The Republicans are very smart. They know that the Democrats have the power to stop the war. Yes, The Democrats have the power and the votes right now to stop the war. They don't need Republican help. They don't need Joe Lieberman. They don't even need all the bluedog dems. The problem is the Republicans have, brilliantly, made the Democratic leadership afraid to use their power.

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The Republicans are very smart. They know that the Democrats have the power to stop the war.

Yes, The Democrats have the power and the votes right now to stop the war. They don't need Republican help. They don't need Joe Lieberman. They don't even need all the bluedog dems.

The problem is the Republicans have, brilliantly, made the Democratic leadership afraid to use their power. They have framed the use of that power as anti soldier, anti-troops.

The Democrats have the votes now to cut off funding for the war. This will not suddenly stop shipments of food or ammo to soldiers in Iraq. THe military has billions, maybe even trillions of dollars in "black money pots" stashed all over the planet, hidden from congress.

The pentagon could probably run the war for another year or two, without another nickel.

But a refusal to further fund the war unless the troops are withdrawn would cause a confrontation between congress and the president. It would cause a confrontation that would force the Pentagon to re-evaluate their relationship with the commander and chief and the congress. In families, this is called "triangulation." It's not a great thing in family systems, but in a pathologically impaired "system" like we now have in the US, triangulation may be a very good thing.

The pentagon might just wake up to realize that Bush and Cheney, who have done more to embarass and shame the US military than any enemy in its history, no longer have full control of the reins of power. The Pentagon may just start leaking whistleblowers. It would be about time. It is sad and frightening that there have not been courageous truthtellers coming out of the military. The failure of truthtelling whistleblowers to emerge from the military is a sad indictment of the military culture. THey are more loyal to their power and hierarchy than to America and her freedoms.

The Democrats leading congress have the power now to block further funding of the war-- of the pentagon. They can insist that the troops be brought home. They can insist that the disgusting no-bid contracts with Halliburton be cancelled and the funding of hundreds of thousands of mercenaries, called private contractors, also be cut off.

The Dems have the power now. The Republicans have, so far, effectively mounted a campaign that directly attacks that power.

The Dems have the support of the American people. The Dems need to find the courage to stand up to the spin, which is just that and nothing more. The Dems need to embrace their power, block the funding and be proud of it. They will be attacked by the Republicans, who will accuse them of abandoning the troops. That's just spin. But it's old, tired, weak spin, like "cut and run" and "hold the course."

The Dems can laugh at the Republicans failure, their incompetence and their track record of letting the troops down-- with Humvee armor, Kevlar vests, Walter Reed-- letting America down with Katrina...

The Dems can attack back-- HARD-- that Bush and his rubber stampers had four years to "achieve victory" to support the troops. But they have failed. They are impotent blowhards spewing a lot of hot air.

They have not had the sense to plan the war and they do not have the guts to tell the truth-- that their failures lost the war.

It doesn't have to take many people to get this message rolling as a meme that can gather power. If it's expressed in a tough enough, agressive enough way, the media will give it voice.

The Republicans will whine back, weakly with their old message. They are very bad a being nimble on their feet, message-wise. So they will just keep saying the same thing. The Dems must get creative in calling the Republicans failures, incompetents and losers. The Dems must weave together the failure in Iraq, Katrina, Walter Reed, diplomacy, the fact that Bush has recreated the deal that Clinton had with Korea... there's a whole litany.

The question is, which members of congress have the guts to do this. Whoever does will be setting his or her self up for a run for the Whitehouse. This will be tough talk, leadership and courage in action.

If Hillary did it, there is no doubt, it would erase much of the enmity many of the antiwar activists now hold towards her. If Obama does it, it will help him to stand out as a strong leader with the courage to take a stand.

John Murtha could do it, as a military veteran. My congressman, for my district in PA, Patrick Murphy, the only Iraq veteran in congress, is in a great position to do it. They're good men. I hope they make the couragous choice, that they consider how many American lives will be wasted... WASTED by delaying the end of the war because they are afraid some incompetent failure Republicans will call them and their party names. I know they have guts. The question is can the rise to be leaders who help give the rest of the Democrats the guts.

Unfortunately, the Fall 2008 deadline the congressional Dems have just proposed is weak, certainly not enough, and most important, has no chance of passing the senate or the sure veto Bush will give it.

Blocking further funding of the war only takes 41 senators and a majority in the house. It's not legislation, it's blockage of legislation. Bush can't veto it. Republicans in the senate can't filibuster it. It is the way of power that the Democrats already have right now.

It is time for them to embrace it.

Authors Bio:

Rob Kall is an award winning journalist, inventor, software architect,
connector and visionary. His work and his writing have been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, CNN, ABC, the HuffingtonPost, Success, Discover and other media.

Check out his platform at RobKall.com

He is the author of The Bottom-up Revolution; Mastering the Emerging World of Connectivity

He's given talks and workshops to Fortune
500 execs and national medical and psychological organizations, and pioneered
first-of-their-kind conferences in Positive Psychology, Brain Science and
Story. He hosts some of the world's smartest, most interesting and powerful
people on his Bottom Up Radio Show,
and founded and publishes one of the top Google- ranked progressive news and
opinion sites, OpEdNews.com

more detailed bio:

Rob Kall has spent his adult life as an awakener and empowerer-- first in the field of biofeedback, inventing products, developing software and a music recording label, MuPsych, within the company he founded in 1978-- Futurehealth, and founding, organizing and running 3 conferences: Winter Brain, on Neurofeedback and consciousness, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology (a pioneer in the field of Positive Psychology, first presenting workshops on it in 1985) and Storycon Summit Meeting on the Art Science and Application of Story-- each the first of their kind. Then, when he found the process of raising people's consciousness and empowering them to take more control of their lives one person at a time was too slow, he founded Opednews.com-- which has been the top search result on Google for the terms liberal news and progressive opinion for several years. Rob began his Bottom-up Radio show, broadcast on WNJC 1360 AM to Metro Philly, also available on iTunes, covering the transition of our culture, business and world from predominantly Top-down (hierarchical, centralized, authoritarian, patriarchal, big) to bottom-up (egalitarian, local, interdependent, grassroots, archetypal feminine and small.) Recent long-term projects include a book, Bottom-up-- The Connection Revolution, debillionairizing the planet and the Psychopathy Defense and Optimization Project.

Rob Kall Wikipedia Page

Rob Kall's Bottom Up Radio Show: Over 400 podcasts are archived for downloading here, or can be accessed from iTunes. Or check out my Youtube Channel

Rob Kall/OpEdNews Bottom Up YouTube video channel

Rob was published regularly on the Huffingtonpost.com for several years.

Rob is, with Opednews.com the first media winner of the Pillar Award for supporting Whistleblowers and the first amendment.

To learn more about Rob and OpEdNews.com, check out A Voice For Truth - ROB KALL | OM Times Magazine and this article.

For Rob's work in non-political realms mostly before 2000, see his C.V.. and here's an article on the Storycon Summit Meeting he founded and organized for eight years.

Press coverage in the Wall Street Journal: Party's Left Pushes for a Seat at the Table

Talk Nation Radio interview by David Swanson: Rob Kall on Bottom-Up Governance June, 2017

Here is a one hour radio interview where Rob was a guest- on Envision This, and here is the transcript..

To watch Rob having a lively conversation with John Conyers, then Chair of the House Judiciary committee, click here. Watch Rob speaking on Bottom up economics at the Occupy G8 Economic Summit, here.

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