Just 32 Real Democrats in the House
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Bob FertikWant to meet our members? Click 'Join' above!
Today was the day to separate the Real Democrats from the frauds. Sadly, there are just 32 Real Democrats out of 258 in the House of Representatives. Here is the Honor Roll:
| Tammy Baldwin Mike Capuano John Conyers Lloyd Doggett Donna Edwards Keith Ellison Sam Farr Bob Filner |
Alan Grayson Raul Grijalva Mike Honda Marcy Kaptur Dennis Kucinich Barbara Lee Zoe Lofgren Eric Massa |
Jim McGovern Mike Michaud Don Payne Chellie Pingree Jared Polis Jose Serrano Carol Shea-Porter Brad Sherman |
Jackie Speier Pete Stark John Tierney Niki Tsongas Maxine Waters Diane Watson Peter Welch Lynn Woolsey |
These 32 Real Democrats stood up to immense pressure from President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Steny Hoyer and voted against the $106 billion war supplemental because they want to bring our troops home. If you are represented by one of them, please call 202-225-3121 and thank them for their courage.
If your Representative is not on the list above, call 202-225-3121 and tell them you will work to defeat them in 2010 because it is long past time for Congress to bring all our troops home.
Naturally, I am disappointed by the final outcome, because an historic victory was within reach. The final vote was 226-202 with 6 absent. With just 13 more no votes, we would have defeated the bill.
I am especially disappointed in those "Democrats" who wanted to vote no but sold out their progressive supporters at the last minute:
| Promised No Vote | Leaned No | Pledged No War Funds in 2007 |
| Yvette Clarke Luis Gutierrez Jay Inslee Steve Kagen Jim Oberstar Nydia Velazquez |
Steve Cohen Peter DeFazio Chakah Fattah John Lewis Doris Matsui Ed Markey Jim McDermott Gwen Moore Jared Polis Michael Quigley Jan Schakowsky Mike Thompson Mel Watt Anthony Weiner Richard Neal |
Andre Carson Danny Davis Bill Delahunt Phil Hare Maurice Hinchey Paul Hodes Carolyn Maloney Jim Moran Grace Napolitano Charles Rangel Laura Richardson Linda Sanchez Bobby Scott Ed Towns |
Here are some of their unacceptable excuses:
Jan Schakowsky (IL):"I want to support my president."
Anthony Weiner (NY): "We are in the process of wrapping up the wars. The president needed our support. But the substance still sucks."
If there's a silver lining, it's the new alliance that was created among truly dedicated progressive activists led by Jane Hamsher of FireDogLake. Here's Jane:
I'll have a lot more to say later, and a ton of people to thank--since some didn't want to be acknowledged at the time I need to back and write up a comprehensive list. But I'm pretty sure it started with Bob Fertik emailing me and David Swanson that he was twittering progressive caucus members, and it quickly took on a life of its own.
But every single person who worked on this was inspirational, especially the people who made the Citizen Whip Count work (I think there were 1,200 or so of you). As I'm going over all the old posts, I am just incredibly excited and energized by what happened. We all knew we were going to "lose" eventually, but "winning" was never the goal.
Just remember:
They had to hold it open 10 extra minutes and after the Dems hit 218 and there were five GOP votes that scurried in under the wire.
We made the President of the United States himself whip to get the votes.
We tried to make the Dems fight like this when Bush was in office to stop funding the war, but they wouldn't--so we did it ourselves.
I'm very proud to have worked with every single one of you. This was going to be a route. They had to work for it.
Let's do it again.
Indeed let's!
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HAWAII Paradise of $$ War Appropriations
Excerpt from my letter June 17, 2009 to
NEIL ABERCROMBIE, US House Representative, Hawaii.
"[Your YEA vote] is not a responsible position in moving the US to a place of security and goodwill within the community of nations and our globalized society of humanity. I assert that you can easily wrap up the Iraq War and settle the Afghanistan war with previous Bush war appropriations and the country's ongoing massive regular military appropriations....
The monopoly US war machine has no place in today's fragile environment (ecologically and in every other way). This is especially so when diplomacy, efficiency, International Law and goodwill can be regarded in countering the isolated threats of real terrorism and correcting the gross US, UK and Australian mistakes of these current wars. They exist only in so far as they are funded...
As a warning to you sir, having witnessed the US/Australian domestic trouble of the Viet Nam War in the seventies, I say that US Democrats must not defy the trust of the generation of young voters who responded to your party's electorate cry: "Change, We can Believe In". This force will not be deceived and your vote here and on other bills (this point forward) will determine how that force reacts to you, your supporters and sponsors".