REP. DENNIS KUCINICH: I’m the only person running for president who not only voted against the war, but voted 100% of the time against funding the war. What you’ve heard here is a bunch of nuancing. They’re all saying the same thing, that they will keep troops in Iraq. The troops will be kept there to protect an embassy. The troops will be kept there for counterinsurgency and for training the Iraqi military. Well, the fact of the matter is, we must get out of Iraq. We must end the occupation, close the bases, bring the troops home. We don’t have a right to have an embassy there, as we are an occupying army. And any way that the United States government would keep its foot in the door of Iraq is a way that the war will continue, because the occupation is fueling the insurgency.
I’m the only one running who had a plan that was introduced immediately after the invasion that called for not only an end to the occupation, closing of the bases, bringing the troops home, but also a parallel process of an international security and peacekeeping force that would move in as our troops leave. We cannot get such a force until the United States determines it will end the occupation. Once we determine we will do that, we can move and to have a rapprochement with Syria, as well as opening diplomatic relations with Iran for the first time in twenty-nine years. It’s vitally important that we work to effect a program of reconciliation between the Shiites, the Sunnis and the Kurds; an honest reconstruction program, where we get rid of the crooked contractors and the mercenaries who have compounded the American occupation. In addition to that, we need to have a program of reparations to the Iraqi people. Over a million innocent Iraqis have been killed. We must repair the breach. That breach was a monetary one. It is a moral and social one. We have a lot of work to do there, and we’re going to have to do it not by occupying, but by showing that we can have a leader who’s compassionate enough to recognize a moral and financial responsibility to the Iraqi people.
We also have to make sure that the Iraqi people have full control of their oil. I’m the only one who’s running who understood immediately that the Bush program for reconciliation was in fact a plan to privatize Iraq’s oil in order to gain control over a $30 billion oil wealth. I think that it is manifestly clear that the only person running for president who will bring our troops home, who will get out of there within three months from taking office, is myself. And all the others have tried to game this issue. They either voted for the war, in the case of Senator Edwards and Senator Clinton, or they voted to fund the war, in the case of Senator Edwards, Senator Clinton and Senator Obama, who, by the way, campaigned in saying, well, he opposed the war from the start, but then when he was elected to the Senate, his voting record is indistinguishable from Senator Clinton’s with respect to funding the war. So you can’t talk out of both sides of your mouth on this thing. You’re either for getting out of Iraq, or you’re not. If you’re for getting out of Iraq, you don’t keep troops there for any purpose whatsoever.
The full transcript is at: http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/16/breaking_the_sound_barrier_democracy_now
Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
