When Dems freeze the war $$ repubs will say we're hurting the troops.

[Philosoraptor]

All day long the republiks scream about supporting the troops, the troops need the tools necessary to win the war, they squeal. The troops need more money to finish the important job of spreading freedom and democracy in the middle east, more money, more money!

This is what they refer to as supporting the troops, when in actuality this is MURDERING THE TROOPS for dick cheney's financial benefit. big dick just can't get enough money for some reason, he always needs more, like all crack heads.

When the Dems suggest cutting funding for the republik's war, they will call us traitors, terrorist appeasers, soldier killers, and worse. We want them to come home from Iraq, this is how WE support the troops, they want them to stay and shoot and die so that the money keeps rolling in for the tiny 1% that rules the land.

Just prepare yourselves for one of the nastiest fights you've ever seen on the hill, the fight to let w keep his masturbatory, highly profitable war, versus the Dems efforts to end it all and bring the troops home.

[Hubert Flottz]

1. The GOP reminds me of this song...

Well, they'll stone ya when you're trying to be so good,
They'll stone ya just a-like they said they would.
They'll stone ya when you're tryin' to go home.
Then they'll stone ya when you're there all alone.
But I would not feel so all alone,
Everybody must get stoned.

Well, they'll stone ya when you're walkin' 'long the street.
They'll stone ya when you're tryin' to keep your seat.
They'll stone ya when you're walkin' on the floor.
They'll stone ya when you're walkin' to the door.
But I would not feel so all alone,
Everybody must get stoned.

They'll stone ya when you're at the breakfast table.
They'll stone ya when you are young and able.
They'll stone ya when you're tryin' to make a buck.
They'll stone ya and then they'll say, "good luck."
Tell ya what, I would not feel so all alone,
Everybody must get stoned.

Well, they'll stone you and say that it's the end.
Then they'll stone you and then they'll come back again.
They'll stone you when you're riding in your car.
They'll stone you when you're playing your guitar.
Yes, but I would not feel so all alone,
Everybody must get stoned. More...

http://bobdylan.com/songs/rainy.html

They'll stone you, because you and me and Jesus ain't totally flawless in every possible way, like they are!

[lligrd]

4. Perfect Analogy

Of course, if they would just all get stoned - we'd be better off.

[Hubert Flottz]

7. I think Bush is not only stoned but burnt out!

Most of the GOP has escaped reality! Or has reality has escaped them? Or all of the above?

I think they are about to get a double dose of reality though.

Edit...Welcome to DU, BTW!

[ClintonTyree]

2. That's why Speaker Pelosi was so adamant yesterday....

in stating that they would in no way cut funds for the troops already in Iraq. She made the distinction quite clear that the troops in Iraq will have everything they need and then some. It's Bush's "surge" or escalation of the war that will face tough financial scrutiny, and rightfully so.
She's a smart cookie. She wasn't going to paint herself into a corner that the rabid right could use to call her and the new Democratic majority traitors.

[stranger]

3. fine! but if she votes to finance a surge,

she will be minority leader pelosi
in two years.

They didn;t elect dems to preserve the status quo.

what's worse, dems would be unable to capitalize on bushs
epic blunder if after all this
dems vote to finance the biggest foreign policy
blunder since viet nam.

You would see ads run against dems like
the one picturing john kerry at a rally dignifying a repub heckler
by trying to explain " i voted against after i voted for it..."

Dems lose when they are STUPID-(like John Kerry was)

Nothing could be more stupid than blurring the difference
between repubs and dems.

but, if we...

Give the red state bumpkins their idiot wedge issues, and we
will NEVER lose another election.

thats means:

1.say we oppose partial birth abortion (whether it exists or not)
2.Say we oppose gay marriage. (1/3 of the gay voters are self hating repubs anyway)
3.Let them HAVE prayer. (they will never get it ratified in 3/4 of the states anyhow)
4.say we oppose gun control.

Poor red state bumpkins will vote for us in economic justice issues, unoversal singlre payer healthcare, repeal bankruptcy "reform" bill, earned income tax credit, head start, funding for legal aid, minimum wage increase , etc-

BUT, being flummoxed by "righteousess", they will NOT vote for us if they perceive (rightly or wrongly) that we are atheist fiends who crack the skulls of babies,
refuse to let little children pray, and want break into their homes in the dead of the night
and confiscate their freaking gun, or tell them the union of two gays is as "holy" as their marriage-which is all these poor fools have in the world, in this new gilded age ronald reagan has given them.

[annabanana]

6. a dead cat can capitalize on shrub's blunders. . .

Madame Speaker is smart as a whip. She knows that the American people know that the jig is up. The media is already reporting her determination not to give dim son another blank check.

(ps: John Kerry wasn't stupid. He was the victim of the RW wurlitzer and the swiftboat hit squad.)

[leftyladyfrommo]

12. Yes - she was very careful. n/t

[Skittles]

5. they will but I am not sure it will work

repukes have fubarred everything and the American people know it - the same old repuke rhetoric will not work the magic it once did

[Peace Patriot]

8. Who cares what they say? Let me give you some stats...

56% of the American people opposed the war on Iraq before it ever began. Feb. '03.

63% of the American people oppose torture "under any circumstances." May '04.

90% of the American people are concerned or very concerned about Bush's humongous deficit. (circa '04).

And today, 70% of the American people want the Iraq War ended.

Pick almost any Bush policy, foreign or domestic, and you are going to find that 60% to 70% majorities oppose it--and have for some time.

The fascist propaganda campaign HAS FAILED. Why? Because it NEVER REPRESENTED the overwhelming majority in this country, which is by and large progressive--tolerant, law-abiding, peaceful and generous.

How do you cram an unjust war down the throats of a law-abiding, tolerant, peaceful, generous and progressive people? You have got to rig the elections. And that's what they did.

How? With the "Help America Vote For Bush Act" of 2002, engineered by the biggest crooks in the Anthrax Congress--Tom Delay and Bob Ney (and abetted by corporatist 'Democrats' Christopher Dodd and Terry McAuliffe)--which fast-tracked electronic voting all over the country, with machines run on TRADE SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code, owned and controlled by rightwing Bushite corporations. No paper trail. No audit. $3.9 billion electronic voting boondoggle--with which to bribe and corrupt election officials across the land, who didn't know what they were purchasing, and hadn't a clue how it worked.

What we are seeing is the result of ELECTION THEFT. MORE war being crammed down our throats, despite 70% opposition!

The rightwing NEVER HAD a majority. What they had was a BIG TRUMPET--way out of proportion to their numbers--handed to them by the war profiteering corporate news monopolies, combined with delusions of grandeur incited by FALSE election results.

And in 2006, as the result of the hard work and passionate commitment of a whole lot of patriotic citizens of this country, the people finally caught on to the game, and outvoted the machines. There were, nevertheless, millions of votes purged, switched and 'disappeared.' (FL-13 is just the tip of the iceberg.) We should have taken 40 to 50 seats in Congress, not just 30. And we were handicapped in the Senate, by only 1/3 of it being up for re-election. But a sidebar stat tells you what was going on: the huge increase in Absentee Ballot voting--50% in many places--a full scale voter revolt, with ordinary voters trying to figure out how to get around the rigged electronics.

A good estimate of the rigging is a 5% to 10% "thumb on the scales" for Bushites and warmongers. That's what the people had to overcome. And they did--in enough instances to give us majorities in both Houses. But a TRANSPARENT election would have been an even bigger "throw the bums out" event.

The people have spoken. The rightwing--never a majority--has at last been put in its place. No one cares what they say. The people are IGNORING the propaganda, and thinking things out for themselves. And they have been all along. They just didn't realize, until recently, that they were ALSO being disenfranchised, and that the IMPRESSION that they had been given of rightwing ascendancy was only that--an impression, an illusion.

Here's an analysis of one small fact that can make this clear. 56% of the American people opposed the Iraq war before the invasion. At the same time, some 50% of the American people also believed that Saddam Hussein had WMDs and/or had something to do with 9/11. So how is this possible? SOME of those people who opposed the war MUST have had these false facts rattling around in their heads. Here is the key: They didn't think it was worth a war. Saddam maybe had some WMDs, but it wasn't a big threat. Or, maybe Saddam had something to do with 9/11, but it was minor. People who were barraged with relentless, 24/7 war propaganda, were TRYING TO THINK FOR THEMSELVES, and DIDN'T TRUST BUSH--starting wa-a-ay back in Feb. '03.

Frankly, I think people are just laughing at their TVs, by now. We don't have to worry about the American people. They are a lot better informed--and a lot smarter--than anyone gives them credit for. The Diebold/ES&S coup sneaked past them, due in part to the collusion of corporatist Democrats in high positions (who prevented any cry of alarm by other Democrats--thus the people didn't know!). RE-ENFRANCHISE the American people, and they WILL vote for the progressive country we all want. They are already trying very hard to do so, with a 5% to 10% "thumb on the scales" against the majority, added to corrupt campaign money and lobbying and rightwing corporate news monopolies, as handicaps on democracy. The people overcame these huge handicaps and handed the Republicans their asses in these last elections, in so far as it was humanly possible.

TRANSPARENT elections is the ticket out of BushWorld.

We don't NEED to argue with Bushites any more. We don't NEED to engage in this shadow play with rightwing think tanks and Rovian "talking points." No one is listening to them. Our strategy should be a positive one of speaking the truth, and re-empowering and re-enfranchising the people.

[leesa]

9. Of course they will, and the Dems need to be prepared to break the bad

news about where the money has been going. They need to follow the money and prove that it's not going to the soldiers and it's not going to Iraq.

[NNN0LHI]

10. Headline in todays Chicago Sun-Times: Pelosi threatens to cut money for GIs

http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/201580,CST-NWS-iraq08.article

[n2doc]

11. Yep. The cure is to show where the $$ are going

My idea would be to take a 1 for 1 reduction in major weapons project funds to pay for the war. Every dollar that shrub asks for is one less dollar for the advanced fighters, submarines, aircraft carriers, etc., etc. Start with the most absurd military bloatware, like the missle defense systems that don't work anyway, and cut away.

Of course this will cause pain for the people emplyed by the military contractors, but that party has to end sometime anyway.

[On the Road]

13. This is a Hard One for the Democrats to Play

and there is an additional issue that if the surge is denied by Congress it will provide an excuse for Republicans to say that Bush was bringing the war under control and that Democrats denied him the means. Also that Democrats are being hypocritical and playing politics by both criticizing the inadequate troop levels and then denying funding for increased troops. Regardless of their truth, these are not trivial charges. I think the administration is laying a trap that Democrats have got to avoid.

Therefore, what I would suggest is that Pelosi approve funding for the surge but only for the limited time frame that Bush had proposed. Funding for any longer period would be denied. That gives the president what he wanted while denying a more permanent escalation.

An alternative would be to deny funding in a way that Bush would be sure to veto it. That would put Democrats on record against an increased presence in Iraq and make Bush go out on a limb to stand behind his proposal and make it work. Which of course is very unlikely.

Pelosi has been very astute so far in taking the right political tack. I hope she plays this one equally well.

[kentuck]

14. They just passed a "PayGo" legislation...

No problem. If they want the money, it will have to be offset. Either cut the Estate taxes or the put the taxrate back on the top tax payers of 1.25 million or more... No big deal.