As An Empty Drum

03/22/2006

Paul Munnis

For just a moment, imagine that the Iraq War went away as an issue. Where would that leave the Bush Administration?

If you said “empty,” you would be right. For indeed this Administration is all about Mid-east war and little else.

Furthermore, in his last three years Mr. Bush would be a lame duck president, unable to control anything.

He would have no programs that he could push through and no political capital to spend.

His Administration would be bankrupt and his staff would soon quit.

So it does not come as a surprise that if Mr. Bush has his way then U.S. troops will stay in Iraq until after 2008. Indeed that is the lead story of every newspaper in America today. Mr. Bush will stay the course.

For Mr. Bush to get headlines the troops must stay at war and keep dying to provide a political agenda. Each death that we read about forces us to ask why that soldier was killed? The reasons are just not there as an answer and that is bad news for the GOP.

That is the tragedy of Iraq that even Jack Murtha has not insisted upon. Troops are dying to provide a one-trick pony show for the GOP and as a podium for political visibility for Mr. Bush and his Administration. Finally we have a proper view for the real reason for the Iraqi War. Before this war, Mr. Bush was nothing, a usurper of the vote for the stolen presidency: a “hanging-chad” ruler. The War gave Mr. Bush status and a reason for being. Remove the war and Mr. Bush becomes as an empty drum—sounding hollow.

It is strange to have that view of the U.S. presidency. Usually a Party represents so much more. They have plans to move America ahead. But not the GOP—it’s war, war, and more war. Everything else is failed. They have so little to show for five years of their time in office except for War. And then when we examine the progress of the War we once again see there is so little to show for the investment made.

Even as we write this, Congressmen and Senators who must stand for election in 2006 are meeting in panic back at home. How are they going to win re-election with their failed record of governance? If they remove the War from the election equation the problem is even worse – they have nothing to justify their existence. So, they keep war as their reason for being, it’s better than nothing.

It’s not much better at the State level either.

A failed platform of “no new taxes” has left the State GOP with little to say and even fewer plans of interest. A lack of solid accomplishment, a failed budget year where GOP solutions are concerned, a terribly flawed miss-cue on education and transportation, has left our Governor and the GOP majority pretty well unelectable in 2006. They lack plans to advance our State forward.

The State GOP are left with wedge issues and a declining voter base who doesn’t much care about such things and thus a few people make lots of noise to make us think there is substance in government where there is nothing at all. The GOP has no plan, no agenda, no policy, and no depth. Even at the State level, if Gov. Pawlenty were stripped of his visits to the troops he would have little left to get media attention with. So the GOP turns to wedge issues: abortion, gay marriage, etc., etc., and of course: “the War in Iraq.”

The voter polls have made it clear enough. The support for the GOP is gone. They are ruling without a voter mandate. Elections are approaching. End the war and you end the GOP rein of terror in American politics. No wonder the GOP is out trying to sell the War to the public—and it is not going well at all. People have tuned Mr. Bush out. He is selling to an empty hall.

The public is rejecting the conduct of the Iraq war. At the same time we are trying to be realistic. We have four years invested, lots of dead, and billions spent. They have oil and we need oil. Surely something can be arranged. Leaving Iraq a blood-stain on the desert is not the American way anyhow. We would like to salvage something from this mess.

Americans are thus letting Iraqi Civil War slide for the moment and we are giving Mr. Bush one more chance. He needs to form a unified Iraqi Federal government with separation of Church and State and with minority rights guaranteed for all. If he does that then the U.S. will provide the hardware needed to equip the Iraq Army, establish bases in Iraq for future strategic reasons, help in the struggle with the Kurds and Turkey, and thus move on in partnership with Iraq. If that doesn’t happen with major progress by Easter, then Mr. Bush is likely going to be asked to resign (by his Party) and if he refuses, as he will, then the Congress and Senate will become Democrat and the GOP will become moribund for years ahead.

So Cindy Sheehan is a wicked threat to Mr. Bush. So is Rep. Jack Murtha. The White House worries more about those two people than they do about all of the members of the Senate and the House combined.

Sheehan and Murtha have it in their power to topple the U.S. government by focusing the American people on ending the War in Iraq.