… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Category: Joe Biden

  • US Lawmakers Renew Call for Biden to Drop Charges Against Julian Assange

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    Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Supporters of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange protest outside London’s Old Bailey court on September 7, 2020 as his fight against extradition to the U.S. resumed. (Photo: Richard Baker/Getty Images)

    “The bottom line is that journalism is not a crime,” said Rep. Jim McGovern. “The stakes are too high for us to remain silent.”

    Imploring the Biden administration to “not pursue an unnecessary prosecution that risks criminalizing common journalistic practices,” a bipartisan group of 16 U.S. lawmakers have signed a letter dated Wednesday to President Joe Biden urging him to end the attempted extradition of Julian Assange and drop all charges against the jailed publisher.

    “Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, faces multiple charges under the Espionage Act due to his role in publishing classified documents about the U.S. State Department, Guantánamo Bay, and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,” states the letter, which is led by Reps. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.). “He has been detained on remand in London since 2019 and is pending extradition to the U.S., having lost his appeal of the extradition order in the courts of the United Kingdom.”

    Assange—who suffers from physical and mental health problems including heart and respiratory issues—published materials, many of them provided by whistleblower Chelsea Manning, exposing U.S. and allied war crimes, including the “Collateral Murder” video showing a U.S. Army helicopter crew killing a group of Iraqi civilians, the Afghan War Diary, and the Iraq War Logs.

    “Deep concerns about this case have been repeatedly expressed by international media outlets, human rights, and press freedom advocates, and members of Congress,” the lawmakers wrote. “In April of this year… members of the House argued to Attorney General Merrick Garland that ‘every day that the prosecution of Julian Assange continues is another day that our own government needlessly undermines our own moral authority abroad and rolls back the freedom of the press under the First Amendment at home.’”

    The new letter has been signed by Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), Greg Casar (D-Texas), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Cori Bush (D-Mo.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Eric Burlison (R-Mo.), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Paul Gosar (R-Az.), Jesús “Chuy” García (D-Ill.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Matthew Rosendale (R-Mont.), and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

    In a message last month inviting congressional colleagues to sign the letter, McGovern and Massie explained that their goal is”to strongly encourage the Biden administration to withdraw the U.S. extradition request currently pending against Australian publisher Julian Assange and halt all prosecutorial proceedings against him as soon as possible.”

    McGovern said last month in a statement to The Intercept that “the bottom line is that journalism is not a crime.”

    “The work reporters do is about transparency, trust, and speaking truth to power,” he added. “When they are unjustly targeted, we all suffer the consequences. The stakes are too high for us to remain silent.”

    The new letter follows last month’s official state visit of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, an Assange supporter who raised the jailed journalist’s case with President Joe Biden, insisting that “enough is enough.” A cross-party delegation of Australian lawmakers also traveled to the U.S. ahead of Albanese’s visit in an effort to pressure the Biden administration “to cease its pursuit and prosecution of Julian Assange.”

    Imploring Americans to put themselves in Australian shoes, former Australian Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce told reporters after meeting with U.S. officials during the lawmakers’ trip: “Imagine if the Australian government said, ‘Hey you in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, as far as we’re concerned, you committed a crime, and you’re going to Canberra where we’re going to send you to jail for 175 years,‘ you’d be up us like a rat up a drainpipe.”

    According to the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, Assange has been arbitrarily deprived of his freedom since he was arrested on December 7, 2010. Since then he has been held under house arrest, confined for seven years in the Ecuadorean Embassy in London while he was protected by the administration of former Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa, and jailed in London’s notorious maximum-security Belmarsh Prison, where he is now.

    If fully convicted of the Espionage Act charges, Assange—who fathered two children with attorney Stella Morris, whom he married last year, while holed up in the Ecuadorean Embassy—could be sentenced to 175 years in prison.

    Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

  • Genocide in Gaza Would Not Be Possible Without Western Complicity

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    Original article by RAMZY BAROUD republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    A pro-Palestinian protester holds a placard accusing Biden, Sunak and Netanyahu of war crimes at a demonstration against Israeli attacks on Gaza in central London, UK.  (Photo by: Andy Soloman/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

    The word ‘hypocrisy’ here does not even begin to describe what is taking place, and the repercussions of this moral failure will be felt around the world for years to come.

    On October 20, Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, stood on the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing, between Egypt and besieged Gaza.

    Guterres was not the only international figure to travel to the Gaza border, hoping to mobilize the international community in the face of an ongoing genocide, in an already impoverished and besieged Strip.

    “Behind these walls, we have two million people that is suffering (sic) enormously,” Guterres said.

    These efforts, however, paid little dividends.

    The spokesperson for the Ministry of Health in Gaza, Ashraf al-Qudra, said in a statement on October 24, that the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza is “too slow (for it to) change the reality” on the ground.

    Never again should the West be allowed to play the role of the mediator, the impartial politician, the judge, or even the self-serving humanitarian.

    This means that the seemingly endless UN Security Council debates, General Assembly resolutions and calls for action did little to alter the tragic situation in Gaza in any meaningful way.

    This begs the question, what is the use of the elaborate international political, humanitarian and legal systems, if they are unable to stop, or even slow down a genocide that is being aired live on TV screens all across the world?

    In previous genocides, whether those accompanying the Great Wars or that of Rwanda in 1994, various justifications were offered to explain the lack of immediate actions. In some cases, no Geneva Conventions existed and, as in Rwanda, many pleaded ignorance.

    But, in Gaza, no excuse is acceptable. Every international news company has correspondents or some presence in the Strip. Hundreds of journalists, reporters, bloggers, photographers and cameramen are documenting and counting every event, every massacre and every bomb dropped on civilian homes. It is important here to note that scores of journalists have already been killed in Israeli attacks.

    Scientific approximations are telling us, for example, that nearly 25,000 tons of explosives have been dropped on Gaza by Israel in the first 27 days of war. It is equivalent to two atomic bombs, like those dropped by the US on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

    When US President Joe Biden callously tried to question the numbers of the Palestinian dead, the Gaza medical staff, who are forced to perform life-saving surgeries on the dirty grounds of hospitals, took the time to prove him wrong. On October 26, they produced a list containing the names of 6,747 Palestinian casualties who were killed in the first 19 days of war.

    Thousands have been killed and wounded since then, yet Washington and its Western allies insist that “Israel has the right to defend itself” even if this comes at the expense of a whole nation.

    The Israelis are not masking their language in any way. The New York Times reported on October 30 that “in private conversations with American counterparts, Israeli officials referred to how the United States and other allied powers resorted to devastating bombings in Germany and Japan during World War II … to try to defeat those countries.” A few days later, Israeli Minister Amichai … has openly declared that nuking Gaza is an option in his country’s genocidal war on the Palestinian people.

    On the day the NYT report appeared, Karim Khan, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), arrived at the Egyptian side of the Rafah border.

    He still used the same guarded language, as if not to offend the sensibilities of Israel and its Western allies. “Crimes allegedly committed in both places have to be looked into,” he said, referring to both Israel and Gaza.

    One could excuse Khan by arguing that legal jargon must be restrained until a thorough investigation is conducted. But thorough investigations are rarely conducted when it comes to Israeli crimes in Gaza or anywhere else in Palestine.

    When an investigation is carried out, international judges frequently find themselves accused by the US and Israel of bias or worse, anti-Semitism. In the case of the investigation spearheaded by a respected South African judge, Richard Goldstone in 2009, the man was forced to retract part of his report.

    Khan knows this too well because he is currently sitting on a large and growing file of Israeli war crimes in Palestine, insisting on delaying the procedure under various excuses. Obviously, the US does not favorably view ICC judges who advance war crime cases against Israel. The anti-ICC sanctions imposed by the Trump Administration in 2020 are an example.

    Many officials in Western institutions are becoming aware of this hypocrisy. On October 28, Craig Mokhiber resigned from his position as the Director of the New York office of the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights in protest of the UN’s failure to stop “a genocide unfolding before our eyes in Gaza.”

    On October 20, around 850 members of the EU staff signed a letter to EU Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, criticizing her “unconditional support” for Israel.

    The letter was polite and diplomatic, considering the horrendous moral failure of Von der Leyen, especially when her gung-ho approach to the Russian war in Ukraine is compared to her blind support of Israeli crimes in Gaza. “Only if we acknowledge Israel’s pain, and its right to defend itself, will we have the credibility to say that Israel should react … in line with international humanitarian law,” she said.

    The International Olympic Committee, which insists on separating between politics and sports, has no problem meddling in politics when the enemy is a Palestinian.

    The IOC issued a statement on November 1, warning any participant in the Paris Olympics, scheduled for 2024, from engaging in any “discriminatory behavior” against Israeli athletes, because “athletes cannot be held responsible for the actions of their governments.”

    The word ‘hypocrisy’ here does not even begin to describe what is taking place, and the repercussions of this moral failure will be felt around the world for years to come. Never again should the West be allowed to play the role of the mediator, the impartial politician, the judge, or even the self-serving humanitarian.

    This is not a difficult conclusion to reach. Gaza has been turned into a Hiroshima as a result of Western bombs and the blank political check handed to Israel by Western governments and leaders from the onset of the war, in fact, 75 years prior.

    Nothing will ever alter this fact, and no ‘strongly worded’ future statements will ever help the West redeem its collective moral failure.

    Original article by RAMZY BAROUD republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

  • Democratic Establishment Seems Ready to Lose With Biden in 2024

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    Zionist president Joe Biden. 27 July 2021 image by Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz. Original public domain image from Flickr
    Zionist president Joe Biden. 27 July 2021 image by Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz. Original public domain image from Flickr

    Original article by JEFF COHEN republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    It looks as though there is only one scenario that offers hope for November 2024: the increasingly unpopular Democratic president announces in the coming weeks that he won’t seek reelection.

    If you get your news from Biden-protecting outlets (MSNBC is just the most extreme of many), you’ve been warned daily that the Trump movement is preparing to steal the 2024 election. It’s a totally legitimate worry – given that MAGA forces nearly stole the 2020 election.

    But there’s another totally legitimate worry that Biden-friendly media don’t like to discuss – that Joe Biden is such a weak candidate, he’s likely to lose a fair-and-square election in 2024. And likely to lose even to the discredited, unstable, repeatedly indicted Trump.

    The New York Times/Sienna College poll of registered voters released Sunday should cause alarm: Biden is trailing Trump in head-to-head match-ups in five of the six most crucial battlegrounds states – all of which Biden won in 2020. The president trails Trump in Nevada by more than 10 points. He trails Trump in Georgia by six points, in Arizona and Michigan by five points, and in Pennsylvania by four points. (Only in Wisconsin does Biden lead, and that’s by only two points.)

    If your news diet is provided by MSNBC or other pro-Biden corporate outlets, you may have heard Biden likened to the second coming of FDR, a savior to the working classes. That’s not how the working classes see him. They see him as economically ineffectual, especially in dealing with inflation. “Bidenomics” may be a success story in the studios of MSNBC or CNN or NPR; it’s not seen that way by the voting masses.

    The “not-as-bad-as-Trump” pitch is obviously not satisfying many Democratic-leaning voters and activists, especially young progressives who are angry with Biden over Gaza civilian deaths and other failings.

    In fairness to Biden-allied media, many of those who voted for Biden in 2020 – but now tell pollsters they won’t do so in 2024 – are “low-information voters.” While some are misinformed by right-wing outlets, most don’t pay close attention to news or politics. You can tell that from the ill-informed quotes they gave to the Times.

    But in my view, the new poll actually understates the problems for Biden. The president has lost many of the activists who are needed to inform the ill-informed, to organize get-out-the-vote campaigns and mobilize occasional voters. These activists are often highly informed. Indeed, they are so well-informed that they know all too well about Biden’s policy reversals and broken promises. For example, thousands of climate activists mobilized in swing states to help Biden defeat Trump in 2020. Will they in 2024?

    As civilians in Gaza are being massacred day after day, Biden’s one-sided “I stand with Israel” policy is losing him countless young activists and racial justice organizers who mobilized for him against Trump in 2020. In Michigan and other swing states, Arab and Muslim activists who detest Trump have said they won’t vote for Biden, let alone mobilize for him

    Let me be clear about my own position: On every issue where Biden’s policies are mediocre (like on climate or the corporate greed that has fed inflation) or awful (like Israel-Palestine), Trump’s policies are even worse. Far worse. That’s not debatable.

    But the “not-as-bad-as-Trump” pitch is obviously not satisfying many Democratic-leaning voters and activists, especially young progressives who are angry with Biden over Gaza civilian deaths and other failings.

    As my RootsAction colleagues and I have been pointing out for the last year via the Don’t Run Joe and then Step Aside Joe campaign, there’s a major split between Democratic Party leaders and donors on the one hand, and Democratic voters on the other. Polls have long shown that the Democratic base does not want Biden to run in 2024. But Democratic leaders and officials have ignored the party’s core constituencies.

    As for the big donors who’ve funded Biden for years (some of whom donate to both parties), they’d rather lose with Joe than risk the election of a change-oriented Democrat they don’t know well or can’t control.

    There is only one scenario that offers hope for November 2024: the increasingly unpopular Joe Biden announces in the coming weeks that he won’t be seeking reelection (President Johnson took that step in March 1968). This would lead to a wide-open primary process featuring competition between Vice President Harris (with approval levels even lower than Biden’s) and various senators, Congress members, governors and activists.

    In an open primary process, the activist base of the party—which is more progressive than the party leadership on every issue from racial justice and economics to climate and foreign policy—could exert its influence and make demands on the candidates. For example: given that most activist Democrats don’t believe “self-defense” justifies the day-in day-out massacre of Palestinian civilians, there’s a real possibility that the winning Democrat would have a more even-handed approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

    What’s needed is a democratic and transparent primary process. Such a process could enable the party to unify and rally behind a Democratic nominee who is capable of soundly defeating Trump and Trumpism.

    Original article by JEFF COHEN republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Biden Officials Claim No Leverage Over Israel as US Prepares $14 Billion in Military Aid

    Top Obama Adviser Hints Biden Should Consider Dropping Out After Latest Poll

  • ‘Let Gaza Live!’: A Month Into Israeli War, Massive US Protests Demand Cease-Fire

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    Original article by JESSICA CORBETT republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Demonstrators gathered in front of the White House during a rally in support of Gaza in Washington, D.C. on November 4, 2023.  (Photo: Oliver Doulliery/AFP via Getty Images)

    “We came here to let our voices be heard,” said one demonstrator in Washington, D.C. “Every human is entitled to basic human rights, not killing kids, not torturing people.”

    This is a developing story… Please check back for possible updates…

    Huge crowds of protesters filled the streets of Washington, D.C. and other U.S. cities on Saturday to demand a cease-fire in Israel’s war on Hamas, which has killed and wounded thousands of Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip over the past month.

    “We came here to let our voices be heard and our hearts and hoping we’ll change the way people see this conflict,” 70-year-old Manar Ghanayem toldThe Washington Post in the nation’s capitol, where demonstrators gathered in and around Freedom Plaza.

    “Every human is entitled to basic human rights, not killing kids, not torturing people,” added Ghanayem, who traveled from North Carolina to march in D.C. with more than a dozen friends and family members, including young grandchildren.

    Ghanayem also said that she voted for U.S. President Joe Biden in 2020 but was outraged by his response to the war. As she put it, “I can’t believe Biden is turning a blind eye to this and gave Israel the green light.”

    Rather than advocating for a cease-fire, the Biden administration has pushed for “humanitarian pauses” in what critics are calling Israel’s “genocidal” air and ground assault of Gaza—launched after a Hamas-led surprise attack on Israel on October 7.

    After speaking with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the beginning of the war, Biden said that “my administration’s support for Israel’s security is rock solid and unwavering.” He quickly asked Congress for $14.3 billion for the Israeli war effort, on top of the typical $3.8 billion in annual U.S. military aid.

    “Americans do not support the genocide in Palestine, we do not support the occupation, yet we are being robbed of our own resources in order to fund this oppression,” said CodePink organizer Nour Jaghama earlier this week. Her anti-war group is a part of a broad coalition that supported Saturday’s demonstrations in the United States.

    “We need to show our government that we are outraged at them for forcing us to participate in such a disgusting and devastating attack on humanity,” Jaghama continued. “As Americans, we have a responsibility to our brothers and sisters in Palestine to fight for them however we can.”

    Jaghama also delivered a speech on Saturday. According to CodePink:

    “One of the most prominent questions we need to ask ourselves is: Why we can hear these words and firsthand accounts from Gaza yet the genocide still continues? Why do only 18 representatives and ONLY ONE senator support a cease-fire? And why does President Biden insist on funding Netanyahu’s genocide?” she asked the crowd…

    She then aimed her questions directly at President Biden: “Is this how you want to be remembered? A genocidal, destructive, warmonger? Shame! Look at this crowd, clearly the American people do not agree with your genocidal plans. You must call for a cease-fire now or solidify your position as one of the most inhumane presidents in American history. The American people demand a cease-fire, an end to the occupation, and the full liberation of Palestine.”

    Demonstrators in D.C. carried signs with messages like “Stop U.S.-funded genocide,” “Cease-Fire Now,” and “Let Gaza Live!”

    Sharing a photo from the D.C. gathering on social media, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said: “Solidarity with the hundreds of thousands of people nationwide who marched in support of a #CeasefireNOW. Our pro-peace, pro-humanity movement is strong and it is growing daily.”

    The Saturday actions followed weeks of protests at places including congressional offices and major transit stations. Jewish Voice for Peace noted Monday that “Jewish people all throughout the United States are protesting in unprecedented numbers against Israel’s destruction of Gaza and the United States’ unwavering support.”

    Protesters, supporters, and journalists shared updates on social media.

    New York, New York:

    Minneapolis, Minnesota:

    Olympia, Washington:

    San Francisco, California:

    (Photo: Brett Wilkins)

    (Photo: Brett Wilkins)

    (Photo: Brett Wilkins)

    The Associated Press reported that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Saturday “met with Arab foreign ministers in Jordan a day after talks in Israel with… Netanyahu, who insisted there could be no temporary cease-fire until all hostages held by Hamas are released.”

    Officials in Israel say Palestinian militants are holding around 240 hostages and more than 1,500 Israelis have been killed over the past four weeks. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, Israel’s war on the besieged enclave has killed over 9,400 Palestinians. Amid a surge in settler violence, 133 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank.

    Israel has faced global criticism for cutting off the people of Gaza from food, water, fuel, and medicine as well as bombing homes, schools, medical facilities, religious buildings, and a refugee camp. Some citizens of Israel have joined in worldwide demands for International Criminal Court action on “escalating Israeli war crimes and genocide.”

    Pro-Palestinian protests were also held around the world on Saturday, including in Berlin, Germany; Dhaka, Bangladesh; London, England; Paris, France; Milan, Italy; Santiago, Chile; and Tokyo, Japan. Scientist and organizer Lucky Tran said on social media that “we are witnessing the biggest global anti-war protests since the Iraq War in 2003.”

    https://twitter.com/luckytran/status/1720912128175956329?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1720912128175956329%7Ctwgr%5E44622c3e6cbb87f46205bec1939f8035d17abe87%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fnews%2Fgaza-protests

    In the United Kingdom, tens of thousands of people blocked London’s Oxford Circus and Piccadilly Circus, then marched to Trafalgar Square. Al Jazeera reported that “protesters held ‘Freedom for Palestine’ placards and chanted ‘cease-fire now’ and ‘in our thousands, in our millions, we are all Palestinians.’”

    Original article by JESSICA CORBETT republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Israel Accused of ‘War Crime’ After Bombing Ambulance Convoy Outside Gaza Hospital

    ‘Let Gaza Live!’: A Month Into Israeli War, Massive US Protests Demand Cease-Fire

    Gaza Death Toll Continues to Rise as US Refuses Global Call for Cease-Fire

    Israel’s Current Government Cannot Envisage Peace

    Israel-Gaza War Is Deadliest Month for Journalists Covering Conflict in Over 3 Decades

    1,500+ Israelis Urge ICC Action on ‘War Crimes and Genocide’ in Gaza

    Israel has a history of killing, maiming and torturing Palestinian children

  • Do American Taxpayers Really Want to Fund Israel’s Genocide of the Palestinian People?

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    Congress should hold public hearings to get an answer to this question.

    Original article by RALPH NADER and BRUCE FEIN republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Civilians try to reach survivors, dead bodies amid destruction caused by Israeli strikes on Bureij refugee camp located in central Gaza Strip on November 02, 2023.  (Photo by Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    Dear Congressional Leaders Sen. Schumer, Rep. Johnson, Sen. McConnell and Rep. Jeffries:

    We strongly urge Congress to hold public hearings, with testimony from a broad range of witnesses, before voting on President Biden’s request for an additional $14.3 billion in military funding to further subsidize Israel’s overwhelming military superiority over Hamas in the war that erupted on October 7, 2023.

    We believe these questions, among others, should be examined:

    1. Why should American taxpayers pay for Israeli military spending incurred because of its stupendous intelligence failure and ongoing genocidal war?
    2. Does Israel need the additional aid since the United States already provides Israel $3-4 billion annually and statutorily guarantees it “a qualitative military advantage” over its neighbors?
    3. Can the United States afford the $14.3 billion in additional spending with a national debt soaring past $33 trillion, and annual trillion-dollar budget deficits?
    4. Israel is among the top 20 global economies in terms of GDP per capita. Could the $14.3 billion be better spent on assisting the world’s 71 million impoverished internally displaced refugees, many created by undeclared, lawless, U.S. wars?
    5. Would the military subsidies make the United States even more of a co-belligerent with Israel in a war against Hamas and, under international law, legally responsible for war crimes or genocide?
    6. Should the additional $14.3 billion in deficit or unpaid-for funding be conditioned on Israel’s compliance with the laws of war and the Genocide Convention as certified under oath by the President, the Attorney General, the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of Defense with an accompanying written explanation? All of these officials have urged the Israeli government to “comply with the laws of war.”
    7. How did the Biden Administration come up with the outsized figure of $14.3 billion for a prosperous economic, technological, and military superpower having a greater social safety net for its people than the United States?

    Asking the American people for their advice on sending $14.3 billion to Israel for its acknowledged, defense blunders is not difficult. Conservative Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie polled 49,000 people from his impoverished state. They registered overwhelming opposition to sending these billions of dollars for Israel’s daily slaughter of the civilians in Gaza, nearly half of whom are children.

    Disaster is courted when the United States races to begin or join military conflicts without measured, sober second thoughts born of hearings and debates that entertain diverse views. The House held no hearings on the ill-fated Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in 1964 which expanded the Vietnam War. The Resolution passed unanimously with but 40 minutes of debate. Senate action was only modestly less rash in voting 98-2 to open the gates to a trillion-dollar military disaster.

    Congress never inquired whether the Executive Branch’s dubious Domino Theory was fantasy. Indeed, Vietnam today is an ally of the United States.

    Congress held no hearings before approving the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) with but one dissenting vote, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA). After spending more than $2 trillion fighting the Taliban over 20 years, the United States de facto conceded defeat in 2021 with an even more militant version of the Taliban now in power in Afghanistan.

    Such hearings will not place Israel in jeopardy. Hamas is no existential threat. And all the world can see Israel pulverizing Gaza daily, including its civilian population, half of whom are children, with brutal air and land attacks on critical civilian infrastructure.

    Sincerely,
    Ralph Nader, Esq.
    Bruce Fein, Esq.

    Original article by RALPH NADER and BRUCE FEIN republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).