It seems that the $124 billion emergency supplemental spending bill for the War in Iraq has been unpopular with both Republicans and some strong anti-war protesters.
Sanders office has stated that he supports it because of the war timeline that’s included. However, I don’t believe that’s the whole story. First, it doesn’t make sense to give more money to something that you don’t support.
Congressman Ron Paul, who does oppose the war, did not support the bill for various reasons…
- Paul cites that congress doesn’t have authority to dictate how wars are carried out, just the ability to vote for funding of them.
- Paul believes the war is unconstitutional and should be ended and therefore doesn’t believe in funding it further. Futhermore, Paul would like for congress to pull authority from the president to continue with the war.
- The Democrats packed $21 billion in pork in the bill to win Democrat votes. Some examples include $200 million to the dairy industry, $74 million for the peanut farms, and $25 million for spinach farmers. The bill also includes $2 billion in unconstitutional foreign aid, including $500 million for Lebanon and Eastern Europe.
It appears to me that the democrats are not really different from most other republicans in that they both see great opportunities to get their pet projects funded by war. In reality, I don’t believe that the democrats (Sanders and Welch included) really want the war to end, as long as they continue to get huge subsidies for all their pet projects and donors to their campaigns.
For example, Sanders received much support from different farming interests here in Vermont according to his campaign commericals. I think that the $200 million included in the war spending bill will go a long way in paying them back for their support and assuring continued support.
Also, last year we had a ballot item here to urge Burlington to discontinue support for Air Guard usage of our airport. Cutting support would have definately made a statement regarding not supporting the war, but both democrats and republicans were strongly against this, most likely for the potential loss of millions of dollars in free money from the fed!
With Ron Paul, you get what you see. He is always quite clear about what he believes when he campaigns and it is very easy to figure out how he will vote on most issues as he adheres to a very well defined set of principles, which makes him one of the most trustworthy congressmen in congress.
More information:
- Eight arrested in war protest at Sanders’ office (BFP)
- More Funding for War in Iraq (Ron Paul)
- The Upcoming Iraq War Funding Bill (Ron Paul)
