Sunshine Patriots Better Start Realize It's Raining

A little while ago, after I remained less than impressed with John Edwards' now-famous "I was wrong" op-ed in the pro-war WaPo, (re-printed in the extended entry) Thomas made the following incisive point in the comments:

No one can make anyone forgive and forget, and no one should have to forgive and forget.  But if that's where you're coming from, nothing Edwards could say would ever change your mind anyway.

That observation comes to my mind whenever I stop by the Edwards campaign site or when I read one of the emails that remind me to go over there to see what's happening with his drive for '08.   I want to be a forgiving person.   Now, finally, after watching Jim Wallis and a hundred other people who are apalled by the immorality of the current regime get arrested for performing an act of civil disobedience, I finally know what Edwards - and any DLC Dem who wants my support - needs to do to make me believe that they are serious about opposing this illegal regime at every sickening turn: they have to spend some time in jail. 

Undoubtedly, there are real risks to civil disobedience.  For the average person it means, among other sacrifices, fines and time lost from work.  In the current climate, it may mean something even worse like longer incarceration and becoming the subject of secret, illegal surveillance.  It may mean subjecting friends and family to that surveillance and worse.  The fact is that we don't know what Team BushCo is capable of, although we can guess that nothing is out of bounds.  But these are not the concerns of John Edwards and other politicians.  The biggest risk for a politician is that his/her political enemies can frame the act as a stunt.  Forgive me if I cry no tears.  Hire a good PR team and figure out how to blunt that attack. 

I'm tired of being asked to understand why that, when our country is being dragged down the dark path to fascism and while we are losing a class war the likes of which I've only read about,  politicans who want to claim that they represent and support me, don't have the courage to actually do that. 

A Special Message from John Edwards

I was wrong.

I wrote these words about my vote to authorize the Iraq war in a Washington Post op-ed piece and I want to share my views with you as well.

Almost three years ago, we went into Iraq to remove what we were told — and many of us believed and argued — was a threat to America. But in fact we now know that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction when our forces invaded Iraq in 2003. The intelligence was deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda.

It was a mistake to vote for this war in 2002. I take responsibility for that mistake. It has been hard to say these words because those who didn't make a mistake — the men and women of our armed forces and their families — have performed heroically and paid a very dear price. It is not right, just or fair that we made a mistake, but they pay for that mistake.

The world desperately needs moral leadership from America, and the foundation for moral leadership is telling the truth.

While we can't change the past, we need to accept responsibility because a key part of restoring America's moral leadership is acknowledging when we've made mistakes or been proven wrong -- and to show that we have the creativity and guts to make it right.

The argument for going to war with Iraq was based on intelligence that we now know was inaccurate. The information the American people were hearing from the President — and that I was being told by our intelligence community — wasn't the whole story. Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war.

George Bush won't accept responsibility for his mistakes. Along with Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, he has made horrible mistakes at almost every step: twisting intelligence to fit their pre-conceived views about Iraq's threat; failed diplomacy; not going in with enough troops; not giving our forces the equipment they need; not having a plan for peace.

Because of these failures, Iraq is a mess and has become a far greater threat than it actually ever was. It is now a haven for terrorists, and our presence there is draining the goodwill that our country once enjoyed, diminishing our global standing. It has made fighting the global war against terrorist organizations more difficult, not less.

The urgent question isn't how we got here, but what we do now. We have to give our troops a way to end their mission honorably. That means leaving behind a success, not a failure.

What is success? I don't think it is Iraq as a Jeffersonian democracy. I think it is an Iraq that is relatively stable, largely self-sufficient, comparatively open and free, and in control of its own destiny.

A plan for success needs to focus on three interlocking objectives: reducing American presence; building Iraq's capacity; and getting other countries to meet their responsibilities to help.

First, we need to remove the image of the imperialist America from the landscape of Iraq. American contractors who have taken unfair advantage of the turmoil in Iraq need to leave Iraq. If that means Halliburton subsidiary, KBR, then KBR should go. Such departures, and the return of the work to Iraqi businesses, would be a real statement about our hopes for the new nation.

We also need to show Iraq and the world that we will not stay there forever. We've reached the point where the large number of our troops in Iraq hurts, not helps, our goals. Therefore, early next year, after the Iraqi elections and a new government has been created, we should begin the redeployment of a significant number of troops out of Iraq. This should be the beginning of a gradual process to reduce our presence and change the shape of our military's deployment in Iraq.

Most of these troops should come from National Guard or Reserve forces. That will still leave us with enough military capability, combined with better trained Iraqis, to fight terrorists and continue to help the Iraqis develop a stable country.

Second, this redeployment should work in concert with a more effective training program for Iraqi forces. We should implement a clear plan for training and hard deadlines for certain benchmarks to be met. To increase incentives, we should implement a schedule outlining that as we certify that Iraqi troops are trained and equipped, a proportional number of U.S. troops will withdraw.

Third, we must launch a serious diplomatic process that brings the world into this effort. We should bring Iraq's neighbors and our key European allies into a diplomatic process to get Iraq on its feet. It's not just in America's security interest for Iraq to succeed, but the world's — and the President needs to create a unified international front.

Too many mistakes have already been made to make this easy. Yet we must take these steps to succeed. The American people, the Iraqi people and — most importantly — our troops who have died or been injured there and those who are fighting there today deserve nothing less.

America's leaders — all of us — need to accept the responsibility we each carry for how we got to this place. Over 2,000 Americans have lost their lives in this war; and over 150,000 are fighting there today. They and their families deserve honesty from our country's leaders. And they also deserve a clear plan for a way out.

John

Comments

[DavidByron]

Good point.