[Peace-discuss] Barbara Lee, Ron Paul, & Walter Jones float bill to end Afghanistan war

[E. Wayne Johnson]

Barbara Lee, Ron Paul float bill to end Afghanistan war

By Josh Richman
Oakland Tribune
© Copyright 2011, Bay Area News Group
Posted: 02/17/2011 02:28:39 PM PST
Updated: 02/17/2011 03:59:37 PM PST

Rep. Barbara Lee joined with two House Republicans to introduce a bill 
Thursday that they say would end the war in Afghanistan.

The bill that Lee, D-Oakland, co-authored with Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, 
and Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., would require that any money appropriated 
for the war in Afghanistan "shall be obligated and expended only for 
purposes of providing for the safe and orderly withdrawal from 
Afghanistan of all members of the Armed Forces and Department of Defense 
contractor personnel."

"It sends, really, a strong message that we've come together today to 
speak with one voice on this issue," Lee said on a teleconference with 
reporters.

Lee noted her lone vote against authorizing the use of force after the 
Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and said her concern that it was a 
blank check for war hasn't abated since. Had Americans known we'd still 
be in Afghanistan almost a decade later, she said, perhaps there 
would've been a more robust debate. "It's costing us $100 billion a year 
and countless American lives."

Lee said the bill already has about 46 co-sponsors from both sides of 
the aisle.

Jones, whose district is home to military installations, including the 
Marine Corps' Camp Lejeune, has seen service members deployed repeatedly 
to Afghanistan. He said he has been in touch with a retired general -- 
whom he declined to name, although he said reporters would recognize the 
name if he did -- who has advised him that the
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situation in Afghanistan is untenable and won't lead to a stable, 
democratic government there.

"It's time to bring them home. The American people are fed up and tired 
of seeking the broken bodies," he said.

Paul thanked Lee for "leading the charge" and said the war is a 
consequence of policy dating back at least to the Persian Gulf War, an 
American interventionist attitude intent on remaking the Middle East and 
South Asia. The U.S. should persuade and lead by example, not by 
gunpoint, he said.