Stay home this weekend if you want the troops to stay in Iraq and Afganistan

[annm4peace]

Every day another person dies in Iraq due to the US being there. Every single day.

Every year we have another march/rally/protest to mark the anniversary and we plead with friends, families, co-workers, and strangers to come out and show the world we want the troops home now.

year 1: they say Saddam had weapons, we have to stay there, I wasn't for invading but we are there now, besides I have to take the kids to soccer practice.
year 2: we have to finish the job or the troops death will be in vain, if we leave there will be a civil war
year 3: once Bush losses the election, Kerry will end the war and bring them home
year 4: We have to stay until it is stable, it is such a mess now, how can we leave
year 5: Bush will be out soon, it is such a mess how can we leave..
year 6: Obama said he would bring them home... he knows we voted him to bring the troops home.
................ year 7: Obama pushes back bringing troops home, wants us there several more years.

3 Trillion dollars on irag... if you don't care, then just stay home this weekend



If not
Here are some links if you don't know where to go:

http://unitedforpeace.org/calendar.php?sortby=&caltype=... =19&ondate=3&ondate=2009&search=Search

and for Veterans (Welcome Home) and those that love them try:
http://www.veteransforpeace.org /


and if you can't get out write Obama and tell him enough, we want the troops home now

http://www.whitehouse.gov/CONTACT/

[EFerrari]

1. K&R

:hi::

[Hoopla Phil]

2. Bring them home NOW!!!

[pleah]

3. K&R END THESE DAMN WARS NOW!

[SmileyRose]

4. I plan to stay home this weekend.

obviously it is because I want more people to die in some middle eastern place and not because my dear husband came home from the hospital today after a 3 month crisis fighting for his life.

My Mom plans to stay home all weekend too. That's also obviously because she wants more deaths in the middle east and has nothing to do with the fact she's a fragile old lady.

One of my neighbors plans to stay home all weekend. She obviously wants a lot of dead people in the middle east. Having worked 14-16 hrs a day 7 days a week at 3 part jobs and finally getting a whole weekend off to spend with her kids has nothing to do with it.

Look, a lot of people want the troops home that aren't going to march/rally/picket on the designated day and time.

[EFerrari]

7. Thanks for the kick!

[SmileyRose]

8. here's another. I want them home too.

the guilt trip in the OP just rubbed me the wrong way.

[EFerrari]

10. I wouldn't read too much into it. Some of us have posted so many of these

threads that WE'RE RUNNING OUT OF FRAMES. How many years? Too many. Too many threads, too.

[Occam Bandage]

5. I don't like when we conflate Iraq and Afghanistan

any more than I did when Bush did. Different wars for different reasons with different goals, different results, a different environment, and different international implications. "We should leave Afghanistan because Iraq was a huge illegal botch job" makes no more sense than "We should should invade Iraq because al-Qaeda attacked us on 9/11"

[LeftyMom]

13. Oh yeah, it's totally different when we destroy one country and kill one people versus another.

Atrocity is atrocity. It's past time to get the fuck out and the historians can quibble about the details later.

[ddeclue]

6. Iraq IS NOT Afghanistan - Afghanistan is justifiable.

and Obama has announced our withdrawal from Iraq so YES I'm STAYING HOME.

:argh:

[Arctic Dave]

9. Way to hold them feet to the fire.

[bottomtheweaver]

16. How?

Seriously.

[elocs]

11. I reject the guilt tripping premise as being false. I'm staying home.

Better luck with it next time.

[Naturyl]

12. Isn't it clear by now that they have no intention of ending this?

This goes on as long as it is profitable. Period.

[MrSlayer]

14. Standing around yelling will do no good.

Protests are a waste of time because they don't give a fuck what you think. There has never been an anti-war protest that did a damn thing to change the minds of the powers that be.

[bottomtheweaver]

15. I think it accomplishes something.

I think we'd have been in Iran two years ago if it weren't for the protests.

[MrSlayer]

17. I don't.

I think we're not in Iran because the PNAC idiots really thought Iraq would be a cakewalk and they got a taste of reality.

[robdogbucky]

18. Thank those selfless millions

that protested the VN war and kept the pressure on that lead to millions marching in nationwide moratoriums that could not be ignored and resulted in effectively shutting down major cities like DC back in '72-'75. F*ck people inconvenienced by the traffic snarls, etc.

Those massive demonstrations most certainly changed the minds of politicians when the handwriting was on the wall that public opinion meant get out of the way if you can't lend a hand, and if you weren't part of the solution you were a part of the problem.

I can always tell when someone either wasn't there or was an active part of the war profiteering and black markets that kept that futile conflict going for years after its shelf life as a "war of containment," had run it course.

History repeats itself for those that don't learn history's lessons.


robdogbucky

[taterguy]

19. That's a rather simplistic view of what happened in Vietnam

We will never understand what happened there and why it happened because it's so complicated, and some of the lessons are very difficult for our psyches to accept, and that applies to people on both ends of the political spectrum.

I think protesting that war was a noble thing but I'm not convinced it led to our withdrawal. Alas, I'm a bit too sleep deprived to fully elaborate.

[TWiley]

22. War is almost always about minerals (titanium vs oil) and a captive labor / consumer populace

[TWiley]

23. We are not in Iran because the military is overextended

the neo-cons truly expected to be greated with flowers, cheese, and wine. We have been greeted with roadside bombs. The neo-con plan always included Iran which is why a war was started on both sides of Iran. Look at a map. The only reason shrubby did not go was because his daddy's war was still unfinished ..... and it still is today.

The peace protests have done very little IMHO. Democratic party unity / republikkklan defeat has come from economic pressure. The wars were pretty far down on the sentiment list.

[empyreanisles]

20. You actually believe Obama doesn't want to bring the troops home?

He is bringing them back (from Iraq) in a responsible way. You can't just pack up and leave in 1 day.

As far as Afghanistan is concerned, I agree that we should cut our losses there. But I'll see what strategy they come up with. I honestly believe we can get Bin Laden another way. We blew our chance at Afghanistan years ago when Bush decided that Iraq was good idea. Now it is too far gone and nothing good can come out of it, IMHO.

EDIT: Honestly, the best way to get back at Bid Laden is to rebuild our economy, and improve relations with Arab nations. If we can get Iran on our side and make leaps toward Mid East peace, we can give his terrorist ass a big middle finger. Let him die in his cave alone and broken.

[TWiley]

21. Mr Obama is trying to end the wars in the best way he can.

Closing Gitmo is a huge indication of a new direction. While I also want these wars to end today, I also understand that it will take some time to unravel the mess the republicans have made. They want a disaster on the pull-out to vindicate their actions, and to give them more political capital during the next election cycle.

The real solution in Iraq is a political one. If we just toss the country to the dogs with the biggest teeth then the result could be worse than what it was 6 years ago.

I support Mr. Obama's approach in resolving this mess. Too many in the peace community simply do not understand how the world works prefering to daydream about how they wished it would be. It is more important to first understand the world it exactly the way that it is, and then try to make meaningful changes out of it.

This is not our mess, but we are left with cleaning it up.