[Peace-discuss] Johnson on WILL at 11am tomorrow

[C. G. Estabrook]

AWAREists--

Tim Johnson, Republican candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives
from the Illinois 15th Congressional District (and incumbent) is to be on
WILL's "Focus 580" talk show from 11am to noon tomorrow, Friday 10/29.

In the last Congressional elections (2002), the Bush administration tried
to scare American voters with the threats of terrorism and Iraqi "weapons
of mass destruction," because they knew that they couldn't run on their
economic polices, which were generally hated.  We know that this was a
settled plan, from the way that they ran the campaign, and from leaked and
blurted comments by Andrew Card and Karl Rove (who said, "Run on the
war"). It barely worked, and the Republicans did manage to maintain
control of Congress.

In our district (Illinois 15), first-term Representative Johnson refused
to say -- even as he asked for votes -- how he would vote on the war.  In
October 2002, he was finally forced to vote on the resolution that is the
Bush administration's sole (and questionable) constitutional basis for
killing thousands and thousands of men, women and children in Iraq.
Johnson voted in favor of it.

When asked about this vote in the campaign, Johnson refused to say why he
had voted for the war -- an act of remarkable undemocratic arrogance. All
he would say is that the president had given him "classified briefings"
that his election opponents (from the Green party and the Democrats)
"haven't been privy to."

Seymour Hersh subsequently wrote in the New Yorker that the administration
used the forged Niger documents in "classified briefings" to elicit
Congressional support -- suggesting that nuclear weapons were at stake.
Asked about that by Philip Bloomer of the News-Gazette (7/30/2003),
Johnson said, "There was never any discussion at any meeting I was
involved in where the uranium was discussed." (But perhaps yellow cake
was? Or materials for nuclear weapons?)  He did not say what those
briefings did contain that convinced him to vote for this war -- and he
still hasn't, although he's asking for our votes again.

Johnson owes his constituents an explanation, because he -- and by
extension we -- are in part responsible for 10,000 American casualties and
perhaps 50,000 Iraqi dead.  Any excuse for secrecy -- except concealing
from us the inadequacy of his reasons -- has passed.

Johnson like the administration has shifted his ground substantially since
October of 2000 on the justification for the invasion.  In the interview
with Bloomer, he said, "The net result of our involvement in Iraq is to
remove somebody from power who committed crimes against humanity that are
almost unparalleled.  We've brought democracy and stabilized the region"
[sic].

That's almost horribly funny now.  And Johnson of course knows that, just
before launching this aggressive war, the Bush administration announced
(at the Azores summit) that even if Saddam Hussein and his family left
Iraq, the invasion would go ahead.  So removing the evil dictator was not
the reason for the war.  How does Johnson now explain the blood on his
hands?

Here's the "explanation" that he gave in a television appearance (WILL
10/24/2002) with his Green party and Democratic opponents during the
election campaign.  The moderator said, "Mr. Johnson, you voted to support
the president on this resolution?" Johnson replied,

"I did and I do.  It was the most difficult issue that I've had to face in
my first two years in Congress.  As a matter of fact, a number of us on
both sides of the aisle held out for a good long time with the hopes and
the expectation -- and the fulfilled expectation -- that the resolution
that passed would be very narrow, and we did succeed in narrowing the
resolution substantially from what was introduced originally.  A very
difficult vote -- but a bipartisan coalition: Mr. Daschle, Mr. Lott, Mr.
Gephardt, Speaker Hastert and others agreed to give the president an
option -- give the president an option that I believe will result in
greatly enhanced opportunities for peace [sic].  Nobody's suggesting --
not did this resolution provide for -- an invasion of Iraq [sic].  They
give the president -- as Condoleeza Rice says -- an option to deal with
people who understand in some cases only one thing.  What my opponents
don't understand -- and I understand that they wouldn't because they
haven't been privy to that -- are a number of classified briefings in
which we were made privy to information that would lead any reasonable
person to conclude that the possession of or potential use of weapons of
mass destruction -- biological, chemical, nuclear and otherwise -- in the
Middle East constitutes a threat not only to the Middle East but to our
interests all around the world."

It was outrageous to say two years ago that "nobody's suggesting an
invasion or Iraq."  Plenty of people -- even some in Congress -- knew that
Iraq was incapable of threatening anyone with weapons -- nuclear or
otherwise -- after twelve years of genocidal sanctions.  (All Iraq's
neighbors knew that, and both Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice said so
explicitly -- before 9/11.) It was even more disingenuous -- it was a lie
-- for Johnson to say that the resolution he voted for did not "provide
for an invasion of Iraq."

Johnson said that the administration gave him information that would
convince "any reasonable person" to vote for that resolution.  After all
these deaths, Americans and Iraqis, he owes the voters an explanation. He
was either cunning, like the Bush administration, or credulous.

He should be asked about this on the radio tomorrow -- and about many
other things: e.g., his shameless misrepresentation of his opponent's
health-care plan (on which see Democratic candidate David Gill's letter to
the News-Gazette tonight).

Regards, Carl

  ==============================================================
  C. G. Estabrook
  University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign [MC-190]
  109 Observatory, 901 South Mathews Avenue, Urbana IL 61801 USA
  office: 217.244.4105 mobile: 217.369.5471 home: 217.359.9466
  <www.newsfromneptune.com> <www.carlforcongress.org>
  ===============================================================
  "We must make clear to the Germans
  that the wrong for which their fallen leaders are on trial
  is not that they lost the war,
  but that they started it.
  And we must not allow ourselves
  to be drawn into a trial of the causes of the war,
  for our position is that no grievances or policies
  will justify resort to aggressive war.
  It is utterly renounced and condemned as an instrument of policy."
  --Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, US prosecutor at Nuremberg
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