44 Republican senators sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Plurality Leader Harry Reid urging them to pass stand-alone Defense and VA spending bills by Veterans Day. The letter included this zinger: "Our soldiers and veterans already have done so much for our county. The Democratic Congressional Leadership should not now cynically use them to shoulder a bloated 'minibus' funding bill up Pennsylvania Avenue and wrest billions in excessive spending."This is apparently how the Democrats 'support' the troops...by withholding funding from them in order to force Bush to pass a socialist health care plan (SCHIP).
Are you angry yet? You should be - this is irresponsible, dangerous, and despicable! Call your Senators and Reps, and Pelosi and Reid and demand they pass a stand-alone defense bill and take the politics out of America's defense.
President Bush fired away for the second day in a row, comparing Congress' Democratic leaders Thursday with people who ignored the rise of Lenin and Hitler early in the last century, saying "the world paid a terrible price" then and risks similar consequences for inaction today. He went on:
"Unfortunately, on too many issues, some in Congress are behaving as if America is not at war," Bush said during a speech at the Heritage Foundation. "This is no time for Congress to weaken the Department of Justice by denying it a strong and effective leader. ... It's no time for Congress to weaken our ability to intercept information from terrorists about potential attacks on the United States of America. And this is no time for Congress to hold back vital funding for our troops as they fight al-Qaida terrorists and radicals in Afghanistan and Iraq."Congress needs to feel the heat from the American people. Call every day until they do their jobs and pass a defense bill.
There's my two cents.
2 comments:
I'll call my Senators and Reps all right! I'll them to support healthcare for our children over this illegal, immoral nation building exersicse in Iraq. Why the @#$% should I pay to build someone elses country!
I think you're missing the point on both issues.
Regarding SCHIP - this is not about health care for children, as I've explained in detail in previous blogs; it's about socialized government-run health care, which has failed miserably in every other country that's tried it. Bush is more than happy to continue SCHIP (even expand it to double the previous funding), and I don't think anyone would dispute that providing health care for children in poor families is a bad thing. The problem is that what the new SCHIP bill would do is provide health care for adults, illegal aliens, and children of families making more than $60,000 a year. These are people that should not be covered in SCHIP. Let's keep it for the actual poor children who need it!
Regarding Iraq - you call it nation building, and to some extent you're correct. Our military (and other American contactors) are building schools, hospitals, roads, and other infrastructure that is critical to any functional sovereign country. But, you are forgetting the reasons we went into Iraq - to remove Saddam Hussein from power for violating dozens of UN resolutions and endangering his neighbors and the region. Here's the thing about America, though - we could have stopped once we removed Hussein, but did we? No, that would have been irresponsible. Being the generous and idealistic (this is admittedly not always good) country that we are, we are helping the Iraqi people get back on their feet after decades of having Hussein's boot against their necks. Is it taking longer than we'd like? Sure. But don't forget, it took the United States over a decade from when the Constitution was signed until we actually started operating under its authority. These things take time, and to pull out of Iraq before they are stable is to invite disaster -- both militarily and reputationally -- on ourselves. You're also refusing to look at the big picture - if we pull out, our enemies will assume (correctly or not) that we're weak and can be attacked with impunity. If we run from Iraq, it will signal open season on Americans all over the world, and on America itself. You'll see 9/11-type attacks come raining down on us, and then we'll have much bigger problems to deal with than health care for rich kids.
Wake up and join the real world.
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