McHugh Watch

Today is a big day for Mr. McHugh. He gets to vote for our farmers or vote for Bush and his war. Either he votes to bring the troops home and for the Milk Income Loss Contract Program that supports family farmers when milk prices drop below a specific value – or he votes to continue to indefinitely fund George Bush’s war.

When he last addressed the House he said the Congress’s

“responsibility … does not lie in nonbinding resolutions that send wrong messages to our troops and absolutely wrong messages to our enemies. It rests in the authorities vested in us by the Constitution of this great land, the power to fund or not all matters of government, especially war.”

Tomorrow is his chance. He objected to the “non binding” Iraq War Resolution of a few weeks ago and spoke for ten minutes defending Bush’s War. To believe Mr. McHugh’s statement above, the Concurrent Resolution (H. Con. Res. 63) was all form and no substance and hence gave him yet another excuse not to vote for it. Today, when the House votes on the supplemental appropriations bill HR 1591, he gets his chance to put his money – no, OUR money – where his mouth is. Tomorrow the supplemental appropriations bill starts the withdrawal of troops on March 1, 2008 over a period of six months. If the President cannot certify that the Iraqi government is pursuing all extremists, Sunni and Shiite alike, and sharing oil revenues with all Iraqis then the withdrawal is to commence on Oct 1, 2007 over a six month period.

Further, funds will not be made available for deployment of units that are not fully mission capable. That turns out to be almost all CONUS (Continental US) units.
He told us three weeks ago he wanted something meaningful. Now he’s got it. Will he do the right thing for our troops, our country and our farmers?

It is time to clearly enunciate the argument for Congress to cut off funding for combat operations in Iraq.

We are involved in a momentous battle for the truth, with the war hawks able to manipulate the language and distort the logic that it should convey. They would have us believe that cutting funding for the war is cutting funding for our soldiers who are presently fighting that war. On the surface, it is a very seductive and compelling argument that has put fear in the hearts of Democrats who campaigned on ending the war. The distortion must not be allowed to stand.

We must understand the distinction between “the war” and “combat operations.” They are not the same. By lumping “combat operations” under “the war” the Republican hawks intend to manipulate the opposition into a corner that they fear they cannot escape. There is a world of difference between the two. Combat operations and war are not synonymous. Just as offensive operations are part of war, so are defensive maneuvers and tactical retreats. It takes as much planning and resources to conduct a tactical retreat as it does to wage an offensive attack. If the situation is futile, a seasoned military commander orders a tactical retreat. Not a surrender, but a conservation of resources to win another way. That other way in Iraq is political not militarily. Continue Reading »

During his last campaign for Congress, Dr. Bob Johnson repeatedly faulted John McHugh for neglecting his responsibility to provide effective congressional oversight. Now that McHugh stands accused of bearing direct responsibility for permitting a military health care scandal that has been in the making ever since the invasion of Iraq, we know how right he was.

At the end of last week the Bush administration was forced to take pre-emptive action by a series of Washington Post exposes of the deplorable out-patient care of our wounded soldiers at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Bob Woodruff’s first-hand reporting on the Pentagon’s and VA’s failure to address the widespread incidence of brain injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder, and imminent long overdue congressional oversight, now that the voters have returned Congress to Democratic control.

To his credit, Robert Gates, the new Secretary of Defense, fired the Secretary of the Army and promised to hold other ranking Pentagon officials accountable for conditions that President Bush belatedly called “unacceptable.” In addition to the Pentagon’s own internal inquiry, Bush announced the creation of a bi-partisan commission to investigate inadequacies in the health care system for active duty military personnel, reservists, and veterans.

Such a presidential commission is a waste of taxpayer’s money designed to deflect attention from the administration’s primary culpability, as happened with the 9/11 Commission report. Our constitutional system of checks and balances empowers Congress to pass laws that protect the health, morale and welfare of the nation’s military personnel and its veterans and to exercise investigative oversight to insure that the executive branch administers these laws responsibly and effectively.

The House and Senate share congressional oversight responsibility for military health care. In the House it is vested in the Armed Services Committee, specifically in its sub-committee with jurisdiction over military personnel matters. From 1999 to the end of 2006 Representative John McHugh chaired this sub-committee, known in succession as Special Oversight Panel on Morale, Welfare and Recreation, Military Personnel, Total Force, and again Military Personnel.

Responding to complaints that the military medical facilities were not up to the task of giving adequate care to the wounded soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan, especially the growing number of wounded reservists returning home for demobilization, McHugh’s Total Force sub-committee held a brief hearing one day after President Bush assured the troops in his January 2004 State of the Union address that the government “will give you the resources you need to fight and win the war on terror.” Accepting the assurances of military officials that the problems that had contributed to a suicide at Walter Reed were being addressed and that the medical health care system had the necessary resources, McHugh’s panel did not even issue a report. It allowed the situation to get worse as casualties mounted over the next three years.

McHugh still supports the President’s futile quest for “victory” in a war that should never have been started. His failure to exercise leadership in congressional oversight may be due to his unwillingness to expose facts that would embarrass the administration. After each one of his six short trips to Iraq he assured his constituents that steady progress was being made in an admittedly difficult war. He has attended funerals of fallen soldiers and visited the wounded in Walter Reed. But shows of compassion are a poor substitute for lack of action that could have helped the soldiers and their families who have sacrificed so much in a disastrous war.

McHugh has failed his constituents, the soldiers from Fort Drum, and the nation. He bears personal responsibility for the military health care scandal. It is high time for the voters to retire the affable ineffectual dandy to Pierrepont Manor.

Publius

This is a letter that was forwarded to McHugh Watch sent by the Madison and Oneida County Citizens for Peace to our congressman on February 25th. Its eloquent simplicity in urging Mr. McHugh to send a compelling message to the President is itself compelling. Most of us feel utterly betrayed by his refusal to do so. We are pleased to reprint it here.

Dear Congressman McHugh:

We write to you today because those who have perished in Iraq are in our thoughts every day. We ask you to speak out against any “surge” in the number of our troops sent to Iraq, which seems imminent although not inevitable, because this would clearly increase the number of casualties without offering any realistic chance of bringing peace or improving conditions there.

Our hearts go out to the young Americans who have been in combat in Iraq. We read the names of those who have been killed by small arms fire, roadside bombs, and helicopters lost in action at a monthly Peace Vigil held in Sherrill or Oneida. Many of them never reached the age of twenty-five. Others have lost limbs or eyes or have suffered profound head injuries. Many of these young people carry images of horror that will never leave them. Many of them will be sick for the rest of their lives.

Our hearts go out as well to the innocent people of Iraq — the men, women and children - who have no control over the fact that their buildings and streets are rubble, or that they have no dependable electricity, water, gas, heat, or medical services. They cannot go out on their streets or even sit in their homes without fear.

Everything that we who opposed this war feared has now happened and worse: 3,400 Coalition soldiers dead, over 23,400 wounded, at least 50,000 Iraqi civilians killed, a country disintegrating before our eyes with ethnic and tribal strife on the increase. And still the occupation continues with no clear goal or mission and no end in sight.

It is easy to blame the failures in Iraq on President Bush, but the war in Iraq is not simply a “Bush war,” it is a congressional war, a U.S. war. Too many politicians seem focused on dodging responsibility for this disaster and pinning blame on the opposing political party instead of taking responsibility and finding a way to stop contributing to the death and destruction.

We are sure you can see, as we do, the radicalization and rage that is brewing in this world when people contemplate the wreckage and anguish in Iraq. Is this really what you want our soldiers to be doing? They will do what you tell them to; but is this really what you want? This isn’t about “smarts” or about how the war was fought. It is about principle and wisdom. It is about understanding that the attacks on the United States cannot be solved through war and domination, but by humane policies and diplomacy.

We call upon you to speak for peace, to make New Yorkers safer by rejecting violence and respecting the rights of other nations. We call upon you to show courage, to stand for principle, to do what is humanly possible to end this killing and to stop a senseless effort to bring peace and freedom through violence.

Sincerely,

Madison-Oneida Citizens for Peace

We will anxiously await his response.

Yes the war drags on. A mounting pile of American bodies. Thousands of soldiers whose bodies have been wrecked. Families put under enormous strain. Veterans left abandoned in rat infested quarters. The horrific mass of dead and suffering Iraqis. But who’s counting and in any case should we? Down the road, this will may seem a small price to pay in the grand game of oil supply geopolitics.. The thirst for oil of China and India grows apace, and we may run out before you can say ‘black gold‘.

Is it any surprise that the Bush Cheney administration has no intention of getting out of Iraq even though getting out is the only way to forge a stable middle east? So how to keep control of the spiggot? WMDs - check. Force protection - check. The enemy without - check. Besides, doesn’t Iran also have a lot of oil too? Since when did you expect McWho to vote in any way contrary to the interests of his plutocrat sponsors? So, what gives with all this falderal?

The danger we face is that the Bush Cheney administration will compound the Iraq disaster with a much greater one. The ominous war drums beat (e.g., here, here, here, here, here, here, here). Moreover, newspapers that not long ago issued mea culpas for their willful lack of critical reporting in the run-up to the Iraq war are once again breathlessly regurgitating administration ‘evidence’. Like the old adage, are not the generals of the opposition strategizing to fight the last war. Will they be left floundering like a sea birds mired in oil sludge, taken aback by the too late realization that the war we actually face is not what they thought it was.

In this context, the most important concern progressive democrats must face is our own party. While the prospective presidential candidates fall all over themselves on who has or has not apologized adequately about Iraq, few deal forthrightly with the fact that despite the lies of Bush and his cronies, the truth was understood by many right from the start. The failure for all was willful suppression of critical thinking for craven political considerations and there are indications that once again, the leading democrats are hedging the possibility of seeming weak kneed on Iraq by being tough on Iran. Hoping to one up John Kerry, they will be for and against war in the middle east at the same time rather than merely sequentially. We must demand that those who would be president provide real leadership in confronting the Washington junta on the looming Iran catastrophe. Continue Reading »

On Thursday, a group of individuals delivered 60 letters to Mr. McHugh’s office in Plattsburgh disagreeing with his support of the Iraq war. The Press-Republican reported the event. According to the Press Republican, Mr. McHugh’s staff member, Mary Ortloff, objected to the press being present.

Mike Kulik from Clinton County was present at the event and submits his thoughts and recollections of the day in an email:

Subject: Journal musings — From Mike K’s visit to Rep. John McHugh’s office Continue Reading »