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Desperation on the Cusp of Madness

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November 3, 2006

Three days left before America goes to the polls and shows the GOP what they think about checks and balances and congressional oversight responsibilities. The rhetoric is flying fast and furious now as republicans scramble to cling to their precious majority. Make no mistake about it America, the very glue that holds our republic together is at stake next Tuesday. Two more years of an out of control executive branch bolstered by his Rubber Stamp Congress would be devastating. As we get closer to Election Day, we see the GOP get more and more desperate.

They tried unsuccessfully to rally the base around an obviously flubbed joke at the President, by John Kerry. They all shed crocodile tears about the Senator's remarks and changed the obvious nature of the remarks to pretend he had spoken ill of the troops. It played for a couple of days until people read the actual quote and saw the context. Then everything returned to sanity and the poll numbers continued to plummet for the do-nothing gang.

Faced with nothing left to run on, all the sad GOP can muster these days is the tired old fear mongering and scare tactics. They have all been reading the Karl Rove 2004 talking points about security and how you can't trust the democrats to handle national security matters. This coming from a group who has eroded the civil liberties of all Americans in the name of the illusionary security they assure us we need. As it turns out it is the people eradicating Habeas Corpus that we need security from. The problem the GOP cannot seem to understand is that it is 2006, not 2004 and America has caught on to the truth. The fact is undeniable; we are not more prepared now then when the GOP took control. Katrina proved that. Terrorist activity has quadrupled in these past five years. The fact that is clear to Americans is that Iraq was never a threat, never had WMD and never had anything to do with 911 or al Qaeda. In fact, they were a secular Islamic regime, which is why Osama bin Hiding hated Saddam. The fact is that our folly of a war in Iraq has taken the only secular Islamic state in the region and destabilized it into another radical fundamentalist theocracy. The fact is that Iraq had nothing to do with terrorism, before we invaded. Now it is a breeding ground for such activity, and that is squarely the fault of this administration and the rubber stamp gang who are now trying to convince you that they are the ones to trust with your security.

That is why it is so comical to hear GOP shills and candidates alike all ask if we can really trust the Democratic Party with our national security. Of course we can. They certainly cannot do a worse job of screwing up foreign policy than the GOP has done over the past five years. We have gone from a moment of international solidarity following 911, to being reviled by the majority of the world. We have gone from a nation respected for our moral high ground to the nation that destroyed the Geneva Conventions and thinks water boarding, a crime we have prosecuted as torture in the past, is somehow acceptable behavior. We have become a nation that has eradicated Habeas Corpus, the vital underpinning of democratic societies for over 800 years, in the name of security we no longer deserve.

Then there is the desperation. Besides the "national security" Rovian talking point we see a revival of the equally odious "we want to win" card. Democrats are branded as "cut and runners" because they at least understand that this war is already over. To hear the GOP shills and candidates pretend that there is a "winning" possibility is laughable on its face. They hide behind the troops who they send out to slaughter and question the patriotism of those who would simply dissent. As Keith Olbermann said, "those of us who would simply ask for the receipt for the emperors new clothes." This from the party that brought us bring it on, mission accomplished, greeted as liberators, they'll throw roses at our feet, the last throes of the insurgency, stay the course, and this is not a civil war. It is not about us not believing they could be right about anything, it is the realization that they have been wrong about everything.

Lastly, we have the cusp of madness card. This is the "but they don't have a plan" card. This is being parroted at the direction of Karl Rove in a purely desperate stand. For starters, the democrats have offered many plans, the first one coming to mind from John Murtha, who actually served for over 30 years in the military. But to simply say that the dems have a plan misses the insanity of the point the GOP is trying to make. The inference being made in this ridiculous accusation is that the GOP somehow has had a plan to begin with, or that they currently still do. If they have had a plan, they must have forgotten to fill in the troops on the ground, or the American people, or even their own party members. Saying "stay the course" is not a plan. Saying "we will win" is not a strategy. Designing public relations photo-ops, while under-cutting the military is not a strategy. Looking back on the worst military debacle in our nation's history and then saying you would not change anything you have done, is the entire point of the GOP strategy; they never had one. They thought they would walk into Iraq, shock and awe them, watch the Iraqis throw flowers at our soldier's feet and then that they somehow would bow down to us as we raped their land of its natural resources. It has become increasingly clear that the GOP was acutely unaware of the various factions within the country and how they would not work together. That was the point of the failed joke from Senator Kerry. If you do not study and do your homework, you get US stuck in Iraq. So every time I hear the GOP shills and candidates decry the dems for "not having a plan", I start to wonder what is in that Kool-Aid they all seem to be drinking? We have had five years of no plan. We have had five years of fake turkey photo ops, Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, staged Jessica Lynch rescues, lies about the death of Pat Tillman, the army you want-not the one you have, not enough body armor or vehicle armor, and box after flag draped box coming home while the party that put those heroes in the boxes walks around pretending they have a "plan."

America has a plan too. That plan is to excise the cancer that the GOP has become on the American soul. When they see the GOP actually using images of Osama bin Laden in their political advertisements it only drives home the point that we are in this situation because of the failed leadership of the Republican Party. The gall it takes to use the image of the terrorist you have failed to "capture" in five years is staggering but to then connect that to say it is the democrats that cannot be trusted with national security is beyond desperation; it is pure madness.

America wants to return sanity to our government. We recognize now that for a false sense of security, we have traded the very things we are supposed to be protecting and spreading throughout the world. We understand now that "winning" means no more of our kids come home in boxes for lies, while the Republican Party's cronies make a killing off of their blood. We understand that it is time to pay some attention to this country. Fix our economy, our education, our infrastructure. We completely understand that those who confuse nationalism for patriotism are serving themselves, not the country. We have awoken in 2006 to realize that the best "plan" is to get rid of the party that came up with the plan that has gotten us to where we are today.
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Anthony Wade, a contributing writer to opednews.com, is dedicated to educating the populace to the lies and abuses of the government. He is a 53-year-old independent writer from New York with political commentary articles seen on multiple (more...)
 

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