2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumA gargantuan elephant in the room is that Iraq War vote
where the old "experience" argument, as it related to the "YES" votes, went from meaningless to apocalyptic. Many of us won`t live long enough to see the final results of that disastrous vote, the "Shock and Awe" campaign the hawks were so proud of. Back then, a YES vote, coupled with a made-in-China flag pin, and you were an automatic patriot.
That YES vote has cost this country dearly. Go sit in any waiting room of any VA hospital and the results of that vote will smack you right in the face. It won`t be so easy for you to say how worth it the multiple deployments were, the lives lost or maimed, the money spent, the principles sacrificed. You`ll learn about hopping on one foot, or riding because of no feet, you`ll see young men and women tremble, struggle, cry, fight back anger. You`ll see family members devastated by the physical, emotional and financial costs.
Today`s Washington mood includes familiar taunts about experience, about weakness, about making the sands glow, about carpet bombing. Similar also are the warnings about "them", "those others", folks we need to see as our enemy.
For me, this election is, in part, about helping every last veteran who needs help and insisting that our political "leaders" take immediate and permanent responsibility for each and every life their vote impacted. My dream is that every person in Congress who votes YES for war be required to go to the front lines or send a family member to do so.
I`ll vote judgement over experience any day.
daleanime
(17,796 posts)VulgarPoet
(2,872 posts)I've said it before, and I'll say it again-- Hillary is a neocon of the highest order. Her actions regarding Iraq, Syria, and Libya paint a better picture than any one of her twittering sycophants possibly could. And if neoconservatism is the future of the democratic party, it is a party I'm better off leaving.
Motown_Johnny
(22,308 posts)It proves that her judgement has not improved any.
As far as foreign policy is concerned, she seems to be our version of John McCain. I honestly can't think of any military conflict that she has not supported.
How sad is that?
Rosa Luxemburg
(28,627 posts)and despite what Hillary says she can't blame Bush and Cheney for her vote.
Fumesucker
(45,851 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)sell that war to Americans, especially Democratic Americans.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12776532
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)I'm still disgusted that the Dem Establishment has thrown the anti-war activists and Occupy Wall Street activists under the bus by lining up behind Hillary.