Garling Gauge

Commemorate Our Armed Forces: Grow a Backbone

Democratic leaders display a history of backing down

I am reminded this Memorial Day of the following video run on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee website in the early summer of last year. An excellent campaign video, it was quickly lambasted by Republicans for a brief image of flag-draped coffins.

By the DCCC exposing the true toll of the Iraq war wrought by Republican leadership, Republican’s denounced the Democrats as unpatriotic and opportunistic. On June 13th, 2006, the Republican National Committee website roared the following ballyhoo: DEMOCRAT DISGRACE

Some immediately saw right through the Republican smear, such as Bob Geiger, who wrote in his July 13, 2006 post on AlterNet:

• So there you have your Republican mock indignation of the day, from the same people who have used the 9/11 tragedy every day over the last five years for their own benefit.

How did the Democrats, eager to wrest power from the Republicans and show their leadership skills, respond?

They took the video down.

Fast forward to May 18th, 2007, when in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, former Pres. Jimmy Carter declared:

• “I think as far as the adverse impact on the nation around the world, this administration has been the worst in history. The overt reversal of America’s basic values as expressed by previous administrations, including those of George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and others, has been the most disturbing to me.

His statements received wide support, including my own, small commentary. His statements also received harsh criticism.

Newsweek summed up Carter backing down in the following way:

• Carter subsequently backtracked; after the White House branded his comments “reckless” and “sad,” Carter told NBC his remarks had been “careless or misinterpreted.”

Come to think of it, former Pres. Carter also backed down on the title and a passage from his book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid:

Now the current Democratic leadership has backed down, as noted in a May 22nd, 2007, New York Time’s article by Carl Hulse: Democrats Pull Troop Deadline From Iraq Bill. The first two paragraphs summarize the article:

• Congressional Democrats relented Tuesday on their insistence that a war spending measure set a date for withdrawing American combat troops from Iraq. Instead, they moved toward a deal with President Bush that would impose new conditions on the Iraqi government.

• The decision to back down was a wrenching reversal for leading Democrats, who saw their election triumph in November as a call to force an end to the war. It was the first time since taking power in Congress that the Democrats had publicly agreed to allow a vote on war financing without a timetable for troop withdrawal.

The Democrats were obviously in a bind, having exhausted, what they determined, the politically viable options available to them.

Left-wing Democrats feel betrayed by Congress passing a war funding bill without prerequisite timetables for withdraw. This is compounded by a history of Democrats backing down when they should be leading the way forward.

Keith Olbermann of MSNBC displays an example of this outrage:

To show true leadership and win the White House in 2008, Democrats needs to grow a backbone, set the debate, and quickly counter attack as they did in winning Congress last year.

Formally known as Decoration Day, Memorial Day began after the Civil War when communities set aside a day to observe the war’s end. My, how Memorial Day has changed.

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Listen to Steve Inskeep and Juan Williams discuss how Congress is doing on NPR’s Morning Edition, May 28, 2007: Click here for audio.

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