How Obama Took Over the Peace Movement

Submitted by John Stauber on

John Podesta's liberal think tank the Center for American Progress (CAP) strongly supports Barack Obama's escalation of the US wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is best evidenced by Sustainable Security in Afghanistan, a CAP report by Lawrence J. Korb. Podesta served as the head of Obama's transition team, and CAP's support for Obama's wars is the latest step in a successful co-option of the US peace movement by Obama's political aides and the Democratic Party.

CAP and the five million member liberal lobby group MoveOn were behind Americans Against Escalation in Iraq (AAEI), a coalition that spent tens of millions of dollars using Iraq as a political bludgeon against Republican politicians, while refusing to pressure the Democratic Congress to actually cut off funding for the war. AAEI was operated by two of Barack Obama's top political aids, Steve Hildebrand and Paul Tewes, and by Brad Woodhouse of Americans United for Change and USAction. Today Woodhouse is Obama's Director of Communications and Research for the Democratic National Committee. He controls the massive email list called Obama for America composed of the many millions of people who gave money and love to the Democratic peace candidate and might be wondering what the heck he is up to in Afghanistan and Pakistan. MoveOn built its list by organizing vigils and ads for peace and by then supporting Obama for president; today it operates as a full-time cheerleader supporting Obama's policy agenda. Some of us saw this unfolding years ago. Others are probably shocked watching their peace candidate escalating a war and sounding so much like the previous administration in his rationale for doing so.

Afghanistan
Politics
War / Peace

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Comments

Anonymous replied on

Thank you very much for this succinct summary of the Obama Deception Campaign. We knew it when we saw it a year ago, with the saber rattling on Afghanistan and the talk of "taking out" bin Laden, but the alternative was so chilling that we could deceive ourselves that Obama would promote many progressive issues. Now it is clear that despite social program funding contained in an otherwise "pork" laden stimulus package, corporate interests will always come first and foremost under any Democrat-Republican Government.

Anonymous replied on

How about joining with Dr. Dean. Since he, too, was not invited, he must be doing something right! Many physicians have seen the hand writing on the wall and are supporting single payer as is the CA nurses association.

Anonymous replied on

I never once saw Obama as anti war, even though he claimed to be aganist the war in Iraq but continued to vote to fund it. Now he is doing a "surge" in Afghanistan, does that sound familiar????

John Stauber replied on

[[Matt Yglesias]] of the [[Center for American Progress]] has criticized this article of mine, and an interesting bunch of comments follow on his site. Check it out [http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2009/03/cap_iraq_and_afghanistan.php here].

Mutternich replied on

...doubtless he'll find a new gig with "AfPak." And maybe the nation we're trying to build isn't really Afghanistan but Pipelineistan: http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175050/pepe_escobar_welcome_to_pipelineistan At least it seems to go farther in explaining our hanging in there for so many years, and our disappointment with our less tenacious NATO allies, than "They attacked us and killed 3,000 Americans!"

Anonymous replied on

ZIonism is a problem but Islamism is not? Has the left forgotten the connection between Islamism and Oil Parasitism? Has the left forgotten the slogan NO BLOOD FOR OIL? Countries like Saudi Arabia have been funding Islamic fundamentalists to ensure that no one notices their own reactionary regimes and how much they profit from over-priced oil. Has anyone even bothered to read the history of Islamic imperialism and how the Muslim Arabs enslaved Africans for centuries before the Europeans got involved? African Americans need to know the real history of the Islamic empires and slavery. African Americans have no interest in joining hands with their ex-slavemasters - Christians or Islamists. For African Americans, Obama is the best president they could have dreamed off - all this bashing just shows that the "left" still doesn't understand what it means to have been an enslaved black. Many blacks have delusions about Islam. But some of us who are better educated have no illusions. That is why we are still with Obama.

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