Democratic Representative Ike Skelton from Missouri was overheard by a Wall Street Journal reporter at a hearing for Army Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, who were about to testify about current conditions in Iraq. He leaned over to say this to Republican Representative Duncan Hunter, “That really pisses me off down there, those a**holes.”
Dem. Rep. Ike Skelton again was overheard saying, “Out they go,” as at least a half-dozen protesters were arrested and escorted out of the hearing. Skelton was visibly irritated. He said “Are they gone?” to nobody specific after all the “a**holes” had been removed.
Forget that these may be your constituents, Mr. Skelton. Forget that these protesters voted for your party to come in and take control of Iraq and bring the troops home in November last year. Forget that your party has failed. Let’s examine the hard fact that you have ignored one congressman’s plan for no apparent or logical reason.
In February 2006, the Democrats were going to come together behind a “strategic redeployment” plan that would have had our soldiers withdrawn and redeployed to other areas outside the region by the end of 2007. Sen. John Kerry and Sen. Russ Feingold even had a plan to get troops out by July 1, 2007. Unfortunately, so far, Democrats like you, Mr. Skelton, have failed to unite behind any sort of a plan that gets our soldiers out of the chaos that engulfs Iraq.
There were brief signs that the Democrats had found their backbone in April this year. On April 26th, the House and Senate approved H.R. 1591 providing $124.2 billion primarily for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and setting benchmarks and a timetable for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq. While it did continue funding the war, it at least meant that a majority had come to their senses and realized it was time to start moving out of Iraq.
Unfortunately, President Bush vetoed H.R. 1591 days later on May 1st. That unfortunately was not the unfortunate part. The unfortunate part was that the Democrats failed to line up votes to override Bush’s veto. And so, Mr. Skelton, your party was back to having no plan, no backbone, and back to having frustrated American protesters like the ones you deem “a**holes”.
The Democratic Party, the party you are part of Mr. Skelton, chose to go ahead and give Bush what he wanted and therefore, let the American people down on May 24th of this year when the Democrats passed a motion to give 120 billion dollars more to the war, which added on to the already extravagant amount of money that has been thrown at this war for the past four years with the hopes of fixing “the problem”, whatever that “problem” may be.
Ten so-called anti-war Democrats voted against the motion in the Senate. While I welcome the winds of change, Mr. Skelton, most of the ten were doing it for political reasons so that they can gain voters in the coming election. Most likely they would authorize a future war with Iran or Pakistan or whichever country the bureaucracy and policymakers in this country decide to go in and invade and rebuild for our own gain next.
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