March 20, 2007


IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY

WHAT WE SHOULD LEARN

There is not much good that will come of this war in Iraq. We're responsible for killing hundreds of thousands of civilians. We've sacrificed members of our own military senselessly. We've left countless others with wounds that they will suffer the rest of their lives. We've destabilized the Middle East. We've run massive deficits that threaten to cripple our economy. The only good that can come from this atrocity is what we can learn from it. Gary Hart writes about it in this article linked at www.huffingtonpost.com:

Do not manufacture justification for invasions. Plan for all eventualities, including the most unpleasant. Do not pay exiles to tell you what you want to hear. Deal honestly with Congress and the American people. Be candid about possible costs in lives and money. And an endless list of common sense, and Constitutional, dos and don'ts.

The second kind of lessons are less obvious and have to do with the new realities of the 21st century:

First, treat jihadist terrorism more like organized crime than traditional warfare. By declaring "war on terrorism" we made the fatal mistake that it could be crushed using conventional warfare and massed armies. We clearly had the legal and moral right to overturn the Taliban government in Afghanistan that harbored al Qaeda as it planned and carried out the 9.11 attacks. Even so, the democratization of an ancient tribal society is proving hugely more difficult than driving the Taliban out of Kabul. Indeed, it seems set on returning.
Instead, we should create NATO II, an organization combining the intelligence services, law enforcement agencies, and special forces of Western democracies to coordinate the crushing of jihadist cells.

SOME "FAMILY VALUES" PARTY

During the Clinton administration Republicans fought against an unpaid family leave bill. The bill allows people to take a certain amount of unpaid leave due to things like a family emergency. Republicans have fought against raising the minimum wage, or the existence of a minimum wage at all. Republicans opposed Social Security back when FDR proposed it. Now Republicans will fight a proposal for a national sick leave bill. The bill would mean sick leave for employees of any company that employees 15 or more people. We'll get the same old excuse from Republicans that it's harmful to small business. Their definition of "small business" might differ from yours and mine. This article by Bob Geiger is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

The Kennedy bill, which applies to companies with 15 or more employees, is a logical follow-up to the minimum wage increase that was passed by the Democratic Congress in their first two months of controlling the agenda on Capitol Hill.

And despite the fact that almost half of all U.S. workers have no paid sick leave -- with 76 percent of the lowest-income workers having no ability to stay home sick without losing income -- Senate Republicans are already signaling that they're willing to fight this at least as strongly as they boycotted raising the minimum wage.

"To extend this type of leave requirement to businesses, as is contemplated by the Healthy Families Act, would be little more than an unfunded mandate on small businesses throughout the country," said Mike Enzi (R-WY), the ranking Republican on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, in hearings last month. "In addition, this legislation represents only direct labor cost, and does not account for a myriad of other indirect costs."