Barack Obama: Show Your Support for Ending This War. The Time to End This War is Now.

[flpoljunkie]

http://my.barackobama.com/page/s/iraqplan?source=homepageFeature

Sign on to my plan. Show your support for ending this war:

The time to end this war is now.

Five years ago, President Bush made his case for war at the United Nations. He was wrong.

But conventional thinking in Washington lined up for war. Too many politicians feared looking weak and failed to ask hard questions. Too many took the President at his word instead of reading the intelligence for themselves. Congress gave the President the authority to go to war, and our only opportunity to stop the war was lost.

I made a different judgment. I opposed this war from the beginning. I opposed the war in 2002. I opposed it in 2003. I opposed it in 2004. I opposed it in 2005. I opposed it in 2006. And I introduced a plan this January to remove all of our combat brigades by March 2008.

My plan for turning the page on Iraq is clear:

remove our combat troops from Iraq’s civil war by the end of 2008
a new approach to press for reconciliation within Iraq
escalate our diplomacy with all of Iraq’s neighbors and the United Nations
confront the human costs of this war directly with increased humanitarian aid

http://my.barackobama.com/page/s/iraqplan?source=homepageFeature

[AtomicKitten]

1. Absolutely effin brilliant!

GOBAMA!!!!

[Kagemusha]

2. I know people expect Obama to somehow stop the war all by himself but, how?

I've yet to see evidence that much more senior senators want to hear anything out of Obama's mouth telling them what to think or how to vote. And I somehow doubt that Senator Clinton would assist him in any effort on the simple principle of, whatever gains him anything, takes away from her candidacy and future presidency.

[flpoljunkie]

3. No one expects that, least of all Obama. He is speaking out, just like he did in 2002, when our

Dems folded and gave Bush the authority to go to war in Iraq. They failed us.

[Kagemusha]

5. You haven't read anything on Daily Kos in the last few days, have you?...

They're sick and tired of Obama's speaking out and achieving no results and hold him personally responsible for the continuation of the war, from Kos himself on down, and have called for immediate action. So I don't think "no one" is completely accurate. There's a vast blog naming and shaming effort targeting Obama personally going on.

Liberals eat their own because it's easier, I guess. Bush won't budge after all.

[BeyondGeography]

7. Yep...strange attitudes toward Obama over there

and lots of love for IWR co-sponsor Edwards, who didn't know he was against the war until 2005 and couldn't even take the time to read the NIE back in 2002. Been like that for awhile. :crazy:

[Adelante]

12. I don't bother going there

It's become unreadable there's so much spin spin spin. At least DU keeps it real even if it hurts sometimes.

[BeyondGeography]

17. Agreed...plus there's no Kos worship

which can be enough to make one :puke: sometimes.

[Connie_Corleone]

8. Obama is damned if he does, damned if he doesn't over there.

That's why I don't waste my time going over to DailyKos. I've even limited my time on DU because of it.

[Kagemusha]

10. I greatly sympathize. I rarely say anything about Obama now.

I'm sick of having to defend anything I say against people who may not be fully committed for one candidate or another, but consider Obama's "message of hope" to be personally and politically insulting and worthy of nothing but dire contempt in return. Doesn't pay to be nice, does it. Or even sound it for diplomatic purposes.

[flpoljunkie]

14. You don't make it in politics in Chicago without being tough. Obama can handle it.

[flpoljunkie]

9. I really do not read Dailykos. Aren't they pretty much Edwards' supporters?

[Kagemusha]

15. Look, I don't mean to say, it's just one site. It's lots.

Good ol' FDL is the same way and lots of others. Obama has to end the war. If he can't or won't, they have no use for him and don't want to hear another word from him forever and ever. Obama can't, and because he can't, he won't, and therefore they have no use for him and want him to shut the hell up.

In that environment, his efforts seem wasted.

[Connie_Corleone]

19. And they cheer Edwards who basically has nothing to lose.

He can say anything and get away with it because he doesn't have to cast votes anymore.

Too bad he didn't show this "courage" while he was still in the Senate.

Obama is doing a whole hell of a lot more than what Edwards did while in the Senate.

[sandnsea]

13. Kos doesn't have a good record of picking winners

I wouldn't give too much credence to what he has to say.

[sandnsea]

11. Challenge the Roadblock Republicans

You are hearing what the Bushies want you to hear. You are ignoring what has been said by many leading Dems, that the Republicans are waivering much more than is being reported. Smith, Coleman, Snowe, Collins, Sununu, Hagel, Warner, Specter, Lugar, Voinovich. This would go a long way to changing momentum in Congress and maybe even pressure Lieberman into changing his vote as well. This would be enough to bring a deadline vote to the floor and pass it, even if it isn't 100% veto proof.

[Cameron27]

21. At least he's in the senate,

I doubt the senior senators have much use for those sitting on the sidelines, who continue to bark orders at them, but who of course, don't have any constituents to consider, and don't have to worry about drumming up any votes for their demands.

Obama's got a good plan, and I'm sure he's got enough friends in Congress who would take him aside and whisper caution if he were stepping on too many toes. Just my opinion.

[Betsy Ross]

4. I support his plan.

Hell, I would support near any plan to get us out of this war.

[sandnsea]

6. He's hitting the most important issues

He has debunked the myth of chaos if we withdraw. He has pointed out the Saudi influence. He has called for both a regional and global response, working with the Iraqi people. Excellent speech.

[smalll]

16. "escalate our diplomacy"?

One should at least go with "engage in a diplomatic surge" instead. Maybe we could learn something from Bush's wordsmiths. They'd never use escalate/escalation -- when it comes to a war, those words focus the mind on the fact that the proposed course of action means more bombs, more gunfire, more deaths and more casualties on both sides, in short, more war. "Surge" is just comfortably sexy.

The problem with escalate/escalation when it comes to diplomacy is exactly the opposite -- it highlights the fact that diplomacy DOESN'T have the force of war -- you imagine platoons of well-dressed State Department people love-bombing various foreign functionaries at diplomatic receptions and cocktail parties, or a line of men in Brooks Brothers precision marching with briefcases. Again, surge is even better for diplomacy -- its sexy, seductive aspect actually fits in quite well with the concept of diplomacy.

[flpoljunkie]

18. Whatever, Bush wouldn't know from "diplomacy" if it bit him in the ass! He deliberately avoids it!

[MethuenProgressive]

20. Just an email addy gathering gimmick

And e-petitions are the highest form of slackivism...

[flpoljunkie]

22. No one is requiring you to sign it, MP.

[jillan]

23. You forgot to post the rest of his plan

De-escalates the War with Phased Redeployment: Commences a phased redeployment of U.S. troops out of Iraq not later than May 1, 2007, with the goal that all combat brigades redeploy from Iraq by March 31, 2008, a date consistent with the expectation of the Iraq Study Group. This redeployment will be both substantial and gradual, and will be planned and implemented by military commanders. Makes clear that Congress believes troops should be redeployed to the United States; to Afghanistan; and to other points in the region. A residual U.S. presence may remain in Iraq for force protection, training of Iraqi security forces, and pursuit of international terrorists.

http://obama.senate.gov/press/070130-obama_offers_pl_1/

[yodermon]

24. THEN FUCKING DE-FUND IT, MR. "RESIDUAL AMERICAN PRESENCE"

fuck.

[madrchsod]

25. this, in one form or another.is what is going to happen

no matter if clinton ,obama or edwards reaches the whitehouse. we are not going to leave the middle east and we must try to repair the damage that bush has done to the iraqi`s and to america.

[Imagevision]

26. Obama has the most valid content given in his speeches then anyone out there...

[mike_c]

27. now or later...?

"End this war now" is just not the same as "End this war in 15 months," and it's especially not the same as "End the war sometime in the future, but somehow hold on to all that oil." I realize the later statement goes a bit further than Senator Obama's stated objectives, but I simply don't have much faith in the resolve of most in Congress to just end the war as a bad business without struggling to achieve some justification or positive outcome.