MAMA WARBUCKS

Hillary Clinton brings home the dollars for New York's defense contractors

by Kristen Lombardi
Village Voice
May 3rd, 2005 11:10 AM

WHO GETS WHAT

When someone like Newt Gingrich commends a Democrat's service on the Senate Armed Services Committee, you know you're looking at a serious hawk. That hawk is Hillary Clinton, junior senator from blue-state New York and possible presidential candidate in 2008.

Senator Hillary Clinton may never see New York return to its glory days of defense contracting, when it was known as the "cradle of aviation." But she's trying. In fiscal 2003—before Clinton got her spot on the committee—New York ranked 13 out of 50 states in contracts, with $4.3 billion. Today, the latest statistics show that the Empire State has nudged up a point to 12 in the nation, with $5.2 billion in procurements.

Maybe it's a coincidence. Or maybe not. Many senators on Armed Services hail from the states ranking highest in Pentagon money. Here is a list of the top 10 states receiving defense contracts in fiscal 2004; also noted is whether the state has anyone on the committee:


1. California, received $27.9 billion
2. Virginia, $23.5 billion, represented by Senator John Warner, the majority chairman
3. Texas, $21 billion, Senator John Cornyn
4. Maryland, $9.2 billion
5. Connecticut, $9 billion, Senator Joe Lieberman
6. Arizona, $8.43 billion, Senator John McCain
7. Florida, $8.4 billion, Senator Bill Nelson
8. Massachusetts, $7 billion, Senator Edward Kennedy
9. Missouri, $6.5 billion, Senator James Talent
10. Pennsylvania, $6.2 billion

villagevoice.com/news/0518,lombardi,63597,5.html

hold on hold on, are the people calling for this sure that Clinton will be at Crobar???? That seems like the last of all places in Chicago she would go to.

Well, if she doesn't show up, we can all stop in at the Crazy Horse II next door. I hear they have the hottest strippers in Chicago.

Check out:
contribute.hillaryclinton.com/events/chicago1203.html

Also listed on Crobars Chicago calendar of events
www.crobar.com/

Will it be the Marine Corps band playing patriotic tunes and funeral dirges?

Or maybe the Village People pumping the Navy?

How about "O Lord Won't You Buy Me a Mercedes Benz?" sung by that new group, the Defense Contractors Quartet.

CROBAR"s address is 1543 N. Kingsbury.

Go get her! I suspect she really doesn't support the war, but wants to position herself as someone who does for 2008. Kerry made that mistake for 2004, and look where it got him.

Maybe this protest will disabuse her of the notion that ostensible support of the war is the best position for someone who hopes to get the Democratic nomination.

wow.

Hillary says what she says to gain and hold power. I think, if/once she is in office, you will be much more pleased with her.

Good points, Curious. I would go for the Village People doing 'In the Navy,' but I like them too much -- and it might make people anti-gay. How about the sound track from 'Apocalypse Now,' Wagner mixed with Heavy Metal?

"Hillary says what she says to gain and hold power. I think, if/once she is in office, you will be much more pleased with her."

I don't think so. Remember, this is the woman who blew the best chance we ever had for national health insurance, all because she wanted to sell out to big insurance companies. She's a corporate shill, masquerading as a liberal Democrat. She'll do anything she can for power -- that is the story of her life. Remeber, she started out as a Goldwater Girl, and got her start in politics the old fashioned way, by marrying it.

What a pathetic excuse for a human being.

you're disgusting - saying marines and patriotism is bad? fuck you and fuck your socialist bullshit - we're going to pave your fucking ghettos into the damn ground and uproot all you cheap fucking shitheads - no more condos, you won't go? no more fucking leftists, you're GOING to go!

liberal democrats are corporate shills. how come people are always suprised by these democrats? all politicians like money even our little good cop Kucinich. i am glad people are targeting the democrats as well as the republicans. electoral politics are dead and corupt people can't rely on the pretty smiles of Clintons and Obamas to solve our problems because their resolutions end with a bang. so lets keep pressure on all politicians who stop in chicago, friendly reminders that their time is up.

If you just want to 'pressure' rather than replace elected officials, 'Bart', besides more militant slogans and rhetoric, what's the difference between you and any variety of liberal?

Electoral politics are dead? To whom? You and a few friends? As long as there are millions, especially a majority, who believe in going to the polls, even if they only have piss-poor choices, rather than engaging in armed insurrection, we have to be on 'the long march through the institutions' with them. if only to exhaust the possibilities.

Combine elections with mass action, yes. Find better candidates, programs, coalitions and parties, yes.

But hand over the whole arena to the right voluntarily? No, unless you're intent on demonstrating in a new era one of Lenin's oft-repeated points, 'Scratch an anarchist, and you'll find a liberal underneath.'

ha. post a protest against hillary clinton and all of a sudden all the trolls are silent?

mwhahahaha!

What do you suggest we replace them with Karl? Eletoral politics are not just dead to me and a few of my friends but they are also dead for the millions of people who chose to stay home on election day. People deserve more than piss poor choices and they realize this, that is why they don’t vote. There is no left and right, there is one system in this country and it is capitalism no matter which party we vote for we get screwed, we get their trade agreements, we get their wars, we starve. The choices have been exhausted now it is time for new tactics, tactics even beyond armed insurrection and defiantly beyond workers dictatorships. By handing over votes or control of our lives to anyone we betray our selves.

Lenin feared anarchists that is why he used such rhetoric with the intent to turn the working class against them making it easier to kill and imprison them with out public outrage.

Better learn to count, Bart, one of the more important tools of politics.

More people vote than stay home on election day, at least in the Presidential years. And those who stay home run the gamut of left to center to right, just like those who vote. It's skewered a little to the left, but not by much.

So by saying elections are dead and don't matter, your strategy for revolution is based on ignoring the views of at least half the adult population.

That's like trying to win a football game by ignoring abilities of half of your team, and half of the opposing team as well. Not very effective, I'd say.

Now I'd agree that we live in a polyarchy --rule by a few colluding and contending capitalist elites -- not a democracy. We've got something like one dollar, one vote, rather than one person, one vote.

But I'm of the opinion that people adopt revolutionary means mainly when they've exhausted the reformist possibilities and have their backs to the wall. They don't do it because you or I make a revolutionary speech, even at a big demonstration or strike; they do it because they can't live in the old way and the current rulers can't rule in the old way.

If you think that's where things are at, make your case.

If you think you can make revolution with just a minority, while a majority still believes reforms are possible, again, make you case.

Otherwise, you can just own up to the fact that it doesn't matter to you what most folks think -- which makes you something of an elitist too, even if it's of a left anarchist variety.

No, "effortless," us "trolls" (i.e. any opposing voice) posted here, but your malevolent dictatorship makes sure you never see our posts. That way the world is much warmer, fuzzier and even more freshly scented.

Which is no small task for this crowd.

Actually in most elections the majority of people do not vote, and when there is a majority of people voting in an election it s a slim majority. There are still millions of people who are disgusted with every fraud candidate that runs.

Well, yes, 'Truth.' If you count all those under 18, all those otherwise legally denied the ballot, and all those too apolitical or antipolitical to ever bother registering -- then, yes, you can find a majority not voting, I suppose.


But my point remains that even these nonvoters still run the full gamut from left to right. They're not all closet anarchists by a long shot. Some are disgusted with elections because David Duke and the KKK are not to be found on their local ballot.

And among those registered to vote, you've still often got a majority, numbering in millions, going to the polls, and some of them even agree with some of the nonvoters that they've only got 'fraud candidates' and biased or rigged rules.

But they go anyway. And let's say a comparable number don't, and it ebbs and flows as to whether the do's and the don'ts are bigger one year or another.

Let's grant all that.

Then, still, what's your point?

I think my questions posed to 'Bart' still stand.

If you're not into entirely boycotting elections, but want to find a new and better way to fight in that arena, at least in the shorter run, then welcome to the club. We're on the same side, even if we differ over details.

But if you think we're in a revolutionary situation where we need to encourage insurrection over bourgeois elections, or that even if we aren't, we should still cede voting to the right and the fascists, then make your case.

Carl how on earth can you try and sum up my strategy for revolution in a few paragraphs? my stance is this people can make a change in this world, the people who don't vote don't decline this privilage because they are closet anarchists i never said that. Most people don't vote for many reasons, because they don't feel the rich christians who occupy political offices don't represent their opinions, maybe now is the time to listen to those people, right or left or sleeping, find out why the system fails them, why they feel tthey have no say in their government and start from there before we start talking about a revolution, the problem with most communism so far is that the intellectuals leading the revolutions never listened to the people, they were to busy hunting them down. But it is a great injustice to people to let them believe in a system that enslaves them at any cost, no more of this lesser evil bullshit they are all evil our back is up against a wall for the entire exsistance of this plaque we call the United States people hae had there backs against the wall. it is up to us now, slave masters don't free their slaves the slaves free themselves, the first battle in this fight is to make people realize that we no longer need the democrats to fight the right because they won't they are all in the same gang

One of Carl's refrains is to apply both street heat and a clever forway into the electoral arena supposedly to push a progressive agenda.

Last time around this ended up demobilizing the mass action component and all of the eggs ended up in the Kerry electoral campaign. Sssh. Only Carl and a "few of his friends" know how this clever strategy of dual tactics works.

It was so clever that the antiwar movement in Chicago has yet to recover from its electoral malaise. But maybe that was the plan all along?

Interesting theory, Bob. But where's the evidence?

One of the largest antiwar protests, some 500,000, led by UFPJ, took place in NYC in the thick of the election campaign campaign -- that's evidence of a mobilization to the contrary of your 'demobilization' theory. Can you name ONE ordinary person who says 'I decided not to go to any antiwar protests because I was too busy registering voters and didn't want to hurt Kerry's chances?'

Funny, I've never run into a single one. And I travel in circles that think voting is important, even if we have lousy choices most of the time.

Sometimes I wonder if a key reason I feel the way I do about this voting issue is that I was one of the kids in the 1960s who went to Mississippi, got whipped and gassed, and learned of others who died, simply to get the right and the ability to register to vote, and then saw what could happen when organizations like the Mississipi Freedom Democratic Party led by Fannie Lou Hamer, or the original Black Panther Party of Loundes County, Alabama, could elect a Black sheriff in a district comprised of a Black majority of sharecroppers.

Some things get seared into your consciousness and stay there, even as your hair gets greyer.

And for the record, I support getting on Hilary's case for running on the war to the right of Bush, which started this thread. My goal has always been to split the Democratic party and supplant it with something positive and progressive. But you don't do that by abandoning the electoral arena and hand it over to the far right.

It looks simple to me, carl you seem to have seperation anxiety, you want to et go but your afraid. it is ok to be afraid these are powerful people who will destroy anything that hinders their profit making and power hording. politicians ecspecialy democrats are not here for you they are here for the corporations they serve.

Separation anxiety?

Hardly. I've never been connected to or even known any of these folks -- unless you want to count Bobby Rush, Jan Schakowsky, Danny Davis and Luis Gutterriez.

Let's see...I voted for Shirley Chisholm, (D-NY) first Black woman to run for President in a Dem primary back in Brooklyn the 1970s, first time I ever voted. Then I voted CP and SWP once or twice. In 1980, I worked and voted for Barry Commoner and the Citizen Party over Carter and Reagan. I worked for Jesse Jackson and Jerry Brown in their primaries, but never voted for Clinton either time. I worked for the New Party, helping to get Ted Thomas of ACORN elected alderman. I did vote for Gore, even though I financially supported the Greens, but Nader pissed me off when he started playing footsie with Pat Buchanan on protectionism. Finally, I voted for Kerry as a protest against Bush, but I never endorsed him, instead repeatedly pointing out that he was from another faction of the imperialists. If Nader was on the ballot in IL, a 'safe state', he would have got my vote, but the Greens could never get it together here.

So you see, even though I'm a picky voter, I've been all over the map over the years, since we've only had weak or piss-poor choices. As a result, I know first hand all the weaknesses of third parties, abstaining from voting AND working with the Dems. I know where too many bodies are buried to have very many illusions about any side in these debates.

As for the big corporations, I've known they owned the two parties probably since before you knew there was such a thing as a corporation. That's why, in the preceding post, I said we lived in a polyarchy, not a democracy.

No, my only anxiety these days is over the terrible suffering in Iraq brought on by the Bush/Neocon war and by the danger of the rise of theocratic fascism, here and abroad.

That's why I'm not surrendering ANY weapons, however limited they may be.

Hillary at the crobar? This is impossible to believe. Only 50 bucks? I might wanna check it out. Why protest in the cold when you can go inside for DIRECT ACTION!

Just kidding I love Hillary, socialize healthcare now!

Carl wrote: "One of the largest antiwar protests, some 500,000, led by UFPJ, took place in NYC in the thick of the election campaign campaign -- that's evidence of a mobilization to the contrary of your 'demobilization' theory."

This was a huge rally FOR the Kerry campaign, that year's "lesser evil." Most progressives, eager for "anybody but Bush," gave the Democrats a pass in Boston a few weeks before the UFPJ rally at the Republican convention, to which Carl refers.

Giving the Democrats a pass at their prowar convention, then rallying at the Republican prowar convention with many Kerry signs held aloft, is not "demobilizing" the mass movement that needs to hold ALL politicians accountable?

"Part of my job is being a good listener," Hillary Clinton wrote, in the first line of her letter received today. As a New Yorker, I'm represented by Hillary in the U.S. Senate. Along with her two-page fundraising letter, I received a four-page "2005 Critical National Issues Survey."

But something was missing -- something Hillary obviously doesn't want to hear about: IRAQ. Nowhere in the letter or the questionnaire was that four-letter word.

Hillary's first question asked me to rank nine issues in their "order of importance." Iraq wasn't on the list. Nor was there a place I could add an issue she'd somehow forgotten about.

The problem is she hadn't forgotten the war. She simply doesn't want to hear about one of the biggest issues dividing our country, draining the federal budget, destabilizing the Middle East, undermining international law and institutions, and spreading fear and hatred of our country.

When national polls show that 54% or more of Americans want our troops withdrawn promptly from Iraq, and 60% believe it was a mistake to have sent troops in the first place, imagine how huge the majorities are for those propositions in Hillary's home state of New York.

Hillary's letter said that she enclosed the questionnaire to help gauge concern about "the extreme Bush agenda." But on the central foreign policy initiative of Bush's agenda, she has been complicit. When she voted to authorize the Iraq war, and today when she echoes White House talking points in criticizing advocates of withdrawal.

Hillary's letter closes by appealing to Americans who believe "no one's listening to me." I'm not one of those Americans: Progressive members of Congress have been listening to their constituents, and speaking out loudly and bravely to end the destabilizing US occupation of Iraq. Now even a hawk like John Murtha is listening. It's Hillary who isn't listening.

What I want this Christmas season is an antiwar Democrat to step forward to challenge Hillary Clinton in New York's upcoming primary for senate. And I want a powerful antiwar Democrat to oppose her for the presidential nomination in 2008.

Pollster John Zogby believes that a credible progressive Democrat will challenge Hillary for the presidency in 2008: "There will be an antiwar candidate," predicts Zogby. "That's what the base demands."

Hillary's letter ended with a P.S.: "Please return your completed survey with a generous contribution within 10 days."

I immediately returned the survey...with the word "IRAQ" scrawled across it in marker. But there was no "generous contribution." I'm keeping my checkbook open for candidates ready to challenge Bush's extreme agenda, at home and in Iraq -- and to challenge Hillary as well.

[Jeff Cohen (www.jeffcohen.org) is a media critic and author.]

What's more disturbing about Hilary's go-go show is that Biz Markie is going to DJ for her. Et tu, Biz? Another childhood hero of mine, tarnished forever. And he says she's just a friend...

Sorry, Bob, but you're caught off base again.

The main slogan of the NYC action was 'The World Still says No to the War', and nearly everyone called it an antiwar rally called by an antiwar coalition.

Now maybe you think it makes sense to have two national mobilizations within weeks of each other, equally targetting the two parties. Most folks though it made more sense to focus on the guy who was the actual commander-in-chief of the war, rather than the one waiting in the wings.

UFPJ and others did get nearly 5000 out to a week-long counter-conference during the Dem convention in Boston, but, as you'll recall, some folks tried a mobilization there but didn't do to well.

Part of good politics is planning for what your people at the base actually WANT to do, not what you think they OUGHT to do.

Moreover, the NYC rally was hardly a Kerry love fest. Here's the Boston Globe's piece on it. these folks don't sound very 'demobilized' to me.

Perhaps you should look at it another way, Bob. Folks with your perspective corraled themselves into a 'left' cul-de-sac, and when the mass of activists decided not to follow your game plan, but did something you disapproved of instead, you try to shift the blame for your own isolation. Just because people didn't mobilize the way you wanted them to doesn't mean they didn't mobilize or were 'demobilized.'

Here's the piece:

Hundreds of Thousands March Against Bush, War

by Raja Mishra and Tatsha Robertson,
The Boston Globe

August 30th, 2004

NEW YORK -- As Republicans began converging on the city to renominate a wartime president, the largest protest ever at a political convention was staged yesterday in Manhattan, a largely peaceful march against President Bush and the Iraq war that underscored the deep divisions within the nation as the fall campaign approaches.

Five weeks after the Democratic convention in Boston, the antiwar protest in steamy Manhattan presaged a bitter contest between Bush and John F. Kerry and between two competing visions of America's role in the world after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The Republican National Convention opens tonight, and Bush accepts the party's nomination Thursday, marking the start of the final two months of campaigning before the Nov. 2 election.

Estimates of how many participated in the protest march neared 400,000 people, with the procession stretching for miles. But little of the predicted violence and unrest materialized. About 200 people were arrested, some for blocking roadways, others for assaulting police. The marchers followed a plan set by New York officials, snaking along a horseshoe-shaped route through New York's cordoned-off streets, then peacefully dispersing at the end.

Anger at Bush pervaded the gathering. Some signs read ''Bush lied, thousands died" and ''Bush: Empty Warhead." Protesters defaced photos of Bush and poked fun at his family and upbringing. ''No more years," many chanted.

Meanwhile, in hotels and ballrooms across the city, Bush's supporters prepared for their weeklong political celebration of his four years in the White House.

The gathering was expected to be the largest protest during the four-day convention. ''It was the largest demonstration since the war began; we feel like we succeeded in combating the rhetoric the Republicans will be issuing from the convention," said Bob Wing, national cochairman of United for Peace and Justice, which organized the protest.

The assemblage, marching in the sweltering August heat, took nearly five hours to file past Madison Square Garden, the convention site in midtown Manhattan. New York police, in keeping with recent policy, refused to offer a crowd estimate. Protest organizers boasted 400,000 people, and several police officers on the scene said there seemed to be more than the predicted 250,000.

Previously, the largest protest at a national party convention occurred the day before Republicans met in Philadelphia in 2000, when 12,000 leftists marched for various causes. In 1968, the raucous protests at the Democratic convention in Chicago involved up to several thousand demonstrators.

Yesterday, opposition to the US occupation of Iraq was the day's overwhelming theme, beginning in the morning, when the march's lead organizer, Leslie Cagan, told the gathering: ''We want the troops brought home now. Not tomorrow, not next week. Now."

Earlier this month, Republican operatives said they would seek to link any protest violence with Kerry, the Democratic nominee. But Kerry's campaign has distanced itself from the protests, which began Thursday.

Many protesters expressed disdain for Kerry's refusal to denounce the invasion of Iraq, and said they would not vote for him. A sign at the head of the march offered a twist on Kerry's famous denunciation three decades ago of the Vietnam War, saying: ''How do you ask a soldier to be the last person to die for a lie?" Organizers said the sign was meant to warn Kerry that many considered his vote for the Iraq war a betrayal of his past.

Most protesters were white, although other racial and ethnic groups were represented, and they ranged from grandmothers to schoolchildren. The protesters came from all over the nation, as well as Canada and several European countries. New York, a majority Democratic state, was heavily represented.

''Bush has been disastrous for our country, especially the arrogance of his foreign policy," said Sean T. O'Connor, 33, of the Bronx, whose stepfather was killed on the plane that hit the Pentagon on Sept. 11. ''He's fighting wars we don't need to fight."

Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said, ''For most Americans, those out on the street today represent a viewpoint that is outside of the mainstream."

But recent polls have indicated that a majority of Americans think the Iraq invasion was a mistake, with an even larger percentage skeptical about the prospects for peace in the country.

The march began on 24th Street and proceeded north on Seventh Avenue. When demonstrators reached Madison Square Garden, they cheered and jeered at onlookers standing on the steps of the arena. But tension expected at that moment did not materialize. Many protesters had said they would march north to Central Park, where they were not permitted to rally, but a wall of police officers barricaded the street, forcing them to turn away.

''It's been very peaceful," Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Browne said. ''We all along felt that if there was any vandalism, it would be from small groups not connected to the marchers."

Many protesters said they were drawn to the demonstration because of their dislike of Bush, but they seemed mostly indifferent about Kerry, who has pledged to keep American troops in Iraq, at least in the short-term.

''I think he will get over that," said Igor Bobrowsky, a former Marine who served in the Vietnam War and received two Purple Hearts. ''I think he should look back at his testimony in 1971 when he asked, 'How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam?' I think he should now ask how many men will be the last to die for a lie."

Kerry's statement in 1971 was, ''How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"

Philip Greenspan, 78, of Spring Valley, N.Y., flashed a thumbs-down when asked whether he would back Kerry. ''He's worse than Bush. He wants to bring in more troops," Greenspan said. ''I'm not going to vote for anybody. No matter who wins, the same policies will be implemented."

Near Madison Square Garden, about 200 Bush supporters gathered to respond to the marchers.

''They're a bunch of left-wing pinko communists, and that is about as blunt as I can get," said Ruben Israel, 43, who had traveled from Los Angeles.

Hundreds of Massachusetts residents participated in the antiwar march. Alexis Sullivan of Somerville wore pink sunglasses and a long, pink nightgown with the words ''Pink Slip Bush" as she marched with pink-clad women from the antiwar group CODEPINK, chanting, ''Hey hey, ho ho, George Bush has got to go!"

well done to the people putting this action together. what a politcally excellent idea to clarify both h. clinton and the crowbar's position on the war in iraq. cuts right through the fat of their positions. how do groups go about endorsing?

cliff willmeng
labor's militant voice

NO regrets, Hillary????...you will if you are depending on my vote

Why would she campaign in Chicago for her reelection campaign in New York? It doesn't make any sense.

You aren't honestly comparing Hilary Clinton to Hitler... that makes me sick.

thats a pretty picture i love it

"Why would she campaign in Chicago for her reelection campaign in New York? It doesn't make any sense."

To raise money for her 2008 run for the Oval Office. This is part of a national fundraising tour by "Friends of Hillary".

Since Carl D. has posted extensively on this thread, and in light of the focus of the parent article, perhaps he could comment on whether Chicagoans Against War and Injustice actually intend to endorse the anti-war protest against Clinton?

Now that some Democrats are finally speaking out against the administration's phony claims about Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction," conservative talk show hosts, columnists and bloggers have been dredging up scores of pre-invasion quotes by Democratic leaders citing non-existent Iraqi WMDs.

These defenders of the administration keep asking the question, "If President Bush lied, does that mean that the Democrats lied too?" The answer, unfortunately, is a qualified "yes." Based on my conversations with Democratic members of Congress and their staffs in the weeks and months leading up to the invasion, there is reason to believe that at least some in the leadership of the Democratic Party is also guilty of having misled the American public regarding the supposed threat emanating from Iraq. At minimum, it could be considered criminal negligence.

As a result, though the Republicans have undoubtedly been hurt by their false statements on the subject, the Democrats are not likely to reap much benefit.

It did not have to be that way. Indeed, given the number of academics, former arms inspectors, strategic analysts, and others (me included) who had warned these Capitol Hill Democrats well prior to the October 2002 vote authorizing the invasion of Iraq that the Bush administration's WMD claims were not to be taken seriously, they have no one to blame but themselves. As a result of the Democrats choosing to disingenuously repeat these false claims of a supposed Iraqi threat in order to justify their vote to give President George W. Bush unprecedented war powers, Republicans are now able to portray the administration's lies simply as honest mistakes.

It is certainly true that the Bush administration pressured members of the intelligence community to come up with data that would support their claims that Iraq was somehow a military threat to the United States and that they presented highly-selective and exaggerated "evidence" to Democratic lawmakers. It is also true that Republicans in Congress have blocked demands by some Democrats that a serious investigation be undertaken regarding the manipulation of intelligence regarding Iraq's military capability.

However, there was enough counter-evidence published in reputable journals, United Nations reports, policy briefs from independent think tanks, and even from within the State Department and CIA that should have made it possible for the Democrats to have seen through the Bush administration's lies if they wanted to. And there is some evidence to suggest that they didn't want to: for example, Senator Joseph Biden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate International Relations Committee, teamed up with his Republican counterparts to prevent those challenging Bush administration WMD claims prior to the invasion from testifying.

It should also be remembered that it was the Clinton administration, not the current administration, which first insisted-despite the lack of evidence-that Iraq had successfully concealed or re-launched its chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons programs. Clinton's fear-mongering around Iraqi WMDs began in 1997, several years after they had been successfully destroyed or rendered inoperable. Based upon the alleged Iraqi threat, Clinton ordered a massive four-day bombing campaign against Iraq in December 1998, forcing the evacuation of inspectors from the United Nations Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) and the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA.) As many of us had warned just prior to the bombing, this gave Saddam Hussein the opportunity to refuse to allow the inspectors to return. It also provided a "lesson" that unilateral military action, not nonviolent law-based processes through inter-governmental organizations, was the means to respond to the threat of WMD proliferation.

Clinton was egged on to take such unilateral military action by leading Senate Democratic leaders -- including then-Minority Leader Tom Daschle, John Kerry, Carl Levin, and others who signed a letter in October 1998 -- urging the president "to take necessary actions, including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspected Iraqi sites, to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs." Meanwhile, Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was repeatedly making false statements regarding Iraq's supposed possession of WMDs, even justifying the enormous humanitarian toll from the U.S.-led economic sanctions on Iraq on the grounds that "Saddam Hussein has . . . chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction."

Congressional Democrats continued their efforts to scare the American people into believing the Iraq was a threat to U.S. national security after President Bush came to office. Connecticut senator Joseph Leiberman sent a letter to President Bush in December 2001 declaring that "There is no doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs" and that Iraq's "biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status." Eight months later, in order to frighten the American people into supporting a U.S. takeover of that oil-rich land, the 2000 Democratic Party vice-presidential nominee even claimed "Every day Saddam remains in power with chemical weapons, biological weapons, and the development of nuclear weapons is a day of danger for the United States."

Even after the International Atomic Energy Agency declared, after more than one thousand unannounced inspections throughout Iraq during the 1990s, that Iraq no longer had a nuclear program and despite the 2001 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that confirmed there was no evidence that such work had resumed, Democratic Senator Jay Rockefeller declared "There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons." President Bush has since used the irresponsible rhetoric of the junior senator from West Virginia -- now the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee -- to discredit Congressional opponents of the war, citing this quote in his recent speech at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska.

During the fall of 2002, in an effort to counter the efforts of those of us questioning the Bush administration's WMD claims, congressional Democrats redoubled their efforts to depict Saddam Hussein as a threat to America's national security. Democrats controlled the Senate at that point and could have blocked President Bush's request for the authority to invade Iraq. However, in October, the majority of Democratic senators, led by Majority Leader Daschle and assistant Majority leader Harry Reid, voted to authorize President Bush to invade Iraq at the time and circumstances of his own choosing on the grounds that Iraq "poses a continuing threat to the national security of the United States … by … among other things, continuing to possess and develop a significant chemical and biological weapons capability, [and] actively seeking a nuclear weapons capability."

In a Senate speech defending his vote to authorize Bush to launch an invasion, Senator Kerry categorically declared, despite the lack of any credible evidence, that "Iraq has chemical and biological weapons" and even alleged that most elements of Iraq's chemical and biological weapons programs were "larger and more advanced than they were before the Gulf War." Furthermore, Kerry asserted that Iraq was "attempting to develop nuclear weapons," backing up this accusation by falsely claiming that "all U.S. intelligence experts agree" with that assessment. The Massachusetts junior senator also alleged that "Iraq is developing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) capable of delivering chemical and biological warfare agents [that] could threaten Iraq's neighbors as well as American forces in the Persian Gulf." Though it soon became evident that none of Kerry's allegations were true, the Democratic Party still decided to reward him in 2004 with its nomination for president.

Kerry supporters claim he was not being dishonest in making these false claims but that he had been fooled by "bad intelligence" passed on by the Bush administration. However, well before Kerry's vote to authorize the invasion, former UN inspector Scott Ritter personally told the senator and his senior staff that claims about Iraq still having WMDs or WMD programs were not based on valid intelligence. According to Ritter, "Kerry knew that there was a verifiable case to be made to debunk the president's statements regarding the threat posed by Iraq's WMDs, but he chose not to act on it."

Joining Kerry in voting to authorize the invasion was North Carolina Senator John Edwards, who-in the face of growing public skepticism of the Bush administration's WMD claims-rushed to the president's defense in an op-ed article published in the Washington Post. In his commentary, Edwards claimed that Iraq was "a grave and growing threat" and that Congress should therefore "endorse the use of all necessary means to eliminate the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction." The Bush administration was so impressed with Edwards' arguments that they posted the article on the State Department website. Again, despite the fact that Edwards' claims were completely groundless, the Democratic Party rewarded him less than two years later with its nomination for vice president.

By 2004, it was recognized that the administration's WMD claims were bogus and the war was not going well. The incumbent president and vice president, who had misled the nation into a disastrous war through phony claims of an Iraqi military threat, were therefore quite vulnerable to losing the November election. But instead of nominating candidates who opposed the war and challenged these false WMD claims, the Democrats chose two men who had also misled the nation into war by frightening the American public into believing that a war-ravaged Third World country on the far side of the planet threatened our nation's security and advocated continued prosecution of the bloody counter-insurgency campaign resulting from the U.S. invasion and occupation. Though enormous sums of money and volunteer hours which could have gone into anti-war organizing instead went into the campaigns of these pro-invasion senators, many anti-war activists refused on principle to support them. Not surprisingly, the Democrats lost.

Kerry's failure to tell the truth continues to hurt the anti-war movement, as President Bush to this day quotes Kerry's false statements about Iraq's pre-invasion military capability as a means of covering up for the lies of his administration. For example, in his recent Veteran's Day speech in Pennsylvania in which he attacked the anti-war movement, President Bush was able to say, "Many of these critics supported my opponent during the last election, who explained his position to support the resolution in the Congress this way: 'When I vote to give the President of the United States the authority to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein, it is because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a threat, and a grave threat, to our security'."

Despite the consequences of putting forth nominees who failed to tell the truth about Iraq's WMD capabilities, current polls show that New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who also made false claims about the alleged Iraqi threat, is the front-runner for the Democratic Party nomination for president in 2008. In defending her vote authorizing President Bush to invade Iraq, Ms. Clinton claimed that "if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."

In his Veteran's Day speech, Bush was able to deny any wrongdoing by his administration by noting how "more than a hundred Democrats in the House and the Senatewho had access to the same intelligencevoted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power." If the Democrats had instead decided to be honest and take a critical look at the phony intelligence being put forward by the administration, they would have said what so many of us were saying at the time: it was highly unlikely that Iraq still had such weapons. Instead, by also making false claims about Iraqi WMD capability, it not only resulted in their failure to re-take the House and Senate in the 2004 elections, but they have effectively shielded the Bush administration from the consequences of its actions.

Even some prominent congressional Democrats who did not vote to authorize the invasion were willing to defend the Bush administration's WMD claims. When House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi appeared on NBC's Meet the Press in December 2002, she claimed: "Saddam Hussein certainly has chemical and biological weapons. There is no question about that." Despite repeated requests for information, made by me and other San Francisco constituents, her staff has been unwilling to reveal what led the Democratic leader to make such a groundless claim with such certitude.

The consequence of these Democrats' actions go well beyond their losses in the 2004 election. If the Democrats had been honest and acknowledged that there was no proof to support Bush administration claims of a reconstituted Iraqi WMD program, the Republicans would have been exposed as deliberately misleading the country into war, thereby making it far more difficult for them to get away with the kind of fear-mongering which threaten further U.S. military interventions in the region and increased waste of our nation's resources into paying for bloated military budgets at the expense of pressing human needs at home. Instead, the prospects of a less militaristic foreign policy and the promises of a post-Cold War "peace dividend" may have been lost for the foreseeable future.

Some Democrats have defended their pre-invasion claims by citing the public summary of the 2002 NIE which appeared to confirm some of the Bush administration's claims. However, there were a number of reasons to have been skeptical: this NIE was compiled in a much shorter time frame than is normally provided for such documents and the report expressed far more certainty regarding Iraq's WMD capabilities than all reports from the previous five years despite the lack of additional data to justify such a shift. When the report was released, there was much stronger dissent within the intelligence community than about any other NIE in history and the longer classified version, which was available to every member of Congress, included these dissenting voices from within the intelligence community

Others have defended the Democrats by saying that if they had insisted on hard evidence to support the administration's WMD claims they would have been accused of being weak on national defense. This excuse has little merit, however, since Republicans accuse Democrats of being weak on defense whatever they do. For example, even though congressional Democrats voted nearly unanimously to grant President Bush extraordinary war powers immediately following the Sept. 11 attacks and strongly supported the bombing of Afghanistan, this did not prevent the White House from falsely accusing Democrats of calling for "moderation and restraint" towards the Al-Qaeda terrorists and offering "therapy and understanding for our attackers." Similarly, even though 2004 Democratic presidential nominee Kerry defended America's right to unilaterally invade foreign countries in violation of the United Nations Charter and basic international legal standards, President Bush still accused him of believing that "in order to defend ourselves, we'd have to get international approval."

In reality, it appears that the Democrats were as enthusiastic about the United States invading and occupying Iraq as were the Republicans and that the WMD claims were largely a means of scaring the American public into accepting the right of the United States to effectively renounce 20th century international legal norms in favor of the right of conquest. Indeed, Senators Kerry, Edwards, and Clinton all subsequently stated that they would have voted to authorize the invasion even if they knew Iraq did not have WMDs (though, in response to popular pressure, they have begun to express some doubts in recent weeks.) Given their apparent eagerness for an excuse to go to war in order to take over that oil-rich nation, they seem to have been willing to believe virtually anything the Bush administration said and dismiss the concerns of independent strategic analysts who saw through the falsehoods.

This may help explain why congressional Democrats had been so reluctant, until faced with enormous pressure from their constituents following the Libby indictments, to push for a serious inquiry regarding the Bush administration misleading the American public on Iraqi WMDs: the Democrats are guilty as well. It may also explain why pro-Democratic newspapers such as the New York Times and Washington Post were so unwilling to publicize the Downing Street memos and so belittled efforts by the handful of conscientious Democrats, such as Michigan Representative John Conyers, to uncover WMD deceptions. Such failures have led both newspapers' ombudsmen to issue rare rebukes.

Even after it has become apparent that the Bush administration had been dishonest regarding Iraq's alleged threat, Democrats still seem unwilling to take a more skeptical view of administration claims regarding alleged WMD threats from overseas. For example, congressional Democrats have overwhelmingly voted in favor of legislation targeting Syria and Iran based primarily on dubious claims by the Bush administration of these countries' military capabilities and alleged threats to American security interests. Given that the vast majority of Democrats who hyped false WMD claims regarding Iraq were re-elected in 2004 anyway, they apparently believe that they have little to lose by again reinforcing the administration's alarmist claims of threats to U.S. national security.

Perhaps we need to prove them wrong. The United States will almost certainly find itself in another war based on phony claims that the targeted country possesses WMDs unless members of Congress know there will be political consequences to their actions. As a result, in order to advance the cause of peace and a responsible foreign policy, it may be necessary to target all members of Congress up for re-election next year who made false statements regarding Iraq's WMD capabilities - both Republican and Democrat - for defeat.

Stephen Zunes is a professor of Politics and the author of "Tinderbox: U.S. Middle East Policy and the Roots of Terrorism" (Common Courage Press, 2003). He is Middle East editor for Foreign Policy in Focus www.fpif.org, where some segments of this article first appeared.

Goddam, Stephen Zunes do you really expect me to read all that crap word for word?

can you make it a just a little shorter

Further chastising of the Senator check here: hrw.org/english/docs/2005/11/23/isrlpa12086_txt.htm

You can put my name down as endorsing it for sure, but I imagine the pix of Hilary in the Hitler suit would be off-putting, justifably, to more than a few in our ranks. Not much time for us to discuss it. I'll post it to our list, but to get the most bang for the buck, I'd approach Code Pink, one of our close allies. This sort of thing is right up their alley -- with the caveat that the focus is on Hillary and her defense of the war, and doesn't get too wacko.

Comparing hillary to hitler?

Thats insulting to the 20 million russians that died defeating that son-of-a-bitch, as well as the millions of others whose life he took.

This is indicative of what I see as a MAJOR problem with the contemporary left in the US...the "hitlery" campaign goes back many years in far right wing (aka militia circles)...

many elements of the left are so eager to secure "allies" or "broaden the base" they'll jump on any oppositioist bandwagon that rolls along.... even if they've got brown shirts underneath their jackets...go check out the forums at nat. vanguard, stormfront, etc. they know excactly what they're doing...many on the left do not

Beautiful. I am in receipt today of a mailing from the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign. This is different from the letter she sent out by e-mail in a rush. I don't know who got the e-mail. She announces it is 1,600 words long. That much of her sentences could end reading. The letter I got is more than a dead dry political mailing. I found it such compelling reading that I drop everything and share with you promptly and thus prominently.

It is a four-page questionnaire with the headline, "2005 Critical National Issues Survey." I thought that this was about the more than 2,000 dead in Iraq. Not even close. I read on, thinking that the pamphlet might tell me what Hillary stands for, as she is pretty much a blank thus far.

The questionnaire begins with a statement that we can't let Republican political attacks distract Hillary from her efforts in the Senate to address the critical issues our nation needs to address. Then there is the normal space for contributions by check or credit card. The amounts are from $25 to $100 and "other." Fine so far.

Here are the critical issues:
"Economy/jobs. Environment. Social Security/Medicare. Education. Homeland Security. Health Care. Tax Cuts. Reproductive Rights. Separation of Church and State."

Absolutely marvelous. Nothing about Iraq. Or the life and death of young Americans in Iraq. Or troop withdrawals from Iraq.

I go through the rest of the pamphlet.

"How concerned are you that President Bush is not doing enough to get Americans back to work, create more jobs and get the economy moving again?

"How concerned are you that the massive budget deficits caused by Republican economic and tax policies will inevitably result in drastic cuts in Social Security, Medicare, education and social services?"

Absolutely beautiful!

There are, as stated earlier, now more than 2,000 young Americans who have died in Iraq. She wants to be a candidate for president and she doesn't even mention our dead, or our next dead.

Wait. Here is question 9:

"How concerned are you that the administration's unilateral policies have reduced our number of allies and endangered our national security?"

How absolutely marvelous!

"It depends on what your definition of 'is' is," her husband said when he was questioned about rolling around on the office carpet with a young office worker.

And she not only copies, but clearly surpasses. She deals with something important.

Hillary Clinton today holds the new North American record for fakery.

She copies. She sneaks and slithers past you with her opinion on a war that kills every day.

Hillary Clinton is in favor of the war and of executions. Sensational!

The other day, when Rep. John Murtha of Johnstown, Pa., called for a withdrawal from Iraq, and obviously did so with half the Pentagon behind him, Hillary said, no, we shouldn't pull out at this time. Oh, it would cause so much violence.

We must stay. It takes a national Alzheimer's for her to be able to try to get away with things like this.

If Hillary Clinton wants this war to go on, then she should send her daughter to fight in Iraq.

We have had in New York as United States senators, Robert F. Kennedy, Jacob Javits and Daniel Moynihan.

We now have Hillary Clinton blowing on her fingers as she goes about cracking the combination to another safe. If the one hand glistens, it is from the wedding ring that she has used to hypnotize the public so far. Beautiful.

I am going to ride to the Crobar with my Critical Mass bike/sound trailer and protest Hillary's
hawkish support of the Iraq war.

If anybody wants to join in or is planning their own protest action, please drop me a note at speedebikes at gmail dot com.

Her gig is from 8-11 pm. I'm thinking that I'll eat dinner at the Handlebar
www.handlebarchicago.com/ on North Avenue from about 5 to 6 pm and then ride over to the Crobar and see what is going on over there.

I expect that people will be arriving and perhaps even be standing in line starting around 6:30. Most likely I'll just crank up some anti Iraq war tunes and proceed to do slow passes up and down the street immediately in front of the Crobar. I also hope to rig up bright lights and a large poster.

if anyone from the dupage area is headin up there could you possibly give me a ride?? just email if anyone can cycoinfo (at) aol.com

We urge you to brave the predicted snow fall today and please join us for the protest outlined below. When ISM-Chicago voted to endorse this demonstration-we did so to call attention to the fact that she supports the Israeli Apartheid Wall and repression of Palestinians. We also oppose her support U.S. terrorism against the Iraqi people. Today there are certain individuals affiliated with one specific coalition calling for this to be a single issue (Iraq) protest. We strongly oppose this! We call for ALL PALESTINE SOLIDARITY ACTIVISTS to bring posters related to Palestine and Palestinian flags to keep the issue of Palestine in this action.
**************************************************
We are opposed to any signage comparing Clinton with Hitler and view this behahior as counter-productive

this is the report from the morning action

We'll be there.

Most folks accept the “butterfly effect” cliché: that if a butterfly flaps its wings in Tokyo, it could help cause a hurricane to intensify or dissipate in the Gulf of Mexico or wherever. So grant for a second that it might matter a _little_ who’s in the White House. Not much: but a little. Part of tonight’s protest outside the Crobar in Chicago was an attempt to get the Democrats to pick someone other than Hillary Clinton as their nominee. Or at least grant that some people were actually there, in part, for that purpose. That’s certainly how the protest was billed, anyway.

The way to get Sen. Clinton to lose her Democratic front-runner status was to convince people outside our ranks – whether across the street heading in to the fundraiser or at home watching us on TV – _not to support her_. Our two best arguments were that 1) it matters who the Democrat candidate is (i.e. don’t back a pro-war candidate) and 2) if Clinton won the nomination we would lead regular Americans to defeat her in November (i.e. don’t back a loser).

We got that message out okay in maybe the first 30 minutes of the protest during which most of the press (but not most of the fundraiser attendees) came by. During these thirty minutes the rich Dems across the street seemed a bit cowed – at least they weren’t defiantly and happily jeering back at us – some of them were ashamed or doubtful, and clearly less likely, hearing our message, to sign up for "Hillary’s" campaign or put that much extra into the campaign hat when passed.

But then folks (either megaphoning their personal politics out as the views of the entire protest or drowning us all out with catchy alternative chants) effectively changed the protest's message along sectarian lines, establishing for all and sundry that we were there not to protest Hillary but rather Democrats in particular, and in general anyone who thinks it matters who’s in the White House. And we started to get folks across the street waving and jeering happily back. We’d switched the points we were making about Clinton (when we were still talking about her at all) to: 1) let a pro-war candidate win the primary if you want to – who cares who wins? and 2): Clinton’s not a loser because the only people who came out to protest her weren’t going to vote anyway.

Which is probably true: I personally tend not to vote for Democrats. But did we have to let the folks across the street in on that little fact? Now, the event organizers got us there saying it did matter who wins the election. Perhaps they had forgotten that it mattered by the time we arrived. Or maybe we were misdirected a little, in a good cause.

On the other hand we could have misdirected the Democrats across the street, letting them think that maybe we and Americans like us were a threat at the ballot box. But these rich Dems we chose not to misdirect (though they deserved it) but to educate about radical politics. We told them about the triviality of national elections and the importance of “getting in the street” like us – a message they were maybe less likely to resonate with than, say, people passing by on any other street in the city tonight, or on any other night?

It wasn’t just the speakers, of course: The anarchists were there playing the part of slender frat boys, drumming and chanting (occasionally over speakers like Mr. Torres) and dancing for the cameras in their costumes – in the spirit of Emma Goldman’s immortal words: “You gotta fight! For your right! To paaaaar-ty!” (I’m a sort of anarchist myself, actually, or at least I think I am: and I like dancing too, just like Emma: but she never said it was more important to dance than to tell folks about a war criminal running for President: she never said you couldn’t stop dancing and drumming long enough to, maybe, help defeat that criminal. She never said you had to have a party at every demo or else stay home. She really didn’t.)

There were two audiences there that night: us and the folks across the street. We focused _entirely_ on how we looked to us. Building and educating and energizing our own movement to resist the Democrats if they get control – _if_ they get control - that is of course very important. But this was not the time or the place to focus entirely on that, as we did during the latter part of the protest when most of the Dems walked by. If we wanted to focus on energizing ourselves, we could have done it _anywhere_, and if we’d done it where actual working people were walking by we might have actually converted some of them to a hard left way of thinking! There were clearly enough of us at the protest actually concerned about the Clinton campaign that we could have had an effect on it left alone to do so. But we brought a different message to a place where the passers-by couldn't possibly listen to it, and a place where (because campaigns and fundraisers “don’t matter”) we wouldn’t have any special effect even if they listened.

In short, many of us chose a campaign fundraiser for our protest _not_ because we thought campaigns are important: but because we’re so contemptuous of people who think they are: and because that provided the contrast we wanted to see between our virtuous selves and the corrupt folks across the street. And they had to be pretty corrupt indeed for us to look good in contrast.

Hillary Clinton is anything but pro-war.

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