[Peace] David Gill in Congress would vote against Obama’s wars

[C. G. Estabrook]

David Gill is running for Congress in C-U in opposition to the incumbent Rodney Davis. He’s running as an independent, but Monday night he met with the local Green party and pledged that if elected he would follow the practice of former Representative Tim Johnson, of not voting for any money for US war in the Mideast, including weapons for Israel, etc.  (Johnson, a Republican and originally a supporter of US Mideast wars, came to oppose them, and signed the resolution for George Bush’s impeachment, as well as joining a bipartisan suit against the illegal US attack on Libya; unfortunately his Republican successor lacks his perspicacity.) 

Obama became president by co-opting - lying to - the anti-war movement. Elected as an opponent of George Bush’s wars, in his first months in office he sent 37,000 more troops to Afghanistan. Today he’s making war in eight countries (two more than George Bush) - Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen,  and the Philippines - in violation of international law, which forbids “the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state” without the authorization of the U.N. Security Council. He is also sending American death squads (“special operations forces”) into more than 100 countries around the world, where their operations include kidnapping (“rendition”), torture, and murder; and he is conducting a secret series of murders by drone that has already killed more than 6,000 people, including US citizens and hundreds of children. His drone attacks has been called "the most extreme terrorist campaign of modern times: it targets people suspected of perhaps intending to harm us some day, and any unfortunates who happen to be nearby.”   

Party identifications mean little in regard to support for Obama’s wars. Davis, a fervent supporter, is a Republican; the Democrats have yet to name a candidate, but s/he’s unlikely to oppose Obama’s killing. Gill, who has run for this seat as a Democrat, now opposes the world-wide war making that Obama tries to get Americans to ignore.  His Republican and Democrat opponents probably won’t. 

—CGE