War, What Is it Good For? Electing Democrats in '08

Ryan Grim reports that the biggest and best-funded organizations in the liberal peace movement, primarily MoveOn and the groups in its Americans Against Escalation in Iraq (AAEI) coalition, are no longer advocating that Congress end the war. This year "the groups instead will lower their sights and push for legislation to prevent President Bush from entering into a long-term agreement with the Iraqi government that could keep significant numbers of troops in Iraq for years to come. ... The groups believe this switch in strategy can draw contrasts with Republicans that will help Democrats gain ground in November." AAEI's PR spokesperson, Moira Mack of Hildebrand Tewes Consulting, called it "the perfect legislative opportunity." In other words, as CMD's Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber noted last March, for MoveOn and other Democrat-aligned peace groups it's not about ending the war, it's about electing Democrats. Most of the tens of millions of dollars that MoveOn and AAEI have spent lobbying and organizing for "peace" has been directed at pressuring and embarrassing pro-war Republicans, while the Democratic Congress has continued to fund the war and pro-war Democrats have generally been given a pass.

Comments

What wrong with 'both-and' rather than 'either-or'? Do you think that peace groups that want to elect certain antiwar Dems in the primaries to defeat pro-war Dems can't oppose the war at the same time? Even if they are targeting only Republicans, don't you think they can do it AND oppose the war, or even BECAUSE they oppose the war?

And you opened the door to a critique of other peace groups than the consultant for AAEI quoted here.

Besides, what's the strategic implication here? That we have to overthrow the two-party system before we can end the war? It would be a lovely by-product of ending the war, but it's silly to make it an organizing principle for your antiwar plans. I wouldn't count on it or hold my breath.

Keep On Keepin' On
Carl Davidson
http://carldavidson.blogspot.com