Finding the Courage to Negotiate: Pelosi, AIPAC and Foreign Policy

The Berkeley Daily Planet

Editorial

By Becky O’Malley


So let us begin anew, remembering on both sides that civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof. Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate.
—President John F. Kennedy


These words are from Kennedy’s first inaugural address. That speech marked a generation, my generation. Nancy Pelosi, a politically aware woman of my own age, like me a college student in 1961, cannot have escaped hearing that speech and being influenced by it all of her adult life, as we all were. The attitude it embodied ultimately resulted in the end of a repressive regime in the former Soviet Union, without the atomic war that many in 1961 thought was inevitable. Kennedy described the belief system he hoped to counter: “[B]oth sides overburdened by the cost of modern weapons, both rightly alarmed by the steady spread of the deadly atom, yet both racing to alter that uncertain balance of terror that stays the hand of mankind’s final war.” Kennedy and his successors made many mistakes along the way, but his assertion that negotiation was the only way to end the balance of terror and avoid the atomic Armageddon which threatened to destroy the planet paid off in the end.

Pelosi, now a grandmother like me, is continuing to follow Kennedy’s advice by visiting leaders of potentially warring nations in the Mideast and urging negotiations. Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor in Congress, is going along. Her credentials as a supporter of Israel, like his, are rock-solid, but no matter, the twerps are nipping at their heels.

Dick Cheney, briefly emerging from his undisclosed hidey-hole, led the attack, which has now trickled down to lesser-con luminaries like columnist Debra Saunders. The most foolish version of all this was Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s suggestion that Pelosi shouldn’t have worn a headscarf when she visited a mosque. “I just don’t know what got into her head, to be completely honest with you,” he said. “Her going to a state which is, without question, a sponsor of terror, and having her picture taken with Assad and being seen in a head scarf and so forth is sending the wrong signal to the people of Syria and to the people of the Middle East.”

Perhaps Romney, who is a Mormon, doesn’t knew that when Nancy and I were growing up Catholic women were always required to cover their heads in church, and that even Protestant princesses (there were no women Speakers in those days) donned veils when calling on the Pope. As a mayor’s daughter she’s undoubtedly grown up seeing politicians of all faiths bobby-pin yarmulkes to their heads when courting Jewish voters. Wearing a scarf is no big deal.

Lantos has even suggested that a trip to Iran should be the next item on the agenda, a proposal which Pelosi’s political staff quickly rejected, but don’t bet against it nevertheless. The time for talking to all parties is now, as sensible Israelis and Americans, even some Republicans, are starting to admit. Pelosi carried what she thought was a peace message to Syria from Israel, only to have clueless Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert deny that he’d intended any such thing, probably under pressure from the Bush White House.

But the time has come to talk. George Soros, international financier, philanthropist and determined advocate of what he believes to be human rights imperatives, came out of the political closet with a piece in the April 12 New York Review of Books.

He said that “The Bush administration is once again in the process of committing a major policy blunder in the Middle East, one that is liable to have disastrous consequences and is not receiving the attention it should. This time it concerns the Israeli–Palestinian relationship. The Bush administration is actively supporting the Israeli government in its refusal to recognize a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas, which the U.S. State Department considers a terrorist organization. This precludes any progress toward a peace settlement at a time when progress on the Palestinian problem could help avert a conflagration in the greater Middle East.” His statement was dated March 15, before Pelosi’s trip, but its endorsement of the necessity of negotiation certainly applies to talking to Syria as well.

With a great deal of trepidation, remarkable in someone with as much influence and even power as Soros has, he zeroed in on the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) as one of the principal obstacles to peace:

“I am not sufficiently engaged in Jewish affairs to be involved in the reform of AIPAC; but I must speak out in favor of the critical process that is at the heart of our open society. I believe that a much-needed self-examination of American policy in the Middle East has started in this country; but it can’t make much headway as long as AIPAC retains powerful influence in both the Democratic and Republican parties. Some leaders of the Democratic Party have promised to bring about a change of direction but they cannot deliver on that promise until they are able to resist the dictates of AIPAC.” Even though Soros is himself Jewish and a strong supporter of Israel, he knows that he is exposing himself to personal attacks for taking this position.

Pelosi, like many Democratic politicians in the Bay Area including Lantos, Assemblymember Hancock and Mayor Bates among others, has in the past been a vocal and visible supporter of AIPAC. That puts her in a good position to jump boldly into the negotiating process, just as Nixon’s history of anti-Communism put him in a good position to open negotiations with China. Even so, it has taken a considerable amount of courage for her to do so, and for Lantos and Congressman Henry Waxman to get her back as she does. It’s not too much to ask that other Democratic political leaders, especially those in safer-than-safe Northern California seats, should now demonstrate similar courage in resisting AIPAC’s undue influence on American and Israeli policy and speaking out in favor of open negotiations with all parties in the Middle East.

How Many Facts Are Needed to Destroy a False Beltway Orthodoxy?

This is my question after reading this morning’s papers: How many cold, hard facts are needed to kill tired Beltway orthodoxies? Or, now that we are in the Age When Journalism Died, is it true that when an orthodoxy has enough money and insider vanity behind it, it becomes immortal? Here are five orthodoxies that jump out from just this week’s news - orthodoxies that have little - if any - relation to the facts. They elicit a simple question: Has our political debate been hijacked by Washington power-worshipers and consequently divorced from the “reality based” world?

1. How many jobs need to be eliminated and how long to wages have to stagnate before Democrats stop promoting the orthodoxy that says Bob Rubin is the greatest economic guru in American history?

As writer Bill Greider notes, when Citigroup executive “Robert Rubin speaks his mind, his thoughts on economic policy are the gold standard for the Democratic Party.” The former Clinton Treasury Secretary is considered by Democratic policymakers to be a deity on everything from trade to job creation. Yet, pick up the New York Times today, and you will note that at the same time Rubin is being asked by candidates like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to write their economic policy platforms, Rubin is overseeing one of the largest single layoffs in recent memory, with Citigroup announcing plans to fire 17,000 employees. Meanwhile, nobody bothers to mention that Rubin’s supposedly stellar record on behalf of ordinary workers - the record that purportedly gives him his moxie in Democratic circles - is actually fairly unimpressive. United for a Fair Economy’s new report shows that during the Clinton years, wages stagnated, even as CEO pay and corporate profits rose - and worse, immediately after Rubin’s crowning achievement, the China PNTR deal, passed, those divergences intensified.

I say this record “purportedly” gives Rubin his moxie among Democrats, because that’s only the public rationale. Democrats know all of the hard data - they know Rubinomics helped rig an economy that creates much, much more for much, much fewer people. But they also know that Bob Rubin can deliver a lot of Wall Street cash to a political campaign. And so the question remains: At what point do all of the undebatable economic data overwhelm the manufactured orthodoxy of “Rubin as guru” that this corporate moneyman is able to buy from Democrats with his Wall Street cash? Is laying off 17,000 workers not enough? How many does he have to layoff to lose his luster? And how much flatter do national wage trends have to be for the chief economic architect of those wage trends to lose the “guru” label?

2. How many union organizers have to be executed, forests defoliated and children enslaved before Washington politicians stop promoting the orthodoxy that “free” trade is designed to help people in the developing world?

Unable to explain away the economic destruction “free” trade pacts have wrought in America, the last refuge of the “free” trade fundamentalists in Washington is the claim that pacts like NAFTA are all about helping poor people in impoverished countries like Mexico. We are supposed to simply ignore the fact that, say, 19 million more Mexicans have been driven into poverty since that pact was signed. But perhaps even worse, we are expected to be prospectively ignorant - that is, project ignorance into the future by ignoring things right here in the present, before we sign new trade pacts. As I noted in a post yesterday, President Bush is pushing a proposed U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement as a way to promote “freedom and prosperity” in that country. Yet, as the Washington Post reports, the Colombian government that Bush is proposing to reward with this trade pact in the name of “freedom and prosperity” is right now helping paramilitary death squads execute workers who join unions. This says nothing of the other trade pacts being pushed that economically reward countries that have no basic environmental or child labor standards.

Obviously, the politicians pushing these trade pacts know all of this - but they also know huge corporate money is behind the drive for trade agreements that create an international legal framework for cost-cutting human and environmental exploitation. So again, the question is simple: At what point do the human and ecological data surpass the orthodoxy that claims this trade policy is good for people in the developing world?

3. When will corporate executives and politicians stop citing retail sector “challenges” as the rationale for the orthodoxy that says retail workers must be paid substandard wages?

Executives, economist and other corporate apologists tell us that the low wage orthodoxy at places like Wal-Mart is justified because the retail sector supposedly subsists on tiny profit margins. Even after taking a peek at Wal-Mart’s healthy, multi-billion dollar profit margins, that justification might hold a drop of water, except when you read a story like this one in the New York Times about how executive pay in the retail industry is skyrocketing. How high do profit margins and executive salaries have to go for “experts” to stop assuming the orthodoxy that says low wages in the retail sector are an economic necessity?

4. How clear do the numbers have to be for the media to stop parroting President Bush’s claims that negotiations over military funding are endangering troops?

It seems everywhere you look, major newspaper reporters are transcribing President Bush’s claim that congressional negotiations over the Iraq War supplemental bill are delaying money that the military imminently needs, and that this supposed delay is endangering the troops. This is a version of the Washington orthodoxy that claims any congressional input into or restrictions on military spending threatens to “cut off funds for the troops” and effectively leave American soldiers naked, starving and unarmed in a Baghdad shooting gallery. Yet, as at least some trade journals like National Journal note, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service has definitively reported that “the Pentagon can finance military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan until as late as July.” Faced with these facts, when will the media and politicians back off the fact-free, “you are cutting off funds for the troops” orthodoxy?

5. How specific did the Founding Fathers have to be about three separate, equal branches of government for today’s Washington power-worshipers to back off the orthodoxy that claims the President of the United States is an all-powerful king? This past Sunday’s Meet the Press roundtable (stacked, of course, with a right-wing pundit and no progressive counter-voice) provided a typical view into power-worshiping, constitutionally-illiterate Washington. Tim Russert read a Washington Post editorial criticizing a visit by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Syria which claimed she was "attempt[ing] to establish a shadow presidency" by "substitut[ing] her own foreign policy" for the White House’s. That Pelosi delivered the White House’s exact policy in her message to Syria, that Pelosi was accompanied by Republican lawmakers, and that Pelosi was following in the well-trodden footsteps of past speakers of both parties wasn’t mentioned - but that’s not even the point. What’s disturbing is the overarching orthodoxy from these Washington pundits that says the leader of a branch of government co-equal to that of the executive branch should have absolutely no voice at all in foreign policy matters and that, in effect, when it comes to issues of global reach, the President is a king.

We are expected to assume that this orthodoxy is exactly the way the Founding Fathers set things up, even though a cursory glance at a 4th grade history book shows that preventing a monarchy like this was precisely the reason the Founding Fathers created co-equal branches of government in the first place. Obviously the president is supposed to be the lead person on foreign affairs, but the idea that constitution somehow declares that the legislative branch should have no say over such matters at all is an insult to the principles this country was founded on. I’m not sure where this Beltway media orthodoxy comes from, beyond basic power-worshiping and vanity. For example, someone like NBC White House reporter David Gregory, desperate to feel important, has proximity to an increasingly irrelevant president, and thus the more he goes on TV to insist that presidential power is omniscient and god-like, the more important he can feel when he goes home and struts before his bathroom mirror. Yet that doesn’t negate the facts of our constitution. So I ask: How much do we have to hear the "president is dictator" orthodoxy from Washington’s power-worshiping press corps before someone starts handing out civics textbooks at the next White House press briefing?

Fact-free orthodoxies like these are, sadly, pretty standard in today’s politics. My book Hostile Takeover looks at many of these, basically asserting that Big Money interests have created an entire maze of economic orthodoxies designed to perpetuate a war on the middle class. In recent months I’ve given special treatment to the Great Education Myth and the Great Labor Shortage Lie - two particularly hideous orthodoxies. I’m not sure exactly what it will take to put these orthodoxies in their grave once and for all - but I do know that unless we return to the “reality-based” world, no well-packaged, soothing, fact-free orthodoxy is going to help this country confront its very real and very imminent challenges.

COMMENTS: Go to Sirota's Working Assets site to comment on this entry

posted 4/11/2007 by David Sirota @ 10:19 am | Permalink

Broken Promises and Barefaced Lies: The Democrats Strike Again

We have observed the same song and dance so many times before it's hard to believe more didn't see it coming. The Democrats once again let down their constituents and all the other voters who ushered them in to power last November – believing, in utter stupidity, that they would somehow halt the madness of the Iraq war by challenging the Bush administration and their Republican allies in Congress.

By now we should all know about the ugly stunt they pulled last week. The Democratic majority in the House passed an appropriations bill that would give Bush more money to continue his war. The legislation, which will likely be knocked out by the White House, calls for the troops to come home later this year. Democrats, led by Nancy Pelosi, believed this would somehow appease their antiwar base. Regrettably their smarmy attempt has absolutely no teeth whatsoever. Having been one of the unfortunate geeks who actually read the bill, I can tell you only one thing – it's a complete farce.

In order for troops to come home the Bushies would have to confirm whether or not "progress" had been made in Iraq, not Congress. So with more money in hand and sole authority on deciding whether or not the war is going as planned, the White House, even if Bush signed the bill, would never have to end the thing. The proposal wasn't a compromise as many have claimed, but a dagger in the heart of all of us who want to bring this war to a screeching halt.

Fortunately these are the sorts of betrayals that fuel activists like Cindy Sheehan and CODEPINK in to putting their energy in opposing the Democratic leadership. Nancy Kricorian, who manages CODEPINK's ListenHillary.org, a site dedicated to challenging Sen. Clinton's stance on the Iraq war, recently told me why she believes it is imperative that we take on the Democratic stalwarts like Hillary Clinton.

"Hillary is the current Democratic front-runner for the presidential nomination and because she is one of the most powerful people in the party, so we feel it is important to hold her accountable for her voting record on and her public statements about Iraq," Kricorian said. "We hope that by pressuring her to change her stance … we will have an impact on the [Democrats]. We are tired of convoluted rhetoric and empty words – we want Hillary and the Democrats to stop buying Bush's war."

Cindy Sheehan reiterated a similar line when I recently spoke with her. "We need to take Hillary and [Nancy] Pelosi on to reflect true progressive antiwar values, not AIPAC or neocon values," she said. "It is important to keep the pressure on her and the others, because number one, she needs to be exposed, and two, she needs to know that we are not fooled by her."

As Election Spectacle 2008 takes center stage over the next year, let's not buy the Democratic bull that they are going to do anything substantial to end the war in Iraq, even if Barack, Hillary, and rest of the gang promise as much. We gave them an antiwar mandate, and they still want to give Bush billions more to continue the war and the sole authority to decide when the time is right to bring the troops home.

The Democrats aren't a party of opposition, but a party of capitulation.

--Joshua Frank

March 26, 2007 in War | Permalink | Comments (0)

Democrats' Victory Means More Iraqi Deaths: End the War, Then Impeach

March 26, 2007

By SUNSARA TAYLOR

"House, 218 to 212, Votes to Set Date for Iraq Pullout" reads the New York Times. "Democrats Tout Plan for Troop Pullout," headlines the Washington Post. "Pelosi's Gamble on Iraq Pays Off," beams the Los Angeles Times. The reader is to believe that the Democrats have "employ[ed] their new Congressional majority to create the most forceful challenge yet to President Bush's war policy."

Today's headlines are parroting the lies of pro-war politicians -- AGAIN!

Today, the lying headlines borrow from the script of leading Democrats, but are every bit as dangerous as the headlines that repeated George Bush's claims four years ago that Iraq had WMDs.

Today's lying headlines are declaring a "victory" against George Bush's murderous Iraq war and working to lull into satisfied passivity the people who need to be raising their voices and raising hell right now more than ever!

As Howard Zinn put it, "To me [this vote] is tantamount to the abolitionists accepting a two-year timeline for ending slavery, while giving more money to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act."

To everyone who was relying on or hoping that the Democrats would act to end the war, the actions of the Democratic leadership are a sharp wake-up call. Only the people in our millions, mobilized in massive and ongoing resistance, can bring this war and this president's whole program to a halt.

Buried is the real story of:

How Nancy Pelosi, Rahm Emmanuel, Jack Murtha and other leading Democrats maneuvered, bribed, threatened, reprimanded and bullied their party into voting to continue the war on Iraq in the face of overwhelming, widespread, deeply-felt, and growing public opposition.

How the new appropriations bill continues to fund Bush's wars to the tune of $124 billion dollars -- more than Bush even asked for!!

How the timetable for withdrawal from Iraq in the bill is so distant (seventeen months away!) it can mean nothing to the people of Iraq whose country is under the ruthless boot of U.S. occupation and is spiraling down a path of sectarian civil war that grows worse by the day.

How this timetable is so conditional -- insisting merely that Bush seek the approval of Congress before extending the date by which troops are supposed to be withdrawn -- that it is easy to imagine that deadline coming and going with no meaningful change in troop levels.

How the new bill -- and the politicians who pushed it -- put the onus for Iraq's misery on the Iraqi people themselves, demanding they meet benchmarks determined by the country that illegally invaded it! Closing the arguments for the Democrats just before the vote, Representative Patrick Murphy of Pennsylvania, asked, "When are these Iraqis going to come off the sidelines and fight for their own country?"

And barely mentioned in today's lying headlines is the fact that liberal Democrats had originally proposed an appropriations amendment that would only have provided enough funds to bring the troops back from Iraq and that this wasn't even allowed by leading Democrats to make it out of the committee to be considered by Congress.

Finally, who could ignore Bush's brazen promise to veto this new bill anyhow and the Democrats know they don't have enough votes to override him?

In the words of White House spokesman, Tony Snow, "You've got to ask yourself, why go through this long, drawn out exercise of going and wheeling and cajoling and trying to buy votes within your own party when, in fact, you know its not going to go anywhere?"

Anyway you slice it, yesterday's vote is no "victory" for the people of this country, of Iraq, or of the world, all of whom overwhelmingly oppose the Iraq war and are aching for it to be stopped. Instead it means that after four years of war crimes, massacres, rapes, torture and what can only be called a colonial occupation that has cost more than half a million deaths and led to the fastest growing refugee crises in the world, the Iraqi people must now brace themselves for more!

This is a moment that cries for clarity and boldness among those who are able to see the stakes of this, actions and voices that can cut through the lies about a "victory" that threaten to quiet and pacify the anti-war movement right when it needs to be louder than ever before.

The war must be stopped! The War-Criminal-In-Chief must be impeached!

Self-deception or self-censorship about this right now will be paid for in blood. But bold truth telling and defiant political actions will find a wide and receptive audience in the anti-war majority. This majority has begun to reemerge in the streets across the country, on the Pentagon, and in recent student strikes. Whether this spreads like wildfire or is dampened at this critical moment is up to all of us.

Sunsara Taylor writes for Revolution Newspaper and sits on the Advisory Board of The World Can't Wait ­ Drive Out the Bush Regime. She can be reached at: sunsarasworld@yahoo.com

Peace-loving goose chase

Israel is railing that even the mild language of the Arab peace initiative must be replaced by its own demands, writes Ramzy Baroud

---

The rapid -- even hasty -- developments on the Arab-Israeli front that followed almost immediately the Saudi-sponsored Mecca Accord of 2 February should be examined in their proper context, as part and parcel of broad regional shifts, exacerbated by US failure in Iraq and the dramatic adjustment in Iran's position vis-à-vis the region and its sectarian, religious composition.

Two prevailing analyses have been offered. One is sceptical, arguing that the Arab initiative, which will be rearticulated at a coming Arab League summit in Riyadh 28 March, was brought back to the scene at the behest of the US administration: by engaging Hamas, Arabs will deny Iran opportunity to further galvanise its regional alliances -- Syria and Hizbullah -- against the US and Israel and further cementing the "Shia crescent" at the expense of the Sunni majority.

The other analysis is optimistic, from Palestinian and Arab commentators talking of "historic opportunities" to Western commentators wondering if the Arab League will finally fulfill its regional promise. "Worried by what they see as the Bush administration's failings, and the new regional power of Iran, the Arabs are struggling to take their destiny into their own hands," concluded BBC Middle East analyst Roger Hardy.

The Arab peace initiative, offering full normalisation with Israel in simultaneous exchange for Israel's withdrawal to pre-1967 borders, was made public in the 2002 Arab League summit in Beirut. It came at the height of the Palestinian uprising. The initiative was immediately rejected by the Israeli government and accepted by Arafat. Its release was a cause of a slight discomfort for Israel, however, principally because the Bush administration viewed it in positive terms -- at the beginning at least -- before disowning it under incessant Israeli pressure.

In the weeks preceding the official announcement of the Arab peace initiative, Israel had assassinated Raed Al-Karmi, Fatah leader in Tulkarm in the West Bank, prompting fresh Palestinian suicide bombings. "Karmi's assassination led to the scuttling of the truce that had lasted since December 16, 2001," Akiva Aldar in Haaretz quoted Mati Steinberg, advisor on Palestinian affairs to the head of the Shin Bet security service, as saying. "It also led to Operation Defensive Shield, which pushed the Arab initiative to the margins and eliminated the opportunity to put the diplomatic track with the Palestinians on a route of direct connection with the Arab peace initiative for the first time."

The Middle East of those days is in many ways different from today's regional reality. Although Israel's colonial project is being pursued with the same level of determination (the apartheid wall, the settlements, the collective punishments, and so forth), Israel's regional reputation as a formidable military power received a significant blow when its army couldn't advance more than a few miles before confronting stiff Lebanese resistance, led by Hizbullah, in the 33-day war of July-August 2007. Neither Israel nor the US were willing to concede that that ferocious fight put up by the Lebanese had much to do with the people's strong belief in a just case. Their fingers pointed to Iran: the head of the snake as far as America's neoconservatives' clique are concerned.

Iran understood that Hizbullah's victory would discourage, slow down, or completely repeal any American military adventure against its own domain. Naturally, a defeat for Hizbullah, relying mostly on Iranian arms, would eliminate the first line of Iran's defences and inspire Washington's hawks, in constant coordination with Israel, to prepare the American public and government for war against Iran.

Not that a war against Iran is no longer on the agenda; on the contrary, something will be done to confront the Iranian "threat". But one has to understand that Israel cannot possibly allow for a regional bully aside from itself to emerge.

It was this logic, as articulated by Richard Pearle in a set of recommendations made to then Likud leader Benyamin Netanyahu in the infamous "Clean Break" memo that envisaged the Iraq war as a strategic Israeli imperative. Iraq or Iran, Sunni or Shia, are all irrelevant semantics, in Israel's view. The failure, however, to "contain" Iran, coupled with America's disastrous war strategy in Iraq, which has given rise to powerful Shia groups with direct links, and in some cases allegiance, to Tehran is sending Israel's military and policy planners to the table, once more, to study their future options.

Israel and its supporters in America are obsessed with Iran. In the well-attended American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference -- drawing 6000 participants including half of the Senate and a large portion of the House along with numerous ambassadors and officials -- Israel's many friends underlined the synergy between Israeli strategic interests and US regional concerns, placing the latter largely subservient to the former. When House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio addressed the conference, defending the current war strategy, he received a standing ovation. But when Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- unequalled fan of the Israeli regime -- dared to spell out a strategy for withdrawal from Iraq, she was booed, according to The San Francisco Chronicle.

The power of the Israeli lobby and the persisting influence of the neocons have reached new heights when Democratic leaders were obliged to strip from a military spending bill a requirement that the president must gain the approval of Congress before moving against Iran. Pelosi and others agreed to such a removal "after conservative Democrats as well as other lawmakers worried about its possible impact on Israel," reported ABC News.

With Iran in focus, coupled with serious worries amongst some Arab countries regarding its possible destabilising role in the region, Israel has agreed to a conditional arrangement: contain Iran to Israel's benefit; stabilise Iraq to the Bush administration's benefit; and introduce a new horizon of peace with the Palestinians to appease the Arabs.

The new horizon of peace -- a new term invoked by Condoleezza Rice in her recent visit to the region -- is basically the old "peace process": significant enough insofar as it yields a sense of hope, but clever enough in guaranteeing nothing, since Israel, assured of unprecedented clout in the corridors of power in Washington, will neither give up its grand plans of territorial expansion and annexation, halt its construction of the gigantic apartheid wall, nor surrender an inch of the illegally-annexed East Jerusalem -- all, predictably, key Arab and Palestinian demands.

Meanwhile, the Arab initiative always seemed vague on the issue of Palestinians made refugees by Israel in 1948 and 1967 and whose plight is as urgent as ever (especially considering their systematic targeting in Iraq, including 500 murdered to date, and Libya's decision to deport its cache of Palestinian refugees to Gaza, as callous as this seems). In order to remove any remaining ambiguity, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is "demanding that the leaders of the 22 Arab states excise the right of return from [the Palestinians]," reports Haaretz.

By crossing out the "controversial" elements contained in the Arab initiative and then opening it up for negotiations, Palestinians -- now browbeaten with a year of embargo and near starvation -- will be taken on another peace-loving goose chase, during which Israeli army bulldozers will hardly cease their determined colonial project. My fear is that Arabs will play along, willingly or not, and Palestinians will be forced to partake in the charade, for their reliance on international handouts for mere survival will make it impossible to defy US-Israeli regional designs forever.

* The writer is an Arab American journalist

© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved

Al-Ahram Weekly Online

Just Whom Does Congress Represent?

03/23/2007
Joe Murray

By Joe Murray , The Bulletin
Philadelphia

I do believe that Congress should assert itself, though, and make it very clear that there is no previous authority for the president, any president, to go into Iran," declared a confident Speaker of the House just a month or so ago.

Driven by a clear mandate to end the Iraqi conflict, remove American troops from Mesopotamia, and close the curtain on America's "Romeo and Juliet" affair with imperialism, it appeared that this grandmother from San Francisco was poised to tell the White House that the buck stopped at Baghdad. It was to be the culmination of the Democratic coup d'état.

But, as stated by Oscar Wilde, "There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it." First, a little background.

The election of 2006 was the Waterloo of the Bush Doctrine; it was the manifestation of American discontent. Five years after telling Americans that an invasion of Iraq would be met with rose petals and the makeover in Mesopotamia would produce a democratic oasis in Arabia, history has proven the cakewalk crowd to be fatally wrong.

Just into its fifth year, the war in Iraq has spilt the blood of 3,000-plus Americans, severely damaged America's international reputation, increased the number of tripwires that would plunge America into wars that are not her own, and tossed onto the ash heap of history Teddy Roosevelt's advice to "walk softly and carry a big stick."

Tired of sacrificing their blood and treasure for a people who did not seek, nor do not want, America's interference in their domestic affairs, Americans decided to pull the plug on the neo-conservative foreign policy comedy hour in November 2006.

Three months into the Democratic reign, the American people are now ready to pull the line of credit extended to Democrats in November. While they are important issues, Main Street is not primarily concerned with stem cell research, a higher minimum wage, and pharmaceutical/governmental relations; they want answers on Iraq.

Make no mistake; Americans rolled out the red carpet for Pelosi and friends because this war weary people believed that a new Congress would roll back the president's ability to increase the war, bring the troops home and restore a traditional foreign policy. This is what Americans were promised.

"And nowhere did the American people make it more clear that we need a new direction than in the war in Iraq," said Pelosi. "'Stay the course' has not made our country safer, has not honored our commitment to our troops and has not made the region more stable."

Americans took the Democrats at their word, but three months into a Pelosi Congress, Americans are still left with unanswered questions.

Where are the congressional hearings scrutinizing the legitimacy, and source, of the evidence used to propel America into the war? Where is the use of subpoena power that was dangled, like the carrot, before Americans?

Where is the tough-talking Congress that wooed Americans in their time of distress? And more importantly, where is the answer to the tough question of who brought this war upon us?
A few weeks ago, it had appeared that the cowardly Congress had found its courage when it decided to attach a provision to a major military spending bill that required the president to obtain congressional approval if he was to attack Iran. In other words, Congress was putting a stop payment on the blank check used to thrust America into the Iraqi war and telling the White House it had to follow the Constitution before launching another pre-emptive war.

The Legislature was back in business.

With well over 60 percent of Americans backing such provisions, it appeared that the Democrats were well on their way to fulfilling their electoral promise. This, however, did not happen.
Democrats were soon burnt by the flames of fury fanned by a militant minority pushing for a widened conflict in the Middle East. Enter the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

The Washington Times explains: "Last week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi received a smattering of boos when she bad-mouthed the war effort during a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the Democratic leadership, responding to concerns from pro-Israel lawmakers, was forced to strip from a military appropriations measure a provision meant to weaken President Bush's ability to respond to threats from Iran."

What did Pelosi say that so enraged the AIPAC audience? Here is Pelosi in here own words: "Any U.S. military engagement must be judged on three counts - whether it makes our country safer, our military stronger, or the region more stable. The war in Iraq fails on all three scores."
All Pelosi did was tell the AIPAC audience that if America is to spill the blood of its children and expend its resources in fighting a war, it will be for the protection of vital U.S. interests. Pelosi was merely acknowledging the wisdom of the four men whose faces are carved into Mt. Rushmore.

AIPAC, needless to say, went apoplectic and the Iranian provision, the Arc de Triomphe of the Democratic Congress, was leveled. The Democratic Congress elected to write the final chapter on a failed imperialistic foreign policy had turned its back on those who put them in power. It is betrayal that would make Benedict Arnold blush.

Why did this happen? Carah Ong, Iran Policy Analyst at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, has her suspicions.

The move to strip the military appropriations bill of this provision, explains Ong, "coincides with AIPAC's annual conference, which Pelosi addressed on Tuesday. It also follows Vice President Dick Cheney's address to the AIPAC annual conference on Monday, during which he pleaded with AIPAC to 'rein in anti-war Democrats' ... ."

Along the same line, David Espo and Matthew Lee, writing for the AP, noted that the removal is reflective of "widespread fear in Israel about Iran, which is believed to be seeking nuclear weapons and has expressed unremitting hostility about the Jewish state."

Translation - Pelosi placed foreign interests before that of the Americans she was elected to represent.

Even more disturbing, AIPAC, despite its clamoring, is not the voice of Jewish America. Ari Berman of The Nation explains: "AIPAC's continued support for the war in Iraq proves how disconnected the organization is from mainstream Jewish Americans. According to a recent Gallup poll, Jewish Americans oppose the war in Iraq more vigorously than any other religious group in the US. Seventy-seven percent of US Jews (and 89 percent of Jewish Democrats!) believe the war in Iraq was a mistake."

In the end, the crux of this matter centers on the power of the Israeli war lobby to affect the legislative process in America. AIPAC is an organization that is unapologetically pro-Israel and makes the fatal mistake of assuming that Tel Aviv's interests are identical to Washington's interests.

It was this type of foreign influence George Washington had in mind when he warned Americans, "a passionate attachment of one Nation for another produces a variety of evils." Washington explained, "Sympathy for the favorite Nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest, in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter, without adequate inducement or justification."

Washington, more than two centuries ago, just explained how America got roped into the mess in Mesopotamia.

Five years after Iraq, the war drums are beating again and Congress must resist the siren song. Just as Washington warned, we cannot let foreign influence dictate U.S. policy and lead us into another war that is not our own.

When Pelosi, in describing Iraqi policy, pledged, "We cannot continue down this catastrophic path," Americans believed her. She was then elected to represent American interests and not the interests of a radical group blinded by its own passions.

Just whom do you represent, Pelosi?


Joe Murray can be reached at jmurray@thebulletin.us.

Antiwar Democrats Cave on Iraq War Funds

Liberals Relent on Iraq War Funding
House Likely to Pass Bill With Pullout Date

By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 23, 2007; A01

Liberal opposition to a $124 billion war spending bill broke last night, when leaders of the antiwar Out of Iraq Caucus pledged to Democratic leaders that they will not block the measure, which sets timelines for bringing U.S. troops home.

The acquiescence of the liberals probably means that the House will pass a binding measure today that, for the first time, would establish tough readiness standards for the deployment of combat forces and an Aug. 31, 2008, deadline for their removal from Iraq.

A Senate committee also passed a spending bill yesterday setting a goal of bringing troops home within a year. The developments mark congressional Democrats' first real progress in putting legislative pressure on President Bush to withdraw U.S. forces.

Even more than the conservative Democrats leery of appearing to micromanage the war, House liberals have been the main obstacle to leadership efforts to put a timeline on the withdrawal of U.S. forces. They have complained that the proposal would not bring troops home fast enough. Their opposition has riven the antiwar movement, split the Democratic base and been the main stumbling block to the legislation, which had originally been scheduled for a vote yesterday.

As debate began on the bill yesterday, members of the antiwar caucus and party leaders held a backroom meeting in which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) made a final plea to the group, asking it to deliver at least four votes when the roll is called. The members promised 10.

"I find myself in the excruciating position of being asked to choose between voting for funding for the war or establishing timelines to end it," said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.). "I have struggled with this decision, but I finally decided that, while I cannot betray my conscience, I cannot stand in the way of passing a measure that puts a concrete end date on this unnecessary war."

That was the message of Democratic leaders: This is the best deal they could make, and it is better than no deal at all.

At a meeting of Democratic vote counters yesterday, House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.) quoted the Yogi Berra line "When you reach a fork in the road, take it."

"We're at the fork in the road," Emanuel said.

Shortly after, Out of Iraq Caucus leaders decided to break the pact that members had made to stick together against the bill. "We have released people who have been pained by all this," said Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.). "We told them we don't want them to be in a position of undermining Nancy's speakership."

To many in the movement against the Iraq war, the liberal opposition to the bill was as maddening as it was mystifying.

"You really have two options here: One is that you can vote for a change of course here and say we're going to find a way out of Iraq, or, two, you can vote against it and hand George Bush a victory," said Jon Soltz, a veteran of the Iraq war and co-founder of VoteVets.org, a group that opposes the war. "It doesn't make sense to me. George Bush got us into the war. They have challenged him on everything. Why would they give him this victory now?" he asked, referring to the liberals.

When Democratic leaders first spoke of attaching strings to Bush's $100 billion war request, their biggest fear was that they would lose their conservatives. Since then, the bill has actually grown more assertive in its efforts to bring the troops home. Initial efforts to tie the deployment of combat forces to tough standards for resting, equipping and training the troops have been bolstered by binding benchmarks for the Iraqi government to meet. If the Iraqis fall short, troop withdrawals could begin as early as July 1. In any case, the withdrawals would have to begin in March 2008, with most combat forces out by Aug. 31, 2008.

Even the more cautious Senate Democrats have moved toward setting a troop-withdrawal date. The Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday approved a $122 billion version of a spending bill that would require troops to begin leaving Iraq within four months of passage and would set a nonbinding goal of March 31, 2008, for the removal of combat troops.

To the surprise of many antiwar activists, House Democratic leaders have been able to keep their conservative Blue Dog members largely onboard as they ratcheted up the bill's language. But with Republicans virtually united in opposition, Democrats can afford only 15 defections.

Bush and congressional Republicans have done their best to exploit the divisions, repeatedly mentioning that the Democrats are not united.

"Congress needs to get their business done quickly, get the moneys we've requested funded and let our folks on the ground do the job," the president said yesterday in demanding the funds with no strings attached.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates warned yesterday that if Congress does not pass the supplemental war funding bill by April 15, the Army may have to slow the training of units slated to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan, or halt the repair of equipment. If the funding is delayed until May, he said, the tours of Army units in Iraq and Afghanistan might have to be extended "because other units are not ready to take their place."

The administration's stand has only increased the anguish in the antiwar movement. The liberal activists of MoveOn.org opted this week to back the funding bill, but the decision split the group's members and prompted accusations that the MoveOn leadership had stacked the endorsement vote. Win Without War, an umbrella group against the Iraq war, met Tuesday to decide whether to endorse the bill, but the divisions were too deep to bridge.

David Sirota, a former House Appropriations Committee aide who is now an uncompromising blogger, dashed off a memo to progressive lawmakers Wednesday night, imploring them to "accept the congressional world as it is right now," not to insist on the world as they wish it to be, and vote for the bill.

Staff writer Ann Scott Tyson contributed to this report.

Where Are The Democrats?

When it comes to Iraq, the opposition party is afraid to oppose.

March 2007

It's hard to get out of a deal with the devil. That's the congressional Democrats' dilemma as they continue to treat the Iraq war as a speed bump on their pathway to the perks of restored power.

Take Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware. Asked on one of the Sunday venues for pompous pontificators how he would respond to any attempt by President Bush to escalate the war in Iraq (to "surge," if you prefer it in Newspeak), the Democratic "leader" on foreign policy responded, "There's not much I can do about it."

This is a man who sees a future president during his morning look in the mirror. Sadly, the glass reflects an empty suit who embodies the congressional Democrats' decision to reduce action on Iraq to a political calculus appropriate for the highway appropriations bill, not a moral imperative to challenge a policy that has sent thousands of twenty-somethings to their deaths in the desert.

You certainly can do something about it, Senator. It's called leadership. You rise on the Senate floor. You say you were out of your mind to write a blank check for this hideous abuse of American military power. And then you propose immediate withdrawal, just slow enough to maximize the safety of the 135,000 young men and women you helped put in harm's way by your collusion with this elective war. You do what Republican Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon had the guts to do last month, stopping just short of accurately labeling this public policy obscenity a criminal enterprise.

I have lived in the 10 surreal square miles of D.C. for more than three decades, usually playing by the rules of decorum dictated by the political and media classes, first as a young congressional aide, later as a national party committee and presidential campaign operative, and now as an aging educator of journalism students who want to spend their careers interpreting politics.

But like millions of other Americans, I can no longer contain the primal scream I want to direct at the members of my party who declined to engage in a real debate in the run-up to this completely avoidable misjudgment of old men and women. Nonexistent, and certainly nonthreatening, WMDs. A secularist paper-tiger dictator, despised by the Islamist lunatics behind the September 11 attacks. A tribal culture with zero indigenous movement for pluralistic democracy.

All of those things were knowable when congressional Democrats such as Biden had an opportunity to stop this madness before it started. Some of them actually shared the neoconservative pretensions of a new American imperialism. But most just quaked in their permanent campaign boots, fearing being labeled Cold War-style liberal wimps. They averted their eyes and closed their mouths instead of acting like a responsible opposition party.

Now, trying to finesse their way out of their Faustian bargain, Democrats engage in a transparent anti-war vamp, with limp proposals to implement the 9/11 commission report and half-measures opposing escalation. And they receive aid and comfort from misguided and timid editorial pages, like those of The Washington Post and The New York Times, which also colluded with power in the run-up to the Iraq war instead of challenging it and which now circumscribe discourse with the narrow frame of how best to muddle through rather than promote an honest debate about whether to stay or go.

Where are the Gordon Smiths in the Democratic Party? Where are the politicians of conviction? Where are the institutions of media power with the courage to say the emperor has no cowboy boots, no jeans, no garments at all-just a hideous, stubborn smirk that is making this country ill and squandering our reputation around the globe?

The only place I can find truth speaking to power is on a cable TV comedy channel, not in the chambers of what used to be called the greatest deliberative body in the world. Is anybody out there willing to lead?

Terry Michael, former press secretary for the Democratic National Committee, directs the Washington Center for Politics & Journalism and blogs at terrymichael.net. A version of this article also appeared in the Washington Times.

MOVEON UNDERCUTS US HOUSE'S 'OUT OF IRAQ' CAUCUS

Anti-War Dems Near Defeat on Spending Bill

By: Josephine Hearn
March 21, 2007 08:13 AM EST

The most outspoken critics of the $124 billion wartime spending bill in the House are facing withering support in their fight to defeat it.

California Democratic Reps. Maxine Waters and Lynn Woolsey said that many of their liberal colleagues were caving under pressure from Democratic leaders who, according to at least one congressman, have threatened to block requests for new funds for his district.

They also cited MoveOn.org's endorsement of the measure Monday as a blow to their efforts.

"This is the process: people who feel strongly about this issue hold out as long as they can," said Waters. "A lot of pressure comes to bear and they can't hold up under the pressure."

The $124 billion emergency spending bill, backed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), includes not only more funds this year for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan but also new military readiness standards, benchmarks for the Iraqi government and an Aug. 31, 2008 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

A floor vote is planned for Thursday.

Democratic leaders have also added billions in funds not related to wartime spending in a bid for more support.

That additional money was attractive for at least one lawmaker, Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), an Out of Iraq Caucus member. His spokeswoman, Danielle Langone, cited $400 million for a one-year reauthorization of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act.

"That's pretty vital for our district, so we'll be voting for the bill," Langone said.

Waters said that she and other opponents of the spending measure had entered the weekend with 20 to 25 members on their side but that they had suffered "a lot of damage" as Democratic leaders aggressively urged members to support the bill.

Vowing to step up her efforts to hold the opposition, Waters said it was clear that Democratic leaders were mounting an all-out whip effort beyond the earlier informal surveying by Democratic Whip James Clyburn (S.C.).

"This is a vote of conscience," Waters said. "Jim Clyburn said he was doing an assessment, so that's what I was doing. Now that he's whipping, I'm going to start whipping."

Clyburn disputed her assertion. "That's not what she told me," he said. "I beg to differ that there's anybody whipping against this bill."

One congressman, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid retribution from leaders, bristled at how aggressively he was being pressured to vote for the bill, singling out Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) as especially forceful.

"I really resent this," the lawmaker said. "Rahm Emanuel told us a vote against this bill is a vote to give the Republicans victory."

The congressman also noted that Democratic leaders had "made clear" to him that they might yank funding requests he had made for projects in his district if he did not support the measure.

Democratic whips, all deputies of Clyburn, approached members on the House floor Monday night.

A jovial Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger went up to fellow Maryland Rep. Albert Wynn as he sat off the floor with a reporter and told Wynn that a vote against the bill was a vote for Republican victory. He waved a copy of the MoveOn.org press release backing the measure.

"Have you seen this?" Ruppersberger asked.

"Yeah, who did that?" replied Wynn, a member of the Out of Iraq Caucus.

"Some people we asked to put out a press release to get you to vote for the bill," Ruppersberger joked. He razzed the noncommittal Wynn a few moments longer, pretending to twist his arm, then headed off to reprise the routine with another Out of Iraq Caucus member, Maryland Rep. Elijah E. Cummings.

Other undecided Democrats were also feeling the heat. Rep. Yvette D. Clarke (D-N.Y.) said she had been approached several times and was "still very undecided."

"This will establish to a large degree who I am. ... I'm really trying to make sure I have an understanding of the supplemental in practicality and balancing that with my own concerns about the war and my constituents who are very opposed to the war," Clarke said. "The sentiment I'm getting from my constituents is that I'm beyond benchmarks now. …The administration has proven to be untrustworthy."

Some anti-war activists assailed MoveOn.org's approach to the Iraq bill, alleging that the organization had used a skewed poll to conclude that 85 percent of its members backed the measure.

"MoveOn put out a dishonest poll that did not offer its members a real choice to end the war, and now the peace movement is lobbying activists to reform MoveOn or drop off its list," David Swanson, a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, said in an e-mail to The Politico. "I unsubscribed from MoveOn this morning."

In the poll, MoveOn.org gave its members a choice of supporting, opposing or being "not sure" of the plan proposed by the Democratic leadership, according to an e-mail sent to members Sunday by MoveOn.org official Eli Pariser.

It did not mention a more aggressive withdrawal proposal backed by Woolsey, Waters and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.).

Pariser said MoveOn.org had held out as long as possible before backing the leadership proposal.

"We were basically declining to take a position as long as we could to strengthen the hand of the progressives. We did the poll at the last time we felt we could have an impact on the final vote."

He said he would support the progressive proposal if it came to a vote. "We'll encourage people to vote for that and for the supplemental," he said. "We are trying to end the war. That's the mandate."

Democratic leaders are pressing hard on the bill even though some members of their whip operation are themselves opposed. Waters, one of nine chief deputy whips, has said she will not whip for a bill she staunchly opposes.

But other members have been more willing to help. Rep. Diane E. Watson (D-Calif.), who remains "solidly" opposed to the bill, was still serving as a regional whip.

"I told Jim Clyburn I'm a team player. I'm a whip. I'll do the whipping," Watson said. But, she added, "My whipping is just a survey. … If I believed in what I was whipping on, I'd do more."

See also: Iraq Bill Hard Count is 204.

TM & © THE POLITICO & POLITICO.COM, a division of Allbritton Communications Company

The AIPAC Girl

by Patrick J. Buchanan

Posted 03/20/2007 ET
Updated 03/20/2007 ET

If George W. Bush launches a pre-emptive war on Iran, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will bear full moral responsibility for that war.

For it was Pelosi who quietly agreed to strip out of the $100 billion funding bill for Iraq a provision that would have required President Bush to seek congressional approval before launching any new war on Iran.

Pelosi's capitulation came in the Appropriations Committee.

What went down, and why?

"Conservative Democrats as well as lawmakers concerned about the possible impact on Israel had argued for the change in strategy," wrote The Associated Press' David Espo and Matthew Lead.

"Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said in an interview there is a widespread fear in Israel about Iran, which ... has expressed unremitting hostility to the Jewish state.

"'It would take away perhaps the most important tool the U.S. has when it comes to Iran,' she said of the now-abandoned provision.

"'I don't think it was a very wise idea to take things off the table if you're trying to get people to modify their behavior and normalize in a civilized way,' said Gary Ackerman of New York."

According to John Nichols of The Nation, Pelosi's decision to strip the provision barring Bush from attacking Iran without Congress' approval "sends the worst possible signal to the White House."

"The speaker has erred dangerously and dramatically," writes Nichols. Her "disastrous misstep could haunt her and the Congress for years to come."

Nichols does not exaggerate.

If Bush now launches war on Iran, he can credibly say Congress and the Democrats gave him a green light. For Pelosi, by removing a provision saying Bush does not have the authority, de facto concedes he does have the authority.

Bush and Cheney need now not worry about Congress.

They have been flashed the go sign for war on Iran.

Pelosi & Co. thus aborted a bipartisan effort to ensure that if we do go to war again, we do it the constitutional way, and we do it together.

Nothing in the provision would have prevented Bush, as commander in chief, from responding to an Iranian attack or engaging in hot pursuit of an enemy found in Iraq. Nor would the provision have prevented Bush from threatening Iran. It would simply have required him to come to Congress -- before launching all-out war.

Now Pelosi has, in effect, ceded Bush carte blanche to take out Iran's nuclear facilities. It's all up to him and Cheney.

For this the nation elected a Democratic Congress?

Why did Pelosi capitulate? Answer: She was "under pressure from some conservative members of her caucus, and from lobbyists associated with neoconservative groups that want war with Iran and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)," writes Nichols.

The Washington Times agrees as to who bully-ragged Nancy into scuttling any requirement that Bush come to the Hill before unleashing the B-2s on Arak, Natanz and Bushehr:

"Last week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi received a smattering of boos when she bad-mouthed the war effort during a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the Democratic leadership, responding to concerns from pro-Israel lawmakers, was forced to strip from a military appropriations measure a provision meant to weaken President Bush's ability to respond to threats from Iran."

This episode, wherein liberal Democrats scuttled a bipartisan effort to require Bush to abide by the Constitution before taking us into a third war in the Middle East, speaks volumes about who has the whip hand on Capitol Hill, when it comes to the Middle East.

Pelosi gets booed by the Israeli lobby, then runs back to the Hill and gives Bush a blank check for war on Iran, because that is what the lobby demands. A real candidate for Profiles in Courage.

As for the presidential candidates, it is hard to find a single one willing to stand up and say: If Bush plans to take us into another war in the Mideast, he must first come to Congress for authorization. And if he goes to war without authorization, that will be impeachable.

All retreat into the "all-options-are-on-the-table" mantra, which is another way of saying, "It's Bush's call."

The corruption of both parties is astonishing. Republicans used to be the party of the Constitution: "No more undeclared wars! No more presidential wars!"

Democrats used to be the party of the people. The people don't want this war. They don't want another. The Jewish community voted 88 percent for Democrats in November, and 77 percent oppose Iraq.

So says Gallup. Yet, just because the Israeli lobby jerked her chain, the leader of the Peoples' House has decided she and her party will leave the next war up to Bush.

Sam Rayburn must be turning over in his grave.

Patrick J. Buchanan (more by this author)