Politicians should be kept away from Iraq
Wes Heinkel
Issue date: 1/31/07 Section: Opinion
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Picture this: 535 members of our nation's Congress, each dressed to a T with firm, white collars, expensive ties and polished shoes. Nancy Pelosi has a gaudy, bright red sash, little American Flag pins run rampant, there's a plethora of gray-haired, old white males and a scarcity of minorities and women, and all are discussing the war in Iraq as it happens in real time.
Imagine a Congress composed of two chambers forging foreign policy for the betterment of Iraq with all possible education, endowments and knowledge. It creates some sort of Utopian pipe dream, a Shangri-La in the heart of the Middle East, if you will. It is a success of epic proportions, worthy of praise across the globe.
And then you get pinched - dream's over, fairy-tale obsolete. Pack your bags and return to reality. The fact is, members of Congress so graciously elected by us still cannot agree on the color of crap. While the majority of us can agree that it's brown, there are those out there who either have a fiber problem or are color-blind, causing the color to vary.
In a recent meeting of the Foreign Relations Committee, Republican Chuck Hagel said this about the nonbinding resolution showing opposition to President Bush's troop surge: "There is no strategy. This is a ping-pong game with American lives. These young men and women that we put in Anbar province, in Iraq, in Baghdad are not beans. They're real lives. And we better be damn sure we know what we're doing - all of us - before we put 22,000 more Americans into that grinder … I think all 100 senators ought to be on the line on this. What do you believe? What are you willing to support? What do you think? Why were you elected? If you wanted a safe job, go sell shoes."
Those words look great on paper and his emotional tirade was a sight to see, but beyond the uncongenial rhetoric, there are some real issues. The non-binding resolution carries just about as much weight as a fart in the wind. No real decision was made. Congratulations Senator Hagel, you are about to passionately cast a meaningless vote that achieves absolutely nothing. This seemingly honorable endeavor is really just a political scheme. All the resolution really did was show our enemies how divided and lacking America is concerning national morale.
Imagine a Congress composed of two chambers forging foreign policy for the betterment of Iraq with all possible education, endowments and knowledge. It creates some sort of Utopian pipe dream, a Shangri-La in the heart of the Middle East, if you will. It is a success of epic proportions, worthy of praise across the globe.
And then you get pinched - dream's over, fairy-tale obsolete. Pack your bags and return to reality. The fact is, members of Congress so graciously elected by us still cannot agree on the color of crap. While the majority of us can agree that it's brown, there are those out there who either have a fiber problem or are color-blind, causing the color to vary.
In a recent meeting of the Foreign Relations Committee, Republican Chuck Hagel said this about the nonbinding resolution showing opposition to President Bush's troop surge: "There is no strategy. This is a ping-pong game with American lives. These young men and women that we put in Anbar province, in Iraq, in Baghdad are not beans. They're real lives. And we better be damn sure we know what we're doing - all of us - before we put 22,000 more Americans into that grinder … I think all 100 senators ought to be on the line on this. What do you believe? What are you willing to support? What do you think? Why were you elected? If you wanted a safe job, go sell shoes."
Those words look great on paper and his emotional tirade was a sight to see, but beyond the uncongenial rhetoric, there are some real issues. The non-binding resolution carries just about as much weight as a fart in the wind. No real decision was made. Congratulations Senator Hagel, you are about to passionately cast a meaningless vote that achieves absolutely nothing. This seemingly honorable endeavor is really just a political scheme. All the resolution really did was show our enemies how divided and lacking America is concerning national morale.
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