Posted on 06/27/2009 8:39:43 AM PDT by james.richardson
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced Friday it will launch a series of district-specific radio ads targeting vulnerable Republicans who voted against President Obama’s controversial war supplemental package.
As a matter of national security in years past Republicans have shown tremendous support for similar measures, however last week they voted en bloc against the $106 billion appropriations bill.
The Democratic Leadership and the DCCC would be content to let the public believe Republicans were “playing politics” with the troops, having voted against the emergency legislation out of pure spite for the president.
Over 100 Republicans voted for the bill when the first iteration—before the $83.5 billion bill mushroomed—reached the floor of the House several weeks ago. But after the Democratic Leadership rewrote the bill to include billions in funding for lawmakers’ pet projects, including an additional $5 billion in funding for the International Monetary Fund (IMF), virtually all Republicans defected, accusing the Democrats of lacing the emergency war-funding bill with billions of extraneous pork barrel spending.
If a global bailout is to be to debated and funded, it surely does not belong in a war appropriations bill. Democrats know this, just like they knew bailout-averse Republicans would, instinctively, vote against any such measure. And then they realized they had the upper-hand: they held the coveted “you’re-playing-politics-with-the-troops” card.
Calculating Democrats put a hold on the appropriations bill as Speaker Nancy Pelosi scrambled to corral enough votes to pass the bill without Republicans and anti-war Democrats. They did, and their disingenuous strategy to score political points—at the cost of our troops’ safety—was set afoot.
Among the Republicans targeted are Congressmen Ken Calvert (CA-44), Charlie Dent (PA-15), Jim Gerlach (PA-06), Dan Lungren (CA-03), Mike McCaul (TX-10), Lee Terry (NE-02).
As a testament to their lack of due diligence, they also set their sights on a retired U.S. Army National Guard Colonel, Congressman Joe Wilson (SC-02).
Military service in Congressman Wilson’s family doesn’t stop there, no. His oldest son Alan McCrory Wilson, a Major in the Army National Guard, spent a year in Iraq. Addison Wilson, Jr., a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, is Lieutenant in the Navy. Wilson’s third son, Julian Dusenbury Wilson, is a Captain in the Army National Guard. And his youngest, Hunter Taylor Wilson, is a current student at Clemson University – where he is, fancy that, a member of the Army ROTC and Army National Guard.
Now if there ever were a legislator who would be chiefly concerned with funding the military—thereby ensuring his own family has the resources they need—Congressman Wilson would be him. And if there ever were a party who would be chiefly concerned with scoring political points by jeopardizing the military, the Democratic Party would be it.
Shame on you, Speaker Pelosi and Congressman Chris Van Hollen. House Republicans were prepared to, and indeed did, pass a troop funding bill. Giving the military the resources they needed was not atop your agenda. As details and your strategy have fleshed themselves out, it has become increasingly apparent you were principal concerned with scoring disingenuous political points.
Shame on you, indeed.
Cross-posted at Skepticians.com.
The only way this will work is if Obama slashes military personnel by 2/3rds... and it is Exactly what Barney Frank and other top Dems suggest that he do!
Is this IMF gold? IMF gold contributed by the United States? What gold are we talking about?
And they can KMA too!
I will not be lectured by the party of lunatics.
Anybody with the will to surf the net, listen to Talk Radio, or watch FNC has heard the conservative message. Voters were NOT ignorant of the direction Obama-Pelosi-Reed would take us.
The problem is really Americans embraced socialism, and gave rats the House, a filibuster proof majority in the Senate, and the Presidency. The problem is the Drive-By Media is absolutely shameless in it's bias, and Pop Culture is deified. The problem is our public schools are indoctrination camps, where history is rewritten, morality subjectified, and ideology programed.
The problem is the game is rigged...
and maybe, the GOP doesn't know how to play, but I'm not ready to lynch Steele for it. The majority of American voters either likes socialism or they don't care about ideology but they still go out and vote. Even eloquent President Reagan couldn't get the conservative message out to the brain dead.
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