If I were a Congressman I would be much like Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL). I think our personalities are very similar. I would come up with wild names for bills and crazy slogans just like he does. His latest, The War is Making You Poor Act, HR 5353, is straight from my own playbook. Except I might title it, The War is Making You Poor and Republicans Rich Act. Nonetheless, he has to be my closest comparison.
But even I have to make a distinction when it's necessary. Grayson's June 6th
blog post for
Huffington Post is absolutely right. We are doing exactly what bin Laden wants us to do with our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Grayson is dead on when he says Bush was bin Laden's best ally-- that bin Laden is co-creditor of our foreign policy is, I think, how Grayson puts it. I couldn't agree more. Bin Laden played George W. Bush right into his hands. Essentially, not that it's hard to do, the world's number one terrorist outsmarted Bush & Co. Bin Laden bogged us down in two very costly wars and is bleeding our country and economy penny by penny and troop by troop. It's exactly what he wanted; exactly what he said he would do and exactly what he did to defeat the last Super Power he fought.
Neither history nor fault stop there and this is where Grayson omits some very important information. President Obama is doing the same exact thing. He has ordered a surge in the war in Afghanistan and expanded it with more drone attacks in Pakistan and Syria. In addition, our withdrawal from Iraq, of which we are still a long way from, is probably not going to happen on schedule. Both wars are still very much ongoing.
Plus, it's only fair to mention the Iraq withdrawal plan is a carry-over from the Bush administration. They do deserve some credit for at least realizing the war had to end sometime. True enough it was the Obama administration that implemented it and made it official; and true enough the Bush administration constantly referred to time-lines as "defeat" and nonetheless did the opposite of their rhetoric. But oh well. I personally see very little difference between the Bush approach that bin Laden helped orchestrate and the Obama approach that continues us on a war path for what is only slightly less than infinity.
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