« Tournament Weekend | Main | Cheney Continues to Fight »
November 21, 2005
Sen. Byrd Hits Back at Cheney
Sen. Robert Byrd struck back a V.P. Cheneys assertions that critics of their Iraq policy were somehow hurting the war effort and acting in an unpatriotic manner. Byrd states;
Whether one supported or opposed the war at its outset: no American must ever surrender the right to question the government.
The Constitution protects the American people from unjust laws that seek to stifle the patriotic duty to question those who are in power, but it is the courage of the American people that compels them to actually speak out when those in power call for silence. If anything, attacks on the patriotism of freedom-loving Americans may result in even more Americans fighting against attempts to squelch the Constitutional protections of freedom....
Wednesday evening, the Vice President of the United States even claimed that criticism of the Administration's war in Iraq was "dishonest and reprehensible." The Vice President's comments come on the heels of comments from President Bush, who said, "What bothers me is when people are irresponsibly using their positions and playing politics. That's exactly what is taking place in America."
The President and the Vice President need to reread the Constitution. Asking questions, seeking honesty and truth, and pressing for accountability is exactly what the Framers had in mind....
The Administration claims that the Congress had the same intelligence as the President before the war, and that independent commissions have determined that there was no misrepresentation of the intelligence. But neither claim is true.
The intelligence agencies are in the control of the White House. All information given to the Congress was cleared through the White House, and the President had access to an enormous amount of data never shared with the Congress. There was a filter over the intelligence information that the Congress received, and that filter was the Administration which was actively engaged in hyping the danger and lusting after this war in Iraq. Remember the talk of weapons of mass destruction, mushroom clouds, and unmanned drones? The so-called proof for war was massaged before it was sent to the Congress to scare members and leaked to reporters to scare the people.
Cheney and the President are clearly on the defensive. Too much factual information emerged over the past couple of weeks that damage their assertions of reality. The polls certainly indicate that the American people increasingly doubt the veracity of Administration accounts. It remains to be seen how the Democrats are able to take advantage of this and what they are able to do to redirect the ship of state. How is Bush going to change the negativity which grows throughout the country? Three more years of this atmosphere is hard to imagine.
Posted by Chip Spear at November 21, 2005 11:33 AM