War

Thanks to Joy Garnett for alerting me to this action two days ago at the Hart Senate Office Building. Note that it barely made the news at all except for some tiny AP stories.

I’m quoting the press release from her post:

via email:
WASHINGTON, D.C.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS – WE WILL NOT BE SILENT

Multiple actions occurred in the early afternoon today inside the Hart Senate Office Building. Eight New York
activists were among the 15 plus arrested.

TODAY, APRIL 26, 2007, A.R.T.* OCCUPIED THE HALLS OF CONGRESS IN A DRAMATIC TWO–PART ACTION.

First, in a massive distribution, A.R.T. hand-delivered a 20-page tabloid petition to every representative. It contained documentary evidence for indictments, literally putting impeachment back on the table.

Then, at 1PM, in a spectacular visual feat, A.R.T displayed the full text of Article II, Section 4 to the Senate as a 30-foot banner drop in the Hart Office Building atrium. A second 30-foot banner read “YOUR SILENCE YOUR LEGACY”. Organizers said, “We must magnify the refusal of Congress to uphold the Constitution. Their silence equals complicity in the flagrant crimes of this administration.”

Contact: *A.R.T. (Activist Response Team)
email: stateofemergencyaction@gmail.com

Related: A28, National Impeachment Protests

What a scary country this is. This is what happened at a McCain campaign stop yesterday.

Another man — wondering if an attack on Iran is in the works — wanted to know when America is going to “send an air mail message to Tehran.”

McCain began his answer by changing the words to a popular Beach Boys song. “Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran,” he sang to the tune of Barbara Ann. “Iran is dedicated to the destruction of Israel. That alone should concern us but now they are trying for nuclear capabilities. I totally support the President when he says we will not allow Iran to destroy Israel.”

He stopped short of answering the actual question and did not say if he supports an invasion of Iran.

[via Huffington Post]

Update:

Here is a post with a video at TAPPED. It’s pretty funny that the person asking the question thinks there is only one country (Iran) causing all of the “troubles” in the Middle East. He probably drove an SUV to the event.

I’m a few days late on this. Is it just me, or does having President Bush make a major speech related to the war in Iraq to the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association have “banana republic” written all over it?

Related: Bush was wrong when he said that the spending bills intended to set a withdrawal date contain spending provisions not related to war and security. Of course, the media didn’t bother to report that.

An AP story from Saturday on Hillary Clinton’s campaign trip to New Hampshire includes these gems (emphasis mine):

Clinton acknowledged “a great deal of frustration and anger and outrage” over the war, and said she was working hard in the Senate to pass legislation capping troop levels in Iraq. She also vowed to try to bring to a vote a resolution disapproving of President Bush’s planned troop increase.

“I’m still in the arena,” she said — an apparent riposte to a Democratic rival, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards. Like Clinton, Edwards voted to authorize the invasion, but he has become a staunch war critic since leaving the Senate in 2004.

“It’s very easy to go around and say, ‘Let’s end the war,’” Clinton added. “If we had a Democratic president we would end the war.”

Her toughest question came in Berlin, a struggling mill town in northern New Hampshire.

Roger Tilton, 46, a financial adviser from Nashua, N.H., told Clinton that unless she recanted her vote, he was not in the mood to listen to her other policy ideas.

“I want to know if right here, right now, once and for all and without nuance, you can say that war authorization was a mistake,” Tilton said. “I, and I think a lot of other primary voters — until we hear you say it, we’re not going to hear all the other great things you are saying.”

In response, Clinton repeated her assertion that “knowing what we know now, I would never have voted for it,” and said voters would have to decide for themselves whether her position was acceptable.

“The mistakes were made by this president, who misled this country and this Congress,” Clinton said to loud applause.

Does she really expect us to believe that she was misled by the Bush/Cheney administration, and she actually thought Iraq was a danger to us, with its supposed WMDs?

Also, she says “If we had a Democratic president we would end the war.” I wasn’t aware that the Constitution had been changed so that we now elect a dictator for four years and Congress has no say over any of his decisions. The Democratic party has a slim majority (counting Lieberman) in the Senate, and a larger majority in the House than the GOP had before November. A majority of Americans support a withdrawal from Iraq within the next year. If we’re going to have to wait for a new President to withdraw, what’s the point of pretentding to be a republic? Shouldn’t we use all of the money we spend on the huge Congressional apparatus on some better use?

A lot of friends seemed surprised that we weren’t more excited after the last election, when the Democrats took back both houses of Congress. That’s because we were expecting Congress to behave as it is now.

Senate votes not to debate Iraq proposal

My first comment upon reading this was: “It’s bad for troop morale to talk about not adding more troops, but getting them all killed for no effective purpose is supporting them?”

Meanwhile, yes we have raised the minimum wage, but the Democrats have done nothing on the suspension of habeas corpus, torture, CIA black sites, illegal eavesdropping, and Guantanamo Bay. Color me not impressed.

Related: Another reason why I rarely link to Daily Kos. His reaction is that this event in the Senate is helpful for the 2008 elections. I think things might get a bit worse before then. This isn’t just about electoral tactics.