Re: [Peace-discuss] What needs to be said…

[Morton K. Brussel]

The options available to those truly against the Iraq, Afghan and  
other imperial wars are sorely limited. The option Solomon softly  
proposes is to apply anti-war electoral pressure to the least  
belligerent of the presidential candidates. This to me is "sage", if  
not sanguine. Demonstrations, protests, lobbying, anti-recruitment  
actions, etc., all are supposedly for this purpose, in that we have  
no viable anti-war presidential candidates. Some congressional  
representatives who have come out strongly for ending occupations and  
military spending should be supported as part of this effort.

What else do you propose? What is Solomon's illusion?


On Mar 7, 2008, at 2:21 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:

> Sage, maybe, but perhaps not entirely free of illusion.  We've seen  
> for example how effective "grassroots pressure" has been with the  
> Democrats who were given control of Congress in 2006.  "Democrats  
> won the 2006 election largely thanks to public disgust with the  
> Iraq war," as Paul Krugman writes today in the NYT, and they proved  
> pretty impervious to "grassroots pressure" as they went on to  
> support the war.
>
> In fact, the leading astro-turf group, AAEI, with its millions from  
> party funders and its mission to co-opt the anti-war movement for  
> the benefit of the Democrats, has just re-emerged under a new  
> name.  Prwatch.org writes as follows:
>
> Campaign to Defend America, a group spun off by Americans Against  
> Escalation in Iraq, is behind McCain: McSame as Bush, a TV ad  
> attacking presidential candidate John McCain. Campaign to Defend  
> America "is among anti-war and left-of-center groups that have  
> pledged a multimillion-dollar effort to target McCain and  
> congressional Republicans on the consequences of the Iraq war on  
> the U.S. economy. ... [T]he Campaign to Defend America has received  
> at least $1.4 million from The Fund for America, a nonprofit group  
> set up last year by John Podesta, a former chief of staff for  
> President Clinton; Anna Burger, the secretary-treasurer of the  
> Service Employees International Union; and Rob McKay, a California  
> philanthropist (and chair of the Democracy Alliance). The Campaign  
> to Defend America is headed by Tom Matzzie, the former Washington  
> director of the liberal activist group MoveOn.org. Among Fund for  
> America donors are multimillionaire financier George Soros." The  
> Center for Investigative Reporting has created a chart illustrating  
> the liberal money and connections behind the Campaign to Defend  
> America.
>
> --CGE
>
> Morton K. Brussel wrote:
>> /
>> /…when a war based on lies is opposed because too many Americans  
>> are dying, the implication is that it can be made right by  
>> reducing the American death toll./
>> /
>> /
>> /When a war that flagrantly violated international law is opposed  
>> because it was badly managed, the implication is that better  
>> management could make for an acceptable war./
>> /
>> /
>> /When the number of occupying troops is condemned as insufficient  
>> for the occupying task at hand, the White House and Pentagon may  
>> figure out how to make shrewder use of U.S. air power -- in  
>> combination with private mercenaries and Iraqis who are desperate  
>> enough for jobs that they're willing to point guns at the  
>> occupiers' enemies./
>> /
>> /
>> /
>> /…The best way to avoid becoming disillusioned is to not have  
>> illusions in the first place. There's little reason to believe  
>> that Obama is inclined to break away from the routine militarism  
>> of U.S. foreign policy. But it's plausible that grassroots  
>> pressure could pull him in a better direction on a range of  
>> issues. He seems to be appreciably less stuck in cement than the  
>> other candidates who still have a chance to become president on  
>> January 20, 2009./
>> /
>> /
>> This is from *Norman Solomon's* sage reflections, at http:// 
>> www.alternet.org/waroniraq/78638/
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>> ---
>> _______________________________________________
>> Peace-discuss mailing list
>> Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>> http://lists.chambana.net/cgi-bin/listinfo/peace-discuss