The Good News is Bad News

The Good News is Bad News
By Cliff May
Thursday, August 2, 2007

It's tough being a member of Congress. Even if you're in the majority,
as is Rep. Nancy Boyda of Kansas, you never know when your ears may be
assaulted by outrageous and offensive ideas.

Like what? At a recent hearing of the Armed Services Committee,
retired Gen. Jack Keane said "progress is being made" by U.S. military
forces in Iraq; "We are on the offensive and we have the momentum," he
added. The freshman congresswoman was so distressed by these remarks
that she got up and she walked out.

There was "only so much" she could take, she explained, so she "had to
leave the room ... after so much of the frustration of having to listen
to what we listened to." She said she was worried, too, that General
Keane's remarks "will in fact show up in the media and further divide
this country." Hey, that could happen!

Lucky for Rep. Boyda, Congress in August goes on vacation. One hopes
she can rest and recover, while blocking out any unwelcome and
divisive news about American military successes in Iraq resulting from
the new strategy being pursued by Gen. David Petraeus and his troops.

For example, let's hope she never hears what General Petraeus' top
deputy, Lieutenant Gen. Ray Odierno, recently reported: A "growing
list of cities" that until recently were under al-Qaeda control have
now been "liberated." General Odierno added that "greater than 50
percent of Baghdad is currently in control of coalition or Iraqi
security forces. ... I can think of no major population center in Iraq
that is an al Qaeda safe haven today."

If Rep. Boyda is careful about which television stations she watches,
she need never learn who is primarily responsible for the carnage in
Iraq. Fox News' Chris Wallace recently asked General Petraeus if most
of the violence is the result of a Sunni-Shia civil war. The general
replied that, in fact, it is al-Qaeda that is "carrying out the bulk
of the sensational attacks, the suicide car bomb attacks, suicide vest
attacks, and so forth....all of the individuals in the intelligence
community, General [Stanley] McChrystal, the head of our Joint Special
Operations Command, all of us feel that the central front of al
Qaeda's terror war is focused on Iraq."

Nor does she need to know that, according to Brigadier General Mick
Bednarek, in Iraq today "al Qaeda is on the run... We are going into
places that the coalition has not had the sufficient troop strength
and force size to go before, and we're going after them, and they will
not find safe haven in this country."

With a little effort, the congresswoman can remain ignorant of the
likely consequences should Congress force the administration to
withdraw American troops before their mission is completed. Major
General Rick Lynch, commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, told CNN's
Jamie McIntyre: "Those surge forces are giving us the capability we
have now to take the fight to the enemy, and the enemy only responds
to force and we now have that force. ... If those surge forces go
away, that capability goes away ... if you did that ...you'd find the
enemy regaining ground, re-establishing a sanctuary ... Over time we can
turn the area over to Iraqi security forces, and then we'll be ready
to do something that looks like a withdrawal. ... People keep wanting to
put a timeframe on this. It's just not possible."

Surely you can see how possession of such information would make it
more difficult for Congresswoman Boyda to do her job -- second-
guessing military commanders? And she's right that such information
can divide Americans. It might even stimulate serious debate -- a
frightening thought.

As House Majority Whip James Clyburn suggested this week, success in
Iraq also would be awkward for those who have bet their political
chips on American failure.

To be precise, Clyburn said that it would be "a real big problem for
us" should General Petraeus return to Washington next month and
present a positive report on progress in Iraq. Moderate Democrats
might listen and decide that for America to be defeated in Iraq by al-
Qaeda and Iranian-backed militias is neither inevitable nor in the
national interest. These same moderate Democrats also might decide
that, for them, the national interest trumps the partisan interest.

If Congressman Boyda were to hear that, she wouldn't leave the room -
they'd have to carry her out.

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Bush is read the 35 Articles of Impeachment
    ... George W. Bush goes down in history for having Articles of Impeachment against him written into the Congressional Record. ... Article II - Falsely, Systematically, and with Criminal Intent Conflating the Attacks of September 11, 2001, With Misrepresentation of Iraq as a Security Threat as Part of Fraudulent Justification for a War of Aggression. ... Article III - Misleading the American People and Members of Congress to Believe Iraq Possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction, to Manufacture a False Case for War. ...
    (alt.politics.bush)
  • Libs in Congress, media defeated
    ... Libs in Congress, media defeated ... With the extermination of al-Qaeda's number one terrorist in Iraq, ... people and their American liberators in an attempt to foment civil war. ...
    (alt.politics.bush)
  • Re: Bush officially a lame duck
    ... Iraq is the launching pad. ... And Rumsfeld is working overtime with Congress to ge the ... This is the Project For A New American Century. ... unify against the war, but they will not do it, and from what you posted ...
    (alt.politics)
  • Re: From Ron Paul...
    ... Congress Must Do Its Duty ... faced with the reality that the war in Iraq is not ... considering the fact that the original authorization no longer reflects ...
    (rec.music.gdead)
  • Re: From Ron Paul...
    ... Many of my colleagues, faced with the reality that the war in Iraq is not going well, line up to place all the blame on the president. ... In reality, much of the blame should rest with Congress, which shirked its constitutional duty to declare war and instead told the president to decide for himself whether or not to go to war. ... More than four years into that war, Congress continues to avoid its constitutional responsibility to exercise policy oversight, particularly considering the fact that the original authorization no longer reflects the reality on the ground in Iraq. ...
    (rec.music.gdead)
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