- SAN DIEGO -- While the Administration
mulls four different levels of troop escalation in Afghanistan, the California
Democratic Party today presented a very different position, as the party
took a step towards rejecting any further U.S. military expansion in the
war-torn Central Asian republic. On Saturday, a committee of the party's
executive board voted in support of a resolution calling for an end to
the 8-year military intervention in Afghanistan, as well as demanding a
cessation of the aerial bombing campaign.
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- This stance represents the first significant opposition
to the Administration's current Afghanistan military policy from within
the President's own political party.
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- Noting that polls "show a majority of Americans
are increasingly disturbed about the toll" of wounded and traumatized
American troops, the resolution renews the call for a time-table for a
withdrawal of U.S. combat forces, adding a demand to "end to the use
of mercenary contractors, as well as an end to the air war on civilian
populations, and urges our President to oversee a redirection of our funding
and resources to include an increase in humanitarian and developmental
aid." (The resolution's full text can be found here.)
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- The moving testimony of Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran
Rick Reyes was seen by many as instrumental to building broad support for
the policy position. Reyes, a Marine Corps veteran, shared his concerns
that the U.S. cannot achieve success in Afghanistan through military means,
and that the policies of the last eight years have failed. Moreover, noted
Reyes, "the Taliban poses no direct threat to U.S. soil."
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- Los Angeles native Reyes served tours of duty in Afghanistan
as well as Iraq, and previously testified before the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee on April 23, 2009, which was 38 years to the date after a young
Vietnam veteran named John Kerry posed his own question to the Senate,
"How do you ask a person to be the last man to die for a mistake?"
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- After his testimony, Corporal Reyes spoke before the
party's Progressive Caucus, citing his recent experience meeting with members
of Congress in Washington D.C., where the former Marine urged a re-evaluation
their Afghanistan position before approving any further emergency appropriations.
Reyes' work on Capitol Hill was joined by former female Afghanistan Parliament
member Malalai Joya.
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- The Afghanistan resolution's co-authors are prominent
members of the Democratic Party of California, and include Progressive
Caucus Chair Karen Bernal and Congressional Candidate Marcy Winograd. Joined
by the party's Women's Caucus, Bernal and Winograd held a forum called
"Exiting Afghanistan," featuring clips from the new Robert Greenwald
documentary "Rethink Afghanistan." Author and journalist Norman
Solomon recounted his experience meeting with displaced Afghanis living
in a wretched refugee camp outside of Kabul. Solomon, of Sonoma County,
served as a delegate for Barack Obama at the party's 2008 nominating convention
in Denver.
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- Having passed through committee successfully, the Afghanistan
de-escalation resolution now goes to a Sunday floor vote of the Democratic
party's executive board. Commented Reyes,
- "Congress must hear more voices like ours before
escalating this war any further. More veterans need to speak out."
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- The author can be contacted at mike.copass@libertyonemedia.com
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- Pictured above: Karen Bernal and Marcy Winograd,
two of the resolution's authors.
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