Senator Kevin Cramer (R) North Dakota and a member of the Armed Services Committee asking snide questions of Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, seems to have no concept of what a war involves or the fact that we were engaged in one in Afghanistan for twenty bloody, expensive years.
It’s obvious that everyone involved in Afghanistan, except the US military, knew that the Afghan army wouldn’t fight and that the Afghan president would run with as much money as he could carry. The only ones other than the military who seemed not to know were Bush, Obama and Trump, our presidents during this war. Biden found out and got us out of a no-win situation that had already cost us $7 trillion for which we got nothing.
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Rick Scott, (R) Florida worked hard at the hearings to prove that you just can’t have members of the GOP on any committee on which you want to arrive at a reasonable, logical and truthful conclusion because they are only interested in making political not truthful points. The facts remain, the Bush administration got us into this war and the Obama and Trump administrations continued our involvement. It was only Biden who even attempted to end this debacle. Trump negotiated for an end and could have puled the trigger at any time, but since he couldn’t figure a way to make money for himself he just let it ride. The reason none of the former presidents tried to end this war was they didn’t have the guts to put up with the kind of bullshit that has been the result of Biden ending the war. It seems that the only one who understood that wars are messy is Biden. He was willing to put up with the mess in order to end the war. No one else had the balls to do this.
In an interesting rebuttal of raving nonsense vomited out by Senator Scott over American civilians who haven’t left Kabul despite all our troops having left, Senator Tammy Duckworth (D) Il, pointed out that her family had been in Cambodia at the end of that war and that they were still there along with numerous other American civilians including our ambassador long after our troops had left, thus putting the lie to Scott’s ravings about American troops never leaving before American civilians. The order of withdrawal is entirely dependent on circumstances and we have brought out troops before civilians many times in the past. Our withdrawal from the Philippines in WWII during which we left behind an entire civilian population including American nurses who became Japanese prisoners, immediately comes to mind.
Sure there are American civilians left in Afghanistan but most of them wanted to stay for their own family or financial reasons. There are some who were too lazy or stupid to get their asses in gear and do what they had to do to get out, and a few are just stuck there because of bureaucratic or other considerations. As Secretary Austin pointed out, we are still working to get these people out. I find it hard to believe that the Republicans who are making a big deal about the messy parts of the drawdown of the war really don’t understand that it’s not possible to get out of a twenty-year war without some blood. I mean these are people who supposedly actually dress themselves every morning. They must have some functional intelligence.
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Then we had an illustration of why these kinds of panels are utterly useless when Republican Marsha Blackburn, failed in her attempt to read a tribute to the patriotism of Tennessee into the record instead of asking intelligent questions. I say failed, because the poor wretch reads about as well as Donald Trump so we were left with a bumbling, stuttering, stumbling disaster. She followed that disgraceful exhibition with questions for the military men present but required that the answers be yes or no. This was, of course, because she isn’t bright enough to understand that most questions cannot be truthfully answered with a yes or no. Unfortunately Blackburn isn’t interested in the truth, only in soring points on a political dartboard. Then because she is who she is, Blackburn rudely interrupted all the answers.
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So push has come to shove as we are down to whether to pass the Infrastructure bill and follow with the Reconciliation bill or to tie them together and while we’re worrying about them, what happens to the Budget Cap?
Are the Democratic Progressives willing to see the bi-partisan Infrastructure bill go by the boards just because they don’t want to do the extra work on the Reconciliation bill? Both these bills have big time voter support, support in the 64-65% area. This is nothing to whistle at. If the recalcitrant Progressives and the thickheaded moderates like Manchin and Sinema become so Involved in their own wants, they could easily blow the whole thing. That would lead to a GOP victory in ’22 and the end of democracy in this country.
From where this writer sits it looks like the Progressives can be brought into line. They have been very clear about what they want and as long as the rest of the Democrats don’t give away the store they are willing to play. Manchin and Sinema on the other hand are not willing to say what they want, only that they don’t want to spend as much as Pelosi is asking for. There are those of us who thought Manchin, at least, knew how to conduct a negotiation, but it seems we were wrong. I can’t give you what you want if you won’t tell me what that is. It’s that simple.
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So how do we get both the Infrastructure bill and the Reconciliation bill passed? This is nothing new with the Democrats; they have been fighting among themselves forever. They have never spoken with one voice as the Republicans have because they are all free thinkers while the GOP is a bunch of followers that line up behind a strong, would be dictator and follow him over the cliff.
Given their position as members of our legislative bodies, it is now time for the Democrats to coalesce and act together for the benefit of the people who voted for them and thereby put food on their tables.
It is way past time for Joe Manchin to put his problems on paper instead of hinting obscurely about what they might be and for Kyrsten to stop babbling about the Progressives holding up the process by threatening to not vote for infrastructure if reconciliation is not attached. Her position is equally ridiculous. The only reason the Progressives are threatening to stop the Infrastructure bill if the Reconciliation bill is not attached, is that Sinema and Manchin are threatening to kill Reconciliation if the price isn’t to their liking.
All that is needed is for Sinema and Manchin to agree to support Reconciliation at a specific figure and then Biden can bring that figure to the Progressives, iron it out and move the Infrastructure bill ahead to a point where they can look at what they want to do, estimate what that will cost and know what’s real and what’s not. At that point Biden will know he has passage of Reconciliation because he knows he has the fifty votes to also pass Infrastructure.
It’s so easy and so obvious that one is forced to consider that Sinema and Manchin are only doing this to massage their own egos. Here we have two Senators from insignificant states hugging the limelight while important legislation hangs in never-never land.
The GOP is infamous for starting two wars and passing only a tax bill that helped the rich in the last twenty years. Intelligent voters considered that when they elected Joe Biden. Let’s hope that the Democrats can come up with something better. It’s time they all got their heads out of their collective asses and functioned.