April 17, 2007

Dems’ Political Brinksmanship Endangers the Lives of Our Troops - and Threatens Future of Dem Party

Dems love to say that they "support our troops," but their support isn't worth much, since it includes a threat to cut off the funds our troops need to do their job as safely as they can. The army is already having to make plans to deal with restricted funding:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Army will defer spending and slow repair work on any equipment not needed for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan due to Congress' failure to approve $100 billion in extra war funding, the largest branch of the armed forces said on Monday.

The Pentagon also will ask Congress to allow the Defense Department to use $1.6 billion in funds meant for the Navy and Air Force to pay the Army's operating expenses, the Army said.

If funds are not approved by May, further spending restrictions will be made. That, the Army warned, could hurt its ability to take on a new fight.

Remember how the Dems used to complain that the troops didn't have sufficient armor? Now the Dems are trying to cut off funding for that armor.

Will any of our troops be killed because the funding they needed for equipment wasn't available?

The Dems are trying to put our troops in harm's way so as to force them to leave Iraq. The Dems are in this way directly helping those who are trying to kill our troops and destroy Democracy in Iraq so as to use Iraq as a new base of terrorist operations.

The Dems want to force another Vietnam on the country. But this time the country knows which party is pushing for that result. From an analysis piece in the Washington Post last February:

...yesterday's vote signaled peril for the Democratic congressional leadership as well. Despite deep Republican discontent with the course of the war, Democrats were unable to persuade more than 17 members of the president's party to register that dissatisfaction with their votes. If Democratic leaders could not build a broader bipartisan coalition for a symbolic vote, it may prove much harder to attract Republican support for proposals to limit Bush's options in Iraq.

Many Democratic strategists remain allergic to repeating the finale of the Vietnam War, when Congress voted to cut funds for the South Vietnamese government and the nation fell to the North in 1975. For years afterward, Democrats have struggled to shed the image of being soft on defense, which is why they were so eager to bring along more Republicans yesterday.

...Administration allies warned about the precedent beyond Bush as well. "If Congress proceeds to throttle the president's strategy, then it will seriously undercut the ability of future presidents to do what they need to do to protect the nation in a time of war," said James Phillips, a foreign policy scholar at the Heritage Foundation. "It's a mistake to think you can effectively run a war by committee."

Rarely have I been so offended by the actions of the Democratic party. As I previously posted in an article titled "Washington Post Compares Iraq to Vietnam - In Terms of Actions by Dems that Harmed Their Own Party":

The Dems must turn away from this path, that is so full of danger to our troops, to our nation, and to the Democratic party itself.