Lieutenant General William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.): (1) Withdraw, (2) Cut Off Funds, (3) IMPEACH

[PalJoey]

Posted: 7/6/07 at 8:12am

[Excerpt:]

...If the Democrats truly want to succeed in forcing President Bush to begin withdrawing from Iraq, the first step is to redefine "supporting the troops" as withdrawing them, citing the mass of accumulating evidence of the psychological as well as the physical damage that the president is forcing them to endure because he did not raise adequate forces. Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress could confirm this evidence and lay the blame for "not supporting the troops" where it really belongs – on the president. And they could rightly claim to the public that they are supporting the troops by cutting off the funds that he uses to keep U.S. forces in Iraq.

The public is ahead of the both branches of government in grasping this reality, but political leaders and opinion makers in the media must give them greater voice.

Congress clearly and indisputably has two powers over the executive: the power of the purse and the power to impeach. Instead of using either, members of congress are wasting their time discussing feckless measures like a bill that "de-authorizes the war in Iraq." That is toothless unless it is matched by a cut-off of funds.

The president is strongly motivated to string out the war until he leaves office, in order to avoid taking responsibility for the defeat he has caused and persisted in making greater each year for more than three years.

To force him to begin a withdrawal before then, the first step should be to rally the public by providing an honest and candid definition of what "supporting the troops" really means and pointing out who is and who is not supporting our troops at war. The next step should be a flat refusal to appropriate money for to be used in Iraq for anything but withdrawal operations with a clear deadline for completion.

The final step should be to put that president on notice that if ignores this legislative action and tries to extort Congress into providing funds by keeping U.S. forces in peril, impeachment proceeding will proceed in the House of Representatives. Such presidential behavior surely would constitute the "high crime" of squandering the lives of soldiers and Marines for his own personal interest.


Lieutenant General William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.), is a Senior Fellow with Hudson Institute and a professor at Yale University. He was Director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988. From 1981 to 1985, he served as Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the Army's senior intelligence officer. From 1977 to 1981, he was Military Assistant to the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs, Zbigniew Brzezinski.
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'Supporting the troops' means withdrawing them

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 7/6/07 at 8:17am

Problem is, we know it wont happen, PJ. Congress is scared to death of the concept of impeachment after the idiocy that was the Clinton "trial", and the general consensus seems to be "well, he has less than a year to serve, so what's the point?", even though we all know how much damage he can inflict in that short a time. Congress had the opportunity -- twice, no less -- to tie the purse strings and caved both times when Bush waved his little veto pen. We're stuck with this mess until someone with cajones comes along and stops it -- and that aint gonna happen for a while yet, possibly not even in the next term.

And know what really bites about all this? Once he's out of office, he'll skip off to Crawford and sit there collecting his multi-million-dollar pension while the rest of us get stuck paying the tab.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 7/6/07 at 8:46am

Nope. You can't think of politics as stasis. It's always moving.

Real politics in influencing the conversation. When the conversation shifts, change occurs.