Washington Examiner: Gene Healy: The War in Iraq Was a Bipartisan Disaster

Source:The New Democrat

I actually agree with Gene Healy on this even though I put most of the responsibility for the War in Iraq on President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney and their supporters. But the fact is the War in Iraq never happens without Democratic support in Congress. Because President Bush wanted a bipartisan vote for the Congressional resolution that gave the authorization for the War in Iraq  that passed both the House and Senate with an overwhelming bipartisan vote. And Democrats under Leader Tom Daschle controlled the Senate for President Bush’s first two years. And then of course all of those appropriations bills and the mountain of debt that was created to fund the War in Iraq and the occupation following the 2003 invasion.

Democrats in the Senate could’ve said one word that would’ve prevented the War in Iraq from ever happening. The word is no and said no “we are not going to support this because we do not believe the case has been made for the War in Iraq and do not support this rush to war. Especially in an election year 2002 with both the House and Senate in play”. Now of course Democratic loyalists are going to say that “President Bush had a very high popularity rating and going up against him in an election year would’ve been bad politics”. Fine that is the political argument for supporting the war a political argument that has played a big part in millions of Iraqi’s being dead and thousands of Americans being dead.

Of course war has consequences, but so does politics especially when political decisions are made that affects human lives. Like whether or not to send American soldiers to a country we certainly weren’t very familiar with pre-2003, but I’m not sure we’ve are very familiar with now. Especially since a country that looked fairly stable just a few months ago now looks like they are in the early stage of a civil war. With the argument being that “we must do this to prevent Iraq from arming terrorists who would kill Americans”. And argument that still have never materialized with any credible evidence. Especially since the Hussein Regime in Iraq at the time didn’t even have weapons of mass destruction.

American Neoconservatives deserve most of the blame for the War in  Iraq and I’m not trying to take any of that deserved blame away from them. But the fact is we are not there today had Congressional Democrats not of backed that war. And they had the opportunity to prevent this war from happening in the first place. And instead decided to back a popular Republican President. And we’ve paid a heavy price for the decision ever since.