STATEMENT FROM REP JOHN P. MURTHA [D-PA]

[barb162]

STATEMENT FROM REP JOHN P. MURTHA :
I have learned through conversations with officials at the Pentagon that at the beginning of November, 2004, the Bush Administration plans to call up large numbers of the military guard and reserves, to include plans that they previously put off to call up the Individual Ready Reserve.

I have said publicly and privately that our forces are inadequate to support our current worldwide tempo of operations. On November 21, 2003, a bipartisan group of 135 members of the House of Representatives wrote to the President urging an increase in the active duty army troop levels and expressed concern that our Armed Forces are over-extended and that we are relying too heavily on the Guard and Reserve.

We didn't get a reply until February 2004, and now as the situation in Iraq is deteriorating, it seems that the Administration will resort to calling up additional guard and reservists, again with inadequate notice.

(this is on Drudge as of 4:30pm eastern)

[Media_Lies_Daily]

1. At the beginning of November, 2004, or just AFTER Election Day?

[PROGRESSIVE1]

4. Right after election day.

[Eloriel]

5. Nov. 2 is Election Day. They can start on the 1st or 2nd or 3rd

and so forth, all of which is "the begining of November, 2004."

[leftchick]

2. how about the New Draft Plan in 2005?....

are the congress critters clueless about the Selective Service plan?

[Corgigal]

3. Draft 2005

Sure looks more likely. Damn, I have two son's who turn 17 this year.

[Politicub]

11. If I had 2 sons that were turning 17

I would get the fuck out of this country if Bush wins the election. I'm not kidding you. I'm gay, and I'm seriously researching ways I can get my partner and myself out of the US for a while should Bush cheat again and get selected.

It's frightening to think of what the Bush admin will do with another 4 years.

Draft? Absolutely
End of social security? already in the works
Fewer jobs? Being the only pres since Hoover to lose jobs rather than create them doesn't bother Bushco at all
Civil rights? If you're not white and fundamentalist Christian, Bushco thinks you should be at Gitmo

I love America, and it pains me to no end how Bush is ripping our country apart.

Seriously, though. Look into getting out of America until the draft talk subsides. It could mean life or death for your boys. At least research your options and make a plan.

[Corgigal]

28. thank you for your thoughts

Already got one probably medically not qualified. The other boy is getting a passport and we have a great friend in yugoslavia if worst comes to worst. Trust me , I do think about this and research it often.

[Owlet]

6. Kerry's Reaction

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Politics/ap20040917_1501.html

[nadinbrzezinski]

10. Hit them ahrd John

and we need to spraed this

[montanacowboy]

7. Big attack on Fallujia after election day

coming up

[Alpharetta]

13. Fallujah's easy. Sadr City is a slum with a population of 2 million

Sadr City is Al Sadr's true base of operations. A Baghdad suburb/slum of 2 million people where US troops seldom venture.

What a catastrophe for U.S. troops and U.S. stature if Bush attacks Sadr City after Nov 2. He's stupid enough to do it, too. The U.S. media has made little out of the 2 recent helicopter attacks on Iraqi ambulances.

The Pentagon thinks they can get away with just about anything. They've banned Al Jazeera from Iraq and turned the country into their own personal bombing range.

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. Why wuold they do this AFTER the election

HMMMMMMMMMMM

We all want to know......

HMMMMMMMMMMM

[Rockholm]

9. I Was Wondering What the End of Week News Would Be.

This is horrible.

[Dogmudgeon]

12. El Linko, por favor

--bkl

[barb162]

16. no hablo espanol; drudge took it off his site

and stuck Kerry making a statement on this in its place.

[barb162]

14. Bush knows darn well Iraq is getting near to civil unrest or anarchy

and there are simply not enough troops or police, either American or Iraqi, to keep civil order. So he keeps on blabbing every day about things moving along over there in a positive fashion. You just cannot have bombers killing people daily on major streets and expect to maintain some sort of order, some sense of safety, where people can go about their daily business. What a quagmire.

[reprobate]

23. How about the unrest right here?

[barb162]

27. hopefully that gets fixed 11/2/04

[Sugarbleus]

15. Kerry's statment @yahoo

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&e=3&u=/ap/20040917/ap_on_el_pr/kerry

Kerry Accuses Bush of Hiding Troops Plan

snip......
"He won't tell us what congressional leaders are now saying, that this administration is planning yet another substantial call-up of reservists and guard units immediately after the election," Kerry said. "Hide it from people through the election, then make the move."

more....

[Tangledog]

18. 2.95 on Yahoo, DU the hell out of it! n/t

[Sugarbleus]

22. Done.........

[Tangledog]

17. Comments on ABC presentation

It'll be interesting to see if Murtha, an old Leatherneck, gets Swiftboated over this.

ABC used a terrible photo of Kerry with the article. But they also presented Kerry as hittin' 'em hard on this one. Between this and the "fantasy world", there's some jugular-oriented action going on. I love it.

[AlCzervik]

19. My neighbor has been out and done for 7 years

he's waiting for his letter.

[barb162]

21. They showed some guy in my area

a few weeks ago who got a letter. I think he was in his late 50s and out of shape. But they needed some skill he had. I think a draft gets announced 11/3. A lot of people aren't paying attention to this because there hasn't been a draft for so long and they probably think there is no way it is coming back. But you can't keep using the armed forces like Bush is doing today.

[chookie]

20. He's a cool guy

Solid credentials. USMC. First Viet Nam vet to be elected to Congress (1974).

Originally supported invasion of Iraq (same reasons Kerry did) and now is outspoken critic of it, claiming Bush bamboozled Congress and got us into a disaster.

He's written a book, From Viet Nam to 9/11 that you might want to check out. He is one of those rare individuals who have a grasp of the overall picture, strategy, and sensitivity towards the cultural distinctiveness of the region -- in other words, he is a clear-eyed pragmatist.

"excerpt:
After the end of the Cold War, national defense policy was set, to some extent, on an ad hoc basis as we responded to crises in Somalia and the Balkans and tried to make breakthroughs in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Neither political party paid significant attention to the other threats that some of us saw as more probable and more dangerous—terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction—or to the need for enhanced homeland security. As I noted in Chapter 10, when I traveled to Texas prior to President Bush’s inauguration, I urged him to make nuclear nonproliferation and counterterrorism the centerpieces of his administration’s defense strategy. Despite this advice—and the warnings contained in the prophetic study on the terrorist threat written by former senators Gary Hart and Warren Rudman, the increases above the budget approved by Congress to counter terrorism, and the proposal by some in Congress to form a Department of Homeland Security—terrorism was basically not on the radar screen of most Americans or of the new administration.
When President Bush took office, his administration’s national security policy emphasized ballistic missile defense, saw China as our chief future adversary, and rejected Clinton’s approach of “constructive engagement” in foreign policy. Most notably, it left Israel and the Palestinians to fend for themselves. Any policy option that sounded even remotely like “nation building” or “peacekeeping” was discredited. This perspective on America’s national security interests, of course, underwent a 180-degree change on September 11, 2001, when the country experienced what some had been predicting: terrorist attacks on our soil. The perpetrators struck at the very heart of our society and showed their determination to use every means at their disposal to disrupt our way of life and counter our geopolitical interests. The dramatic events of that day cleared away all the haze in the debate about defense policy. The American people rightly understood that terrorism, and the potential use of unconventional weapons against us, was the number one threat.
-snip-

Excepts from his book can be found here
http://www.psupress.org/Justataste/samplechapters/justataste_murthaE.html

[Bunny]

25. Murtha's from my home area.

Solid Dem, good guy. Very powerful, knowledgeable, and rational. If he says it's going to happen, it's going to happen.

[Flailey]

24. did I miss the link or...

Can he prove this with documents?

[LowerManhattanite]

26. Drudge yanked the Murtha statement off his site within an hour...

...covering Bush's *ss again? Hmmm?