Liberal Democrats Take Aim at Funding for War

[babylonsister]

Liberal Democrats Take Aim at Funding for War

by Joe Garofoli


Liberal Democrats, led by heavy-hitting members of Congress from California, are taking on President Obama for the first time, aiming to block funding for his plans to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan.

At the same time, voters who supported Obama's candidacy last year are expressing their disappointment online and in street protests against his plan to increase American forces in the war-ravaged nation to nearly 100,000.


Rep. Barbara Lee of Oakland has sponsored a bill to cut off war funding. (Photo: Alex Wong / Getty Images)

"This is not the hope you voted for," read a sign at an anti-war protest in San Francisco this week.

Congressional leaders predict that Obama will have to ask Congress for supplemental war funding in the next six months to pay for his plan, which his administration estimated would cost $30 billion. Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., who chairs the subcommittee that oversees the Pentagon budget, predicts it could top $40 billion.

Bay Area positions

That offers an opportunity for opponents, including Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, who has sponsored a bill that would cut off funding for the war, to leverage Congress' power to challenge the war.

A week after saying there wasn't Democratic support for an escalation, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi - typically the president's biggest backer on Capitol Hill - continued Thursday to offer neutral statements on Obama's plan except for saying she opposes a proposed war surtax to fund it.

Rep. Mike Honda, D-San Jose, chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus' Afghanistan Task Force, worries about the annual cost of $1 million per soldier on the ground in Afghanistan.

Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, added: "I expect more casualties, and I don't see any end to what has been going on unsuccessfully."

At a Senate Foreign Relations hearing Thursday, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said "the situation got worse" after she voted to fund Obama's request to send 21,000 more troops to Afghanistan earlier this year.

"How can we now leap to the conclusion that more troops will mean less violence when the opposite seems to have occurred?" Boxer said.

more...

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/12/04-5

[tekisui]

1. knr.

[arcadian]

2. K & fucking R

[dtotire]

3. I don't object to raising taxes

They should be limited to above $250,000 for couples and $125,000 for single filers.

[LastNaturalist]

4. It should be "liberal California, big-city Democrats"...

take aim, etc., etc.

[Tippy]

5. According to CNN ...

Bin Laden is in Afganistan.......