No More Blood Money-End This War!

Brad Sherman
March 10, 2005
5000 Van Nuys Blvd.
Van Nuys, CA.

Dear Rep. Sherman,
Thank you for receiving our constituent delegation. We're members of Progressive Democrats of Los Angeles (PDLA). It's a chapter of Progressive Democrats of America (pdamerica.org) organized within Democratic Clubs and on e-mail networks of friends. We want you to oppose the unquestioned $80 billion appropriation for the war in Iraq. It is off-budget, as is the $151 billion already spent for the war. The previous billions are not all spent and those spent are not all accounted for. The Bush budget is already in deep deficit, and taxpayers will pay the bill. All this red - the ink and the bloodshed --must be questioned. You did not declare war, in Congress. You voted to trust the Administration as a matter of policy. The administration lied to you. A majority of Americans know that. A majority want the troops home now. We know our consent, given because of fear of Iraqi nuclear weapons, was based on a lie. Many of us are aware that the Bush Administration's friends, through Project for the New American Century, planned this war in Iraq long before 9/11. Rumsfeld promised it would take "weeks, not months." It has been two years. Many of us suspect "getting the job done" is not to establish Iraqi democracy as much as to secure the flow of oil for our economy. Yet the same Republicans who insist on sacrificing lives and limbs of our soldiers refuse to impose mileage standards for American cars to conserve this high-priced resource.
The Iraqi people recently elected, at risk of their lives, the slate of candidates that promised to negotiate a US withdrawal and end the occupation. The spectacle of American legislators passing $80 billion more without bringing up that democratically-expressed wish of the Iraqi people is shameful and a mark of hypocrisy. Progressives in your district are tired of violence as foreign policy; of media and politicians who don't count Iraqi dead; of the silence from Democrats about Abu Ghraib, which has blackened our soul in the eyes of the world. We are tired of Democrats who comply, by silence, with election officials like Conny McCormack, who would impose paperless voting machines on LA, to manage democracy without audit. The troops need our support. We would prefer a vote for an amount earmarked for their safety while a withdrawal is negotiated. It is time to call for such negotiation. It is time for questions from our politicians: How is this $80 billion earmarked? How much more will be required? What about the Iraqis' wish for an end to the occupation? Many people from the military support an end to this war. Our veterans are in need and our citizens are in need. We want government support, on-budget, for health care, schools, jobs, and our dirty environment. We want you to end this war.

Sincerely,
Mimi Kennedy
National Board Member - Progressive Democrats of America