Kuhl listens to Ambassadors, not the American People
Congressman Randy Kuhl at Mendon Community Center 3/17:
The clip reveals a troubling development. As evident, Congressman Randy Kuhl has insulated himself from the majority of the American people, who plead for a change of course and US troop withdrawal from Iraq. Randy is listening more attuned to the advice of Middle Eastern ambassadors from across the globe instead of the local residents of the 29th District.
Congressman Randy Kuhl explains his thinking on how and when to withdraw US troops from Iraq. Kuhl justifies his reasoning based upon private conversations with ambassadors of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Jordan. Randy Kuhl states our brave men and women can not return home until Iraq is ’stabilized’ and Iraq ’stands up’ or ‘then it is a lost effort’. Kuhl ‘keeps in mind’ the comment of the Egyptian Ambassador about leaving Iraq: ‘if you leave…the disaster would be more colossal than World War II’.
Shocking, to say the least.
I have to disagree. I’m glad he’s talking with the ambassadors of Egypt and Jordan. On the other hand, here’s the point with this: Egypt and Jordan are Sunni countries and the Sunnis in Iraq may end up as the big losers in the event of an American withdrawl. Remember: they’re a small minority of the Iraqi people but they controlled the country under Saddam Hussein so there’s a lot of bad blood.
I agree that the interests of Sunni Muslims may not be aligned with our own interests, but better he listen to ambassadors from Egypt and Jordan than to columnists for the Weekly Standard (Bill Kristol is said to be the “brains” behind the recent escalation plan).
My concern is that he doen’t show a lot of serious independent though or personal analysis of issues, He consults with people who confirm the views of his leadership. I wouldn’t expect him to simply respond to the whims of his constituents, but I’d like to see evidence that his main job isn’t just to keep his job.
I agree that he doesn’t show much independent thought.
But relying on something he heard from an ambassador is at least a better cover story than the “the soldiers get to eat lobster tail!” garbage we were hearing this summer.
Not to say that I approve of either, but I take it is a sign of progress that we’ve made him step up his game in terms of his cover stories.
Since when does our Congressman need a cover story? A step up from Lobster stories? That is success? Geez -
That story broke last August. So for argument sake say August 1st. Since then 634 American serviceman and women have died in Iraq.
I think the point here is America is against the war. America wants it to end. To end it means leaving. Have you read Odom’s Op-ed?
Nice that he talks to regional leaders. Is that really going to stop us from pulling out? Should it?
We don’t need a permission slip from the neighbors to leave. Since I don’t believe Randy or the President for that matter believes it either then it is all pretense.
Bad news doesn’t get better with age.
The point is talk is cheap, we need to move out of Iraq. I spoke of this in your follow-up post.
“We don’t need a permission slip from the neighbors to leave.”
Well said. I think that’s the exact way to reply to what Kuhl said.
My point is that I think that his position here should be argued at from a _serious_ perspective, such as the one you take, rather than with the same mockery we gave to the lobster comments.
Okay so his _serious_ position is that we need to consider the best interests of the other countries in the region … but the Bushies didn’t think about the best interest of other countries in the region when they took us to war … it was only the United States interests that mattered at that time.
So why or how did Bush and the members of his party get to be so benevolent to care about other Middle Eastern (Arab) countries now? I don’t think Bush or the Republic party care about the best interest of other Arab countries. I think this is their smokescreen of the moment.
If they truly care about the best interests of those Arab countries, why aren’t we sitting down and doing serious diplomatic negotiations to avoid this potential disaster? And why don’t we adopt any one(s) of a thousand different foreign policy changes that are truly in the interest of those Middle Eastern countries?
Smokescreen. Smokescreen. Smokescreen.
Okay, first of all, his WWII comparison is just stupid. I meant to say that earlier.
In Kuhl’s defense, he did a sign a letter asking Bush to open negotiations with Iran.
Truthfully, I have no idea what goes on in Bush’s head when it comes to Iraq. I can’t even begin to fathom that.
Good that Kuhl is actually talking to people in the region, bad that he’s talking to ambassadors from Jordan and Egypt. Right now, the governments of most of the countries in the region are rather like those of the Central American during the Cold War (when they were the “Free World”) - authoritarian, often corrupt and repressive, and wildly out of touch with their people. It amazes me that, since 1945, the U.S. has always sided with dictatorships rather than popular insurgencies (unless those dictatorships were Communist or Communist-supported). Iran 1979 = any of Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria and/or Jordan 201?.
Paradoxically, Iran is probably the closest thing the U.S. has to a true ally in the region. It’s peaceful, democratic, and most of the people don’t remember the 1979 revolution and are sick to death of the mullahs. If you want something resembling a home-grown Western-style democracy in the Middle East, the closest you’re going to find is Iran. Better yet, for cultural and historical regions, they HATE Sunni extremists - like Al Queda and the Taliban. If Bush is actually allowed to attack Iran, the real tragedy will be that we’ve pissed away a real opportunity to get a stable, loyal ally in the region.