By Ralph Lopez
February 11, 2010
Published by Daily KOS.
Unveiling a potentially powerful campaign which goes beyond pointless marching in the street on a Saturday in DC when no one is around, and the march is roundly, thoroughly, even aggressively ignored by the media, Progressive Democrats of America has come to a realization that International ANSWER has not. It's our house.
With the cost of a robust public option put at about $50 billion, it turns out we spend that in about 5 months on military operations (not civilian help) in Afghanistan. This is major motion for the Anti-Waste-on-War Movement, my own tongue in cheek moniker which is intended to reflect that if attacking a bunch of 19 year-old-Afghans kids who joined the Taliban because there were no other jobs were buying us security, it might not be waste, though it would still be immoral. The fact is it is buying us the opposite. Hatred, astonishment at our government's will toward war. And more hatred. 100 Al Qaeda in the country at most, according to the Pentagon's own estimates, who Afghans would willingly dispatch themselves given the chance.
But that's how Lockheed and General Dynamics, Halliburton and Blackwater-XE like it. When you are an executive or a shareholder looking at your starter castle, your vision can get blurred. You don't care about the educational system. Your kids will go to private school. And those bloody fools out there, My God, they think this is about security. PDA is calling for citizens to join its Brown Bag lunch series, every third Wednesday of each month, in which like-minded folks will be going into congressional district offices, relaxing with their sandwiches in the spaces their taxes are paying for, and asking congress members to commit publicly to voting against further war funding. So far about 36 District Offices are on tap. They'll be talking to each other via cellphone, by Skype, and having all kinds of fun.
"Further war funding," obviously, does not preclude the minuscule amount, relatively, for orderly withdrawal or economic stabilization ($5 a day jobs for for former and potential Taliban, they would jump at it.) No one is talking about letting soldiers run out of bullets in the middle of a battle, a ridiculous response it's time to take head-on.
This beats shouting in the streets where no one, and I mean absolutely no one, gives a rat's a%#.
Add this to plans being made for constant, regular actions in DC, including civil disobedience, and by God we've got a real chance of stopping this thing. We're bringing camcorders and Skype video connections to beam back to the constituents just why Congressman A would rather finance Lockheed than your prescriptions that you can't afford or even a basic coverage plan. If you are a conservative some of it could go toward deficit reduction. The dirty little secret, that many people are just starting to wake up to, is that what we spend on insecurity is so golddarned much we wouldn't even have to choose. We could, literally, have it all. Jobs, healthcare, deficit reduction. $9 billion a month is the "burn rate" for more insecurity. Burn rate is the term recently used by General Barry McCaffrey for the cost of Afghan war operations. I'm not making this up. Burn, as in money into a fireplace.
Join PDA's Brown Bag Vigils here. Make new friends. Meet the love of your life even! Democracy is fun, once we realize IT'S OUR HOUSE.
SEE HOW MUCH IN CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS YOUR CONGRESS MEMBERS TAKE FROM THE DEFENSE INDUSTRY (aircraft makers here)
The diarist is co-founder of Jobs for Afghans.
Take Action: Eat lunch for peace--become a "brown-bagger" http://pdamerica.org/articles/misc/2009-11-13-12-49-50-misc.php
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