New Jersey Democrats Lack Commitment To Victory In Iraq
As we previously noted the House of Representatives voted on November 18, 2005 by a margin of 403.to 3 against pulling American troops out of Iraq. All 13 New Jersey Congressman voted against the measure.
On Friday, December 16, 2005 the Congress voted on expressing commitment to achieving victory in Iraq. The vote was 279-109 in favor of the resolution.
All seven of New Jersey’s Republican congressman voted in favor of achieving victory in Iraq. Four Democrats - Rush Holt, Bob Menendez, Frank Pallone and Bill Pascrell voted against a commitment to victory in Iraq. The other two Democrats - Robert Andrews, voted “present” and Donald Payne did not vote.
Less than a month ago Holt, Menendez, Pallone and Pascrell were voting against pulling our troops out of Iraq ASAP and now they go on record as being against achieving victory in Iraq – truly breathtaking. The country is in the middle of a war and we have congressmen that are not committed to victory. Unbelievable.
In between these two congressional votes, Iraq has held a free and successful election, with Millions of Iraqis voting to choose a parliament, a first in the Arab world. So many Sunni Arabs voted that ballots ran out in some places. Immediately prior to the election, a major poll found that 70 percent of Iraqis say their own lives are going well, and nearly two-thirds expect things to improve in the year ahead.
A successful democratic election and optimistic Iraqis people should be cause for growing confidence and pride that our mission in Iraq is succeeding. Instead as success builds in Iraq Holt, Menendez, Pallone and Pascrell have decided to send a message of weakness and defeatism to the citizens of the United States, to our troops on the field of battle, to the Iraqis people and to our enemies. Pathetic, and to think Bob Menendez is about to become the next senator from New Jersey.
The Democratic Party once had a standard barer that spoke these words:
On Friday, December 16, 2005 the Congress voted on expressing commitment to achieving victory in Iraq. The vote was 279-109 in favor of the resolution.
All seven of New Jersey’s Republican congressman voted in favor of achieving victory in Iraq. Four Democrats - Rush Holt, Bob Menendez, Frank Pallone and Bill Pascrell voted against a commitment to victory in Iraq. The other two Democrats - Robert Andrews, voted “present” and Donald Payne did not vote.
Less than a month ago Holt, Menendez, Pallone and Pascrell were voting against pulling our troops out of Iraq ASAP and now they go on record as being against achieving victory in Iraq – truly breathtaking. The country is in the middle of a war and we have congressmen that are not committed to victory. Unbelievable.
In between these two congressional votes, Iraq has held a free and successful election, with Millions of Iraqis voting to choose a parliament, a first in the Arab world. So many Sunni Arabs voted that ballots ran out in some places. Immediately prior to the election, a major poll found that 70 percent of Iraqis say their own lives are going well, and nearly two-thirds expect things to improve in the year ahead.
A successful democratic election and optimistic Iraqis people should be cause for growing confidence and pride that our mission in Iraq is succeeding. Instead as success builds in Iraq Holt, Menendez, Pallone and Pascrell have decided to send a message of weakness and defeatism to the citizens of the United States, to our troops on the field of battle, to the Iraqis people and to our enemies. Pathetic, and to think Bob Menendez is about to become the next senator from New Jersey.
The Democratic Party once had a standard barer that spoke these words:
In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility -- I welcome it.The difference between Democrats then and now is enough to make you weep.
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
Posted by Enlighten-NewJersey @ 9:10 PM
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9 Comments:
The Iraqi opinion poll in the UK Telegraph article you cite is from August and the results have been disputed by the British government. But let’s assume those published poll results accurately reflected Iraqi opinion in August. The poll we cited is from December. In addition to the postive findings noted in our post, the poll also found more than two-thirds of Iraqis surveyed opposed the U.S. presence, but only one-quarter of respondents wanted American troops to leave right away.
Assuming both polls are valid, 16% fewer Iraqis oppose the presence of U.S. troops today than in August and 75 % of Iraqis don’t want U.S. troops to leave right away. So our noting the increasing optimism of the Iraqi people is founded in reality and your pessimism… Well, we will let you explain why you choose to ignore these recent poll results in our post and continue to cling to whatever negative reporting you can find, no matter how dubious or out of date.
And please explain where you come up with “But then again for people who can so easily be spoon fed lies about WMD and ties to terrorism, it should be easy for your cognitive dissonance to ignore reality and sheepishly follow dear leader over a cliff.”
And you say “If someone drives my car into a ditch, I take the keys away. You, however, let him try to drive you out of it. It's funny to watch you still try to reflexively justify and excuse every idiotic thing he does.”
First we reject your premise that someone has driven our car in a ditch. But assuming someone had and we landed in the ditch to avoid being killed, in a say a head on collusion, then we would have appreciated the driver’s actions and would have no problem with the driver getting us out of the ditch on our way.
How do you justify your statement “you still try to reflexively justify and excuse every idiotic thing he does”? How did you reach that conclusion? Where’s your evidence that we justify and excuse every thing the President does, let alone reflexively? And finally would you care to name the “idiotic” things you think President Bush has done?
Oh, and the roll call vote over here - 4 yeas.
So why does Garrett get an asterisk?
Ken,
Ah, you noticed the secret code we use to communicate with other members of the vast right-wing conspiracy. Now we have to remove it.
Terry,
Are you referring to the President talking about the Patriot act in the link you provided? Why do you confuse the NSA program and laws that were changed by the Patriot Act.? The Patriot Act was passed to give the government more authority and flexibility not to less.
See more of the quote from the President’s speech below:
"So the first thing I want you to think about is, when you hear Patriot Act, is that we changed the law and the bureaucratic mind-set to allow for the sharing of information. It's vital. And others will describe what that means.
Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution."
As far as we know nothing has changed when it comes requiring a court order for a wiretap for communications completely within the United States and that was what the President was talking about those situations in relation to the Patriot Act..
Now, for more information concerning the legality of the NSA program see this article and this one. Just a snip from one below:
THE NEW YORK TIMES Published: November 7, 1982 - “A Federal appeals court has ruled that the National Security Agency may lawfully intercept messages between United States citizens and people overseas, even if there is no cause to believe the Americans are foreign agents, and then provide summaries of these messages to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.”
I think the issue here, as I understand it, is that the government is snooping on all of the communications not just overseas communications. Of course the administration just keeps aying trust me instead of explaining itself. That's what got GWB into the place he is now.
RBM, from the New York Times article that started it all
Under a presidential order signed in 2002, the intelligence agency has monitored the international telephone calls and international e-mail messages of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people inside the United States without warrants over the past three years in an effort to track possible "dirty numbers" linked to Al Qaeda.
I hope that the military personnel and their families who are from the Congressional Districts represented by the "Nay" voters take note.
As for my Congressman, Donald Payne, this is not the first time he ducked such a vote. In March 2003 when the House voted on "Congressional Resolution No. 104, Expressing the Support and Appreciation of the Nation for the President and the Members of the Armed Forces Who are Participating in Operation Iraqi Freedom" Mr. Payne voted "present".
They (the Nay Voters) and he (Mr. Payne) disgust me.
Jim
Parkway Rest Stop
http://parkwayreststop.com
Terry,
Thanks, yes we had read the article. Some people miss the fact that under this NSA program one side of the conversation must be on foreign soil per President Bush’s order. The article and snip you cited makes that fact very clear.
We too thought The Times headline for the article was misleading – “Spying Program Snared U.S. Calls”. For those that haven’t the time to read the article, the piece says, right after the snip you provided, that a small number of purely domestic communications have been intercepted, apparently accidentally.
The “small number” of cases the article refers to is indeed small – one. As the authors write:
"But in at least one instance, someone using an international cellphone was thought to be outside the United States when in fact both people in the conversation were in the country."
We are glad to see that you have come to realize the Times has been making much ado about nothing. It makes you wonder why, doesn’t it? Yes, one of the reporters, James Risen to trying to generate excitement for a book he’s written, but why would the owners/editors of the paper risk national security by exposing a legal program? As far as we can tell, the Times has uncovered a grand total of one understandable mistake by the NSA under the Bush program. Do you think it could be BDS?
Terry,
Which is what? A program can be legal and secret can't it? You see the NSA program used to be both legal and a secret. Now it’s still legal, just no longer a secret. Got it?
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