With his autonomous decision to send an additional 20,000 troops to Iraq, King George has assumed a dictatorial prerogative that leaves Congress no other choice but to cut funding for the war. If they don't, if they choose to debate semantics or concepts like "victory" or success," their deference will demonstrate an inability to rein this evolving dictatorship and render themselves obsolete.
This is a watershed event for our country. In six short years, Bush has transformed the presidency into a dictatorial power, much like Hitler in 1933. Using the Reichstag fire 9-11 as a justification, he's created an American Gestapo by placing all intelligence-gathering services under military rule, hardlined to the Oval Office, and giving them sweeping powers to spy and detain American citizens. He's suspended basic constitutional rights in place for hundreds of years. He's invaded Poland Iraq with false assurances to the world and outright lies to the public. He's established secret prisons overseas where political dissidents enemy combatants can be tortured without trial or redress. He's cloaked his hegemony in anti-semetic "terrorist" propaganda to incite the citizenry to render their sons and daughters. All he needs now is an Enabling Act to elevate himself to the position of Fuhrer Decider and an edict outlawing opposition parties, and he'll be there.
Neither can be far off.
Fact is, Bush's audacious expansion of the war is a gauntlet thrown at the public's feet and a challenge to anyone who thinks they can override his omnipotence. And it may well be the first and last chance Congress ever gets to stop this cowboy before he ignites a global conflagration. Congress must cut funding for this war. Period. There is no other choice. Anything less, any attempt at reason or concilliation, any attempt to legitimize his criminal enterprise in the Middle East, will end in disaster, especially if he moves on Iran.
Bush is no Hitler. That much we know. He doesn't have the cunning or the popular support. If anything, he's closer to Louis XV if the polls we read are correct. But his neocon advisors--a misnomer designed to seduce the politically naive--are fascists, through and through. And such fascists, as we learned years ago, have no respect for democracy or its institutions.
When Bush requests the $5.6 billion he needs to pay for his ludicrous troop surge and the additional $1.2 billion he wants for "rebuilding" and "jobs programs" in Iraq, the answer from Congress should be a resounding no. Questioning the logic behind his strategy, as many in Congress have done (including Republican Sens. Smith, Colemen, Hagel, Snowe, and Brownback) or passing non-binding resolutions, as suggested by Sen. Charles Schumer, is not enough. The request for additional funds should be denied out of hand, and Sen. Kennedy's proposal to require congressional approval for troop increases should be passed quickly. Anything less would concede the authority of civilian rule and shatter our illusion of democracy.
Andrea Hackett is an freelance journalist, founder of the Las Vegas Dancers Alliance in Nevada, and editor of the Populist Review. She may be contacted at andreahackett@cox.net
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