October 25, 2007 at 11:49:33

Not One More Dime to Continue the Iraq Occupation

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By Ron Fullwood (about the author) Page 2 of 2 page(s)

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Moreover, there needs to be a full accounting of all of the money spent by the administration in Iraq and Afghanistan before Congress begins to consider new funding requested by the administration in the Defense budget. Also, those funds which Congress intends to allocate for Iraq need to take a back seat to those concerns here at home which have been parsed out as miserly afterthoughts while over $800 billion since the invasion has flowed to Iraq, unabated by Congress.

There can't be any more cover for legislators who claim to be providing some necessary gear, equipment or supply for the troops because, there is more than enough money allocated in the last supplemental to just bring the troops home. There isn't even a bit of pretense left of any reasonable or acceptable justification for remaining in Iraq that anyone serious about their opposition to the occupation should accept or support with a vote for more tax dollars thrown into the money pit.

Any congressperson or senator claiming to be anti-occupation who gives Bush another dime for Iraq without legislating an exit date will be no less complicit in its continuing than the duplicitous liar in the White House. Those couple of thousand troops Bush promises to bring home by Christmas should be joined by several thousand more. The best way to ensure that Bush allows more troops to come home will be to show the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, that Congress is finished with funding their Iraq fiasco.

Mullen told students in the Artillery Captain's Career Course at Fort Sill this week that, "the Army is the best trained and equipped in the world and is a model for other countries. The question, he said, is: "How do I hang on to all of that?"

Congress needs to dictate the answer to his question, and not just wait for fate, or the demonstratively flawed judgment of the administration, to (once again) prevail.

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Ron Fullwood, is an activist from Columbia, Md. and the author of the book 'Power of Mischief' : Military Industry Executives are Making Bush Policy and the Country is Paying the Price

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