Washington D.C., April 2, 2009
Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today issued the following statement after voting against H.Con.Res 85, setting forth the Congressional Budget for the fiscal year 2010:
“I am committed to doing everything I can to put our community and our nation on the path to economic stability. I led opposition to the bank bailout program TARP, I worked vigorously in favor of the stimulus package, and I have worked to save the automotive, steel and aerospace industries in America.
“This budget is a statement of principles for the upcoming year, and I cannot accept it in its entirety. I will not vote for a budget that ties military spending to the operational funding of our government. This year, the budget includes $130 billion for war funding. The Washington Post reports today another 10,000 troops may be sent to Afghanistan, bringing our total number of troops there to as much as 78,000 by 2010 – a more than 100% increase from today’s troop levels. This budget is a plan that authorizes the expansion of the war. I simply cannot endorse a budget or a plan that sends more of our brave men and women to Afghanistan, a conflict which has the potential to become this generation’s Vietnam.”
Why is President Obama continuing to fight a war in a country where the people will never stop trying to kill our soldiers and remove us from their land? Juan Cole and other Middle Eastern experts have said in many media outlets that Al Qaeda is barely even in Afghanistan; they are in Pakistan. Are we going to go to war with Pakistan now, if we aren’t already? Where is Congress on this? They are in favor of it, except for a very few like Kucinich. Congress is full of war-loving blue Democrats as well as war-loving Republicans and they will never vote against a budget that contains war spending. Most Democrats, as well as Republicans, are in favor of unnecessary war. So is President Obama.
The blue Democrats in Congress will never enact caps on carbon emissions or do anything that needs to be done if it has any negative political ramifications for them at all. When we will get these conservative Democrats out of power and put more people like Dennis Kucinich in office? Another example of the behavior of conservative Democrats who are just as useless as Republicans:
“Ten Democrats vote for Sens. Kyl and Lincoln’s bill protecting the children of multimillionaires. lincoln23.jpgSens. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) and Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) recently introduced a $250 billion amendment to slash estate taxes for the heirs of multimillion-dollar estates. Yesterday, the Senate narrowly passed the bill by a 51-48 vote. Joining Republicans in approving the bill were ten Senate Democrats: Baucus (D-MT), Bayh (D-IN), Cantwell (D-WA), Landrieu (D-LA), Lincoln (D-AR), Murray (D-WA), Nelson (D-FL), Nelson (D-NE), Pryor (D-AR), Tester (D-MT) As the New York Times explained, under Obama’s budget, “99.8 percent of estates will never — ever — pay a penny of estate tax. The heirs of the remaining 0.2 percent of estates are who Ms. Lincoln and Mr. Kyl are so worried about.”
Make a note of these conservative Democrats and get them out of office next election, OK?
Baucus Bayh Cantwell’ Landrieu Lincoln Murray Nelson (Florida) Nelson (NE) Pryor Tester
Cross them off your list of who to vote for.
These are not the only ones of course, but these are the ones working against the middle class and preserving the tax cuts for the top one-fifth of one percent of the wealthiest Americans, making the rest of us make up the slack with our taxes. They are also consistently conservative in their other votes, including on funding for war (as are most of the cowards in Congress).
www.350.org"
