South Coast Daily: United voice would focus U.S. attention

[paineinthearse]

By now, we are all familiar with the South Coast Daily's article "Kerry assails Bush on Iraq" by Steve Urbon

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1516892

...written after a session with the editorial board. Here is that board's collective opinion.

Wasn't it at John Conyers' media hearing that one of the participants suggested that Congress people march into the editorial board rooms of the corporate media and force the facts upon them? It appears the strategy has been put into motion!

http://www.southcoasttoday.com/daily/06-05/06-02-05/a14op114.htm

United voice would focus U.S. attention

Both Sen. John F. Kerry and Congressman Marty Meehan, D-Mass., are scratching their heads about why more Americans aren't raging mad about the daily death toll in Iraq of our young soldiers. They're wondering why more people aren't upset about the tens of hundreds more soldiers returning with serious physical and mental injuries. But when the senator and congressman swung through New Bedford this week and stopped to talk to the editorial board, Iraq was their secondary topic. It should be the most important issue facing the U.S. Congress today.

Instead, these two Democrats were pushing other pet projects to the public. Rep. Meehan is advocating an ethics reform act and Kerry is promoting a health care plan for all children in poverty. Rep. Meehan is honest about the fact that even the Democrats aren't united on what to do about Iraq. Kerry disagrees when questioned about Democratic unity of purpose. He insists that Democrats have a clear set of principles that they all run on. But we know differently. Rep. Meehan is closer to the truth. And that's a big part of the reason that the failed strategy in Iraq is not being addressed with the attention it deserves.

The Democrats aren't articulating their own bold strategy for Iraq. They are tweaking the edges of the Bush strategy. Even leading thinkers in the military have now come out with reports listing the many mistakes the Bush administration has made and is continuing to make in Iraq. In other words, the Democrats have all the materials they need to unite and suggest a more intelligent course for the nation. Last week, the U.S. Army War College issued one of the most damning reports on Bush's entire war on terror since 9/11, saying it lacks clarity and the cost of having no coherent strategy is rising quickly as the insurgency builds in Iraq. "To date, American policy has combined ambitious public statements with ambiguity on the critical particulars," said the report, "American Grand Strategy After 9/11: An Assessment." This report comes weeks after the release of the 2002 Downing Street memo from Tony Blair's administration which shows that the Bush administration planned to "fix" intelligence to justify the invasion of Iraq long before Congress even voted to allow the president to take the nation to war.

And yet the Democrats can not unite around this mounting evidence of a colossal failure of leadership and deception that is putting our soldiers in danger every day and our nation in danger over the long term. Sen. Kerry and Rep. Meehan have to stop tweaking around the edges of a failed Bush policy and work to unite their party to change this country's course in Iraq. A united party has a much better chance of grasping the megaphone.

This story appeared on Page A14 of The Standard-Times on June 2, 2005.

JACK IDDON/The Standard-Times
Sen. John Kerry at the Buttonwood Senior Center

Note: cross posted to EDITORIALS - http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x129491 - and the After Downing Street blog - http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=29&thold=0&mode=0&order=0

[BigBearJohn]

1. We will see what they say on Monday when Kerry speaks to Senate!

[blm]

2. This paper doesn't realize GOP controls the broadcast media microphone

and whatever happens in print STAYS in print unless the broadcast media shares it en masse with the greater part of America that doesn't read the occasional bit of real news that shows up in print.

They also do the predictable thing and BLAME THE DEMS for the fact that they can't access those mics to any effective degree because they are so tightly controlled.

When ARE newspapers going to point out that it's the BROADCAST MEDIA not doing their job and, indeed, acting as a protector of the Bush White House and its image?

[paineinthearse]

6. This paper doesn't realize GOP controls the broadcast media microphone

Yes, aren't independents wonderful?

[KittyWampus]

3. #1. Bush Has Taken Clark & Kerry's Advise Belatedly Almost Everytime

always too late for it to work effectively.

#2. Candidate Kerry certainly had plans to deal with Iraq and articulated his positions quite well. It's the damned Media's fault for buying the GOP Talking Point he didn't have his own plan.

#3. The GOP has no plan for Iraq other than to continue War Profiteering whilst building 10 bases and ignoring the troops' welfare, the Iraqis' welfare and the welfare of the American people.
None of the rest of us enter into his plan at all except to benefit the few cronies in his circle.

#4. The Democrats can't come up with a truly effective plan without being privy to the info that the Bush Junta refuses to share. And any

#5. Any suggestions the Democrats make will be ignored until finally Bush DOES get around to 'stealing' their ideas long after such action would make a real difference.

#6. The difference tween the Democrats & Bush is quite clear. Bush wants to keep Iraq in chaos and for our troops to use it as a launch pad for future assaults in the Middle East and the Democrats would work to stabilize Iraq, leave and get a peace process going again.

[LittleClarkie]

5. Indeed

Who is tweeking whose strategy.

[TayTay]

4. Gawd, I agree and disagree

(Oh shit! I can't agree and disagree. Crap.) I think the Meehan and Kerry projects have merit on their own. The Ethics reform that my Rep Meehan is pushing is very good. (And Rep Meehan floated his own proposal for a troop withdrawal back in Jan, It think. He got some press, but then the 'Miracle Purple Finger Elections' knocked it out of the papers. Sigh!

I think Kerry's initiative on health care for kids has merit. But the Iraq War has fallen off of the front pages unless something especially awful happens. (As if that war isn't awful enough just day by day.)

I think I want the pols to push both. I would also like a rethinking of how to end this war. Sigh!

[paineinthearse]

7. Re Meehan's exit plan

All you say is true. But back in January I was shouting the story to DU at the top of my lungs. The words fell on deaf ears. Who here took the information and ran with it? Who shared it with friends and friendly media?

If there is any interest in Meehan's proposal, or anyone cares to refute the lack of DU support, post it here and I will provide links to the DU posts in the GD/GDP/Massachusetts forums.

[corbett]

8. They're Starting To Listen But We Have A Long Way To Go

Here's some recommended reading of how to proceed:

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20050601/the_key_to_impeachment.php