Drop a tac-nuke down a rathole, you gotta lotta dead rats.
(..or was it "bugs"? What's the dif... *grin*)
Posted on 05/22/2003 2:59:16 AM PDT by kattracks
Leading Democrats in Congress expressed grave reservations about Bush administration attempts to create a new class of nuclear weapons that could be used on the battlefield.
The move by the White House to explore developing low-yield nuclear weapons sparked a revolt among senior Democrats in the US Senate, who pointed out that, while valued for their deterrent effect, nuclear weapons have long been considered off-limits for tactical military use.
"For the past nine or ten years, we've had a prohibition in law against the research and development," Senator Carl Levin said Wednesday at a press conference.
But the US Senate voted late Tuesday to lift that ban, acceding to White House wishes. Michigan Democrat Levin called the development "reckless and dangerous."
"The message from this administration (is) while we're telling everybody else don't go down that road, we are going to go down that road ourselves," he said.
Senator Dianne Feinstein said countries around the world were also likely to become alarmed by the development.
"It really says to the world that this nation with the mightiest military, is now going to begin to expand its nuclear weapons."
The controversy over the possible US development of low-yield nuclear weapons came as part of a larger senate debate on the 2004 Defense Authorization Bill that would give the Pentagon 400 billion dollars to fund military operations and modernize its arsenal.
The senate rejected an amendment by Feinstein that would have kept the decade-old ban on low-yield nuclear weapons in place -- a development that unleashed both heated defense and furious denunciations of the administration's defense and security policies from the senate floor.
Opponents warned Wednesday that introducing such weapons could trigger a dangerous new nuclear arms race.
"Do you know what the message is to India, to Pakistan, to North Korea -- to every other nation that wants nuclear weapons and has nuclear weapons?" said Senator Byron Dorgan.
"The message is, this country doesn't think that we ought to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, or that we ought to prevent the use of nuclear weapons.
"That is exactly the wrong message this country ought to be sending anybody in the rest of the world," the North Dakota Democrat said.
The comments by Dorgan and other Democratic colleagues were mild compared to those of West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd, who issued a scathing denunciation of White House military and diplomatic policy, accusing the Bush administration of "prevarication and the reckless use of power," during the recently-concluded war in Iraq.
Supporters of developing, or at the very least researching, the use of such weapons, maintained nuclear devices may one day prove to be an important weapon and that revoking the ban was necessary to combat new security threats around the world.
"We need to be thinking about what we want the military to look like 20 or 30 years down the road," said Colorado Senator Wayne Allard, who argued that a modern military needs to have at its disposal the broadest possible range of weapons.
Feinstein, while vowing to continue to fight, warned that the weapons seem headed toward certain development in the absence of a public outcry against them. She explained the lack of public outrage on the after effects of the September 11, 2001 terror attack on New York and Washington, which traumatized the entire nation.
"I sometimes think that the wound was so deep from 9/11, and it presented such deep scar tissue on the American psyche," Feinstein said, "that it kind of opened to door to all kinds of things that the American people would not have supported before."
Nevertheless, "some of us decided that we're going to fight and try to raise the warning flag," she said.
Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy lamented the "very deep division that exists in this country about the radical departure of this administration in terms of nuclear policy."
"We are going to do everything we possibly can ... to halt this reckless escalation of the nuclear arms race," said the Democrat.
It's generally referred to as a wake up call, Ms Feinstein.
Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy lamented the "very deep division that exists in this country about the radical departure of this administration in terms of nuclear policy."
The deep division, between those of us who want to see that America has the means to protect itself against terrorists and rogue countries who never have and never will "follow the rules", and the Dems, who have never considered the protection of the US as a priority.
"We are going to do everything we possibly can ... to halt this reckless escalation of the nuclear arms race," said the Democrat.
But only in the US.
Democrats prefer keeping things as they are....That is, they prefer using huge nukes on cities filled with civilians rather than using small nukes on the battlefield.
Have they no consciences?
No. Democrats have no substance of note. They are straw scarecrows living in straw houses surrounded with the straw dogs they use to protect their hollow strawlike ideology, which they use to suck nourishment produced by the labor and investment of others. If we aren't careful, their undefended, poorly built straw houses will ignite and set everything on fire.
Drop a tac-nuke down a rathole, you gotta lotta dead rats.
(..or was it "bugs"? What's the dif... *grin*)
Gee, Carl, doesn't that coincide with the approximate time you Dims took over the Executive Branch and the Defense Dept? It looks like "W" and Rummy are still working to clean up the mess you left. You didn't "get it" then, and you don't "get it" now.
Senator Dianne Feinstein said countries around the world were also likely to become alarmed by the development.
In the 14 years that we have had our nuclear arms development branch closed, Russia has not closed theirs. It seems the only thing the disarmament treaty did is disarm us! If we run down that road fast enough, we might just catch up with the rest of the pack.
Feinstein is pretty stupid along with the rest of the RATS. They do not care about Americas Defense, they do not even bother to check the facts, before shooting off their mouths. Is disarming America good for a sound byte? By all means sell your soul for air time! I just would not mind so much if they were not selling us out at the same time.
You know, for a hundred grand a year plus job, one would think they should do their homework before sounding off using their office as a soapbox.
Feinstein, you have been asleep. So had the American people. They woke up when someone murdered 3000 of us. God knows, you socialists are trying to put them back to sleep with bread and circus, but so far they're still awake.
We support defending ourselves now. We didn't before.
Great image!
I can picture the porkers, like Byrd, in the setting you have described.
And who would have thought a democrat would come up with the primary reason to get this project going!
As a matter of fact Senator, yes I do......
Screw up you a-holes and your toast!
Times are changin', Carl. See us pulling out of Saudi and Germany? See us dumping France for Spain and Canada for Bulgaria? Notice Saddam and the Taliban are gone? Notice North Korea reniged on their deal? Notice Turkey being a bunch of twits? Notice that hole in New York City where a certain pair of buildings used to be?
"The message from this administration (is) while we're telling everybody else don't go down that road, we are going to go down that road ourselves," he said.
Oh, so if we just tell terrorists not to use nukes, they won't? Oh wow, why didn't we try that first???
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