Dissident Voice

September 18, 2003

It is time for honest, tough leadership to show its face in Washington and in congress. We can no longer afford this charade that the president can be trusted, or that he is doing what is good for the US and the soldiers on the front lines.

It's that simple. Say NO. Do not give him the money. Do not allow him to hand over more gifts to his Haliburton friends. Do not allow Paul Wolfowitz to privatize the military, creating corporate military "divisions" as he told congress he wants to do.

Everyone agrees, now that Bush and Rumsfield and the neocon keystone cops have fraudulently, stupidly and incompetently dragged us into this Iraqi quagmire without any follow-up plans to the easy military victory, that we need to finish the job responsibly.

But what people are not saying and they should be screaming is that Bush has lost the right to be trusted to do the right thing, that his advisors have proven themselves to be failed incompetents who are totally untrustworthy, in terms of coming up with solutions to the Iraqi problem. The Democratic leaders should be stating, in no uncertain terms that they are one hundred percent in support of the troops and in support of supporting Iraq, but also one hundred percent diametrically opposed to letting George Bush and his team handle the money.

There is no reason to trust Bush's competence to take the next steps and there are many reasons to mistrust Bush-- that he will continue to lie, dissemble and provide false, fraudulent, misleading information.

The answer is to set up an independent, bi-partisan commission to take over the decision making on Iraq. This will certainly raise a gallery of shrieks and nasty remarks from Republicans like Tom DeLay. But we have seen the power of the filibuster in the judicial appointment process.... and we're talking about $87 billion dollars here, which we all know is just the next installment on the biggest boondoggle in world history. We know that Bush will be coming back to the trough in another six months.... and the numbers have not gotten smaller, the next time he'll be asking for over $100 billion dollars.

There has to be a "line in the sand" to quote Bush senior, and it should be drawn now. Say NO to Bush's request for $87 billion and YES to an independent commission that can not only decide how monies for Iraq are spent, but can also investigate and run how the post-war "peace" is being managed.

While Bush has not yet been charged with impeachable offenses, he is clearly guilty of mismanagement and massive misleading of the congress and the people. He has failed totally in the use of diplomacy as a leadership tool. While he is not yet impeached he should at least be restrained from doing more damage.

Of course, this is one of those easy to suggest, not so easy to do proposals. When Bush senior drew his line in the sand it was a declaration of war and this is just as tough, just as strong a position. But back in '91 it was Saddam who'd already declared the war by invading Kuwait, and now, in 2003, it is Bush and his neocon handlers who declared war on the US, by their lies, and frauds-- using the normal faith and trust Americans have in the office of the presidency to perpetrate a war of choice that was not necessary, that should never have been initiated.

History will look back on this war as one in a series that were initiated by leaders who used lies and deceptions to fool the American public and congress. But there is still the chance for history to record the outcome of this war as one that was changed by tough, honest politicians and activists who stood up to the corrupt leaders and forced the war to turn in a drastically different direction.

It is clear that Bush and his lieutenants are still either lying about Iraq or deluding themselves, investing more in proving their past lies than in solving the current problems. The only rational solution to the Iraq situation is to wrest control of the decision making process out of the hands of the people currently in charge. If it takes a filibuster that shuts down the congress, so be it. Fortunately, a new ABC/ Washington Post poll reports that 61% of those polled oppose the funding, and 71% of women do not support it. That should make it easier for even the Republicans in congress to stand up to iPOTUS (incompetent President of the United States.)

Rob Kall is publisher of progressive news and opinion website www.opednews.com and organizer of cutting edge meetings that bring together world leaders, such as the Winter Brain Meeting and the StoryCon Summit Meeting on the Art, Science and Application of Story. He can be reached at: rob@opednews.com. This article is copyright by Rob Kall, but permission is granted for reprint in print, email, blog, or web media so long as this entire credit paragraph is attached.

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