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Labor's Antiwar Movement
Write-in "Doug Mann" for School Board
by Doug Mann, 29 Oct 2004, Submitted to the Star-Tribune for publication 28 Oct 2004
Subj: [laborpartyusa] Labor's Antiwar movement
Date: 5/7/2003 10:01:13 AM Central Daylight Time
From: Dougmann99@cs.com
To: laborpartyusa@yahoogroups.com
CC: laborpartypraxis@yahoogroups.com
Please note that USLAW has backed off from raising the demand to immediately withdraw US troops from Iraq. The language in USLAW's draft resolution is in fact at odds with the demand to "Bring the troops Home Now!"
Coupled with the call "for reconstruction of that war-devastated country under the auspices of the United Nations" USLAW's call for an end to the US occupation of Iraq is meaningless. The reconstruction of Iraq under UN auspices is basically the same thing as a continuation of the US occupation under the UN flag. That's also the position of Bush's loyal opposition within the Democratic Party.
And opposition to "Bush's doctrine of preemption" is just more inane rhetoric from Bush's loyal opposition in the Democratic Party. Acts of war, up to and including the invasion and occupation of countries other than Iraq has been done many times with flimsier pretexts or none at all. The Bush doctrine is essentially no different from the foreign policy of liberal icons like FDR and JFK.
The "antiwar" Democrats, i.e., those who voted against authorizing 'unilateral' military action last fall also supported preparations for the invasion. After all, their alternative to war, the inspection regime was based on the credible threat of an invasion. And the Bush administration made it pretty clear that UN approval was a dispensable formality. That's why I have been slamming the "Win Without War Coalition" and MoveOn.org as being leading lights of the anti-antiwar movement / the phony antiwar movement.
The draft antiwar statement presented to the USLAW conference in January was similar to the statement adopted by the Labor Party in February. Both included language opposing an invasion of Iraq outside of the framework of the UN. This is a rather significant detail left out of the account of
founding conference by Bill Onasch, which is the only report about the USLAW founding conference that I've seen. -- Onasch is a member of the Labor Party INC and a leader of the Kansas City LP chapter.
If you haven't already, please read
by Charles Walker, from LABOR TUESDAY! for May 6, 2003
http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/bobibt/myhomepage/news.html?mtbrand=AOL_US
-Doug Mann
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