits-war without end. Under his direction, General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker propose a war that continues for probably another decade-the George Bush trillion dollars, 15 years war.
Now Congress must respond to the President's propaganda surge with a truth surge, with a memory surge that reminds America of repeated false cries of progress and phony excuses that have only brought our families more insecurity. Congress must learn from the courage of our troops. Appeasement will not stop this wrongheaded administration policy. More blank checks will only drain our national treasury while fueling more death and destruction that only endangers American families.
And so today we respectfully thank General Petraeus and all who serve America. We know you will do your job, but it is long past time for all in Congress to do ours. Our best hope remains a safe and orderly, fully-funded phased redeployment that begins immediately.
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Lloyd Doggett II
Dear Democratic Colleague,
Let's not surrender to the propaganda surge.
Fact-based analysis of the total failure of the surge to achieve its purpose will never by accepted by this Administration. And President Bush can never be appeased in his determination to shift responsibility for concluding the Iraq war to his successor. Indeed, like his earlier "bring ' em on" declaration, his comments in Australia last week suggest that he continues to view this tragedy like a fraternity house brawl.
I urge your consideration of the excellent commentary below of Paul Krugman.
September 7, 2007
Time to Take a Stand
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Here's what will definitely happen when Gen. David Petraeus testifies before Congress next week: he'll assert that the surge has reduced violence in Iraq - as long as you don't count Sunnis killed by Sunnis, Shiites killed by Shiites, Iraqis killed by car bombs and people shot in the front of the head.
Here's what I'm afraid will happen: Democrats will look at Gen. Petraeus's uniform and medals and fall into their usual cringe. They won't ask hard questions out of fear that someone might accuse them of attacking the military. After the testimony, they'll desperately try to get Republicans to agree to a resolution that politely asks President Bush to maybe, possibly, withdraw some troops, if he feels like it.
There are five things I hope Democrats in Congress will remember.
First, no independent assessment has concluded that violence in Iraq is down. On the contrary, estimates based on morgue, hospital and police records suggest that the daily number of civilian deaths is almost twice its average pace from last year. And a recent assessment by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office found no decline in the average number of daily attacks.
So how can the military be claiming otherwise? Apparently, the Pentagon has a double super secret formula that it uses to distinguish sectarian killings (bad) from other deaths (not important); according to press reports, all deaths from car bombs are excluded, and one intelligence analyst told The Washington Post that "if a bullet went through the back of the head, it's sectarian. If it went through the front, it's criminal." So the number of dead is down, as long as you only count certain kinds of dead people.
Oh, and by the way: Baghdad is undergoing ethnic cleansing, with Shiite militias driving Sunnis out of much of the city. And guess what? When a Sunni enclave is eliminated and the death toll in that district falls because there's nobody left to kill, that counts as progress by the Pentagon's metric.
Second, Gen. Petraeus has a history of making wildly overoptimistic assessments of progress in Iraq that happen to be convenient for his political masters.
I've written before about the op-ed article Gen. Petraeus published six weeks before the 2004 election, claiming "tangible progress" in Iraq. Specifically, he declared that "Iraqi security elements are being rebuilt," that "Iraqi leaders are stepping forward" and that "there has been progress in the effort to enable Iraqis to shoulder more of the load for their own security." A year later, he declared that "there has been enormous progress with the Iraqi security forces."
But now two more years have passed, and the independent commission of retired military officers appointed by Congress to assess Iraqi security forces has recommended that the national police force, which is riddled with corruption and sectarian influence, be disbanded, while Iraqi military forces "will be unable to fulfill their essential security responsibilities independently over the next 12-18 months."
Third, any plan that depends on the White House recognizing reality is an idle fantasy. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, on Tuesday Mr. Bush told Australia's deputy prime minister that "we're kicking ass" in Iraq. Enough said.
Fourth, the lesson of the past six years is that Republicans will accuse Democrats of being unpatriotic no matter what the Democrats do. Democrats gave Mr. Bush everything he wanted in 2002; their reward was an ad attacking Max Cleland, who lost both legs and an arm in Vietnam, that featured images of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.
Finally, the public hates this war and wants to see it ended. Voters are exasperated with the Democrats, not because they think Congressional leaders are too liberal, but because they don't see Congress doing anything to stop the war.
In light of all this, you have to wonder what Democrats, who according to The New York Times are considering a compromise that sets a "goal" for withdrawal rather than a timetable, are thinking. All such a compromise would accomplish would be to give Republicans who like to sound moderate - but who always vote with the Bush administration when it matters - political cover.
And six or seven months from now it will be the same thing all over again. Mr. Bush will stage another photo op at Camp Cupcake, the Marine nickname for the giant air base he never left on his recent visit to Iraq. The administration will move the goal posts again, and the military will come up with new ways to cook the books and claim success.
One thing is for sure: like 2004, 2008 will be a "khaki election" in which Republicans insist that a vote for the Democrats is a vote against the troops. The only question is whether they can also, once again, claim that the Democrats are flip-floppers who can't make up their minds.
Sincerely,
Lloyd Doggett