You Might Not Know It From The Election Campaign But There's Still An Active War In Afghanistan

As if the unfolding of this midterm cycle wasn't sickening enough to think about, I've been re-reading Rick Perlstein's Nixonland, specifically the parts about how he dealt with the Vietnam War and how he cynically exploited every facet he could for narrow domestic partisan gain. Being sociopaths, Republicans are really good at that; Democrats aren't.

Not many people, other than the families of the killed and wounded, are paying much attention to the very violent U.S. occupation of Afghanistan-- no one in America, I mean-- right now, right in the middle of an election cycle. Yesterday, the NY Times reported that a whole Afghan police unit defected to the Taliban and there was nary a ripple. I lived briefly not far from Khogeyani, where this happened when I was visiting college buddies who were stationed in Ghazni, southwest of Kabul. That was 1969-70 and, by our standards, this was about as backward a place as you could ever hope to find, not just in terms of technological development-- it sort of stopped in its tracks after the invention of the wheel-- but in terms of human development as well. No, they're not just like us. Maybe they're just like our ancestors were 2,500 years ago... or earlier. It's insane that the U.S. is sacrificing the recovery of our economy for a war that no one quote understands what we're doing in. Counting the medical care of severely wounded American soldiers-- something around $700 billion-- the estimates for the cost to the U.S. of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, so far, is between $4 trillion and $6 trillion. That's even more than all the help the Republicans want to make sure poor people never get!

Yesterday David Swanson argued convincingly that the U.S. has to choose between war and jobs. The Democrats may be better regarded by normal voters than the Republicans but because Obama and Congress let the country down so dramatically on real change in so many ways, the Democrats are suffering painful reversals today-- and not just in the Old Confederacy.

All during the campaign you hardly heard a voice from either side of the aisle arguing about the war. It was a non-issue, except for Alan Grayson, who has been one of the most serious voices in the country about ending it. Yesterday, in his final substantive communication with central Florida voters he reminded them how important an issue the war is.

Before the election tomorrow, I want to tell you one last thing about my Republican opponent, Daniel Webster. Because it illustrates the mindset of the Far Right, and what will happen to us if Webster, and people like Webster, come to power again.
 
This year, jobs and the economy are on the voters’ minds. But every once in a while, a question comes up about war and peace. It happened here a few weeks ago. Someone asked Daniel Webster, “how long do we stay in Afghanistan?”
 
Webster’s answer: “However long we stay is a military decision that should not be shared with the world.”
 
Nor, apparently, shared with us. It’s our job to pay for the war, and to raise children who will fight and die in that war. But not to know how long the war will go on, even if it goes on forever.
 
But that’s not all. Webster said that the war in Afghanistan must continue indefinitely, because “we need a beachhead in the Middle East.” (Note to Webster: Afghanistan is in Central Asia, not the Middle East.) And occupying Afghanistan “protects us,” Webster said, “because once that beachhead is established, it can move further and further.”
 
In Thomas Greer’s book A Brief History of the Western World, he describes the result of the Crusades as follows: “The feudal system of western Europe was thus transplanted to this Christian beachhead in the Middle East.”
 
But here is the punchline. Webster finishes his answer to the question “how long do we stay in Afghanistan” by referring to “the biggest threat to our country.” Which is this: “Losing the hand of God’s protection.”
 
Greer’s book describes the “orgy of looting and killing of Muslims and Jews” during the Crusades. In words echoing what Daniel Webster says today, one Crusader wrote in his journal, “It was a just and splendid judgment of God that this place [Jerusalem] should be filled with the blood of unbelievers, since it had suffered so long from their blasphemies.”
 
I support peace. Daniel Webster supports endless war. The choice is clear...
 
I believe what Abraham Lincoln believed: "Don't pray that God's on our side; pray that we're on his side."