Investigate the President, Stop the War

Investigate the President, Stop the War
by Don Mayer

It will come as no surprise to you that I am opposed to this war in Iraq. I opposed it before we invaded a country that had not attacked us and I oppose it now. On town meeting day here in Vermont this week over 30 towns passed resolutions seeking to impeach President George Bush, while another 16 towns passed resolutions calling upon Washington to withdraw US troops from Iraq.

Today General David Petraeus, the new US Commander in Iraq said that attacks were intensifying and that there was no military solution in Iraq. Meanwhile the troop build-up continues, US soldiers and contractors are being killed daily and many times that many Iraqi civilians, most non-combatants, are being killed or injured. The tragedy in Iraq, the cradle of civilization, continues without end.

In a recent survey, Americans didn’t even come close in their perception of civilian casualties in Iraq. Most were off by an order of magnitude. It has been clearly demonstrated that at least 50,000 and perhaps 150,000 Iraqis have died as a result of this war. Thousands of others have been injured and hundreds of thousands have been forced to leave their homes.

President Bush sold us this war based upon fear of weapons of mass destruction. He claimed the Iraqis would welcome us as liberators and that Iraq would bloom into the desert democracy of his dreams. That dream is a recurring nightmare for our troops and for innocent Iraqis. The President lied about the intelligence leading up to the war and Scooter Libby took the fall this week for covering up the administration’s attempt to out a CIA agent in retaliation for attempting to seek the truth about Iraq.

President Bush should be removed from office for misleading the world about Iraq. He has squandered billions upon billions of dollars in a misguided attempt to ram a square peg into a round hole. He has weakened our military, he has weakened our economy, he has weakened our stature in the world. It is time to stop the bleeding and find new leadership to begin the long road to making our country stand for truth, democracy and compassion once again. I believe that the President’s actions do rise to level of incompetence and mis-information that merit his dismissal. He’s a quarterback that simply has fumbled too many times.

More importantly it is time to end this foolish war in Iraq. It is time to bring the troops home, or as the late Senator Aiken from Vermont said during the Vietnam war – it is time “to declare victory and leave”. Our national interests are not served by a continued armed conflict in Iraq, on the contrary, they are harmed in a significant manner. The US should begin the withdrawal process immediately and should begin the diplomatic process in earnest. We should be talking to everyone that might be able to help mitigate the impact of our withdrawal and assist in stabilizing Iraq when we are gone. It is time to get our hand out of the hornet’s nest of Iraq.