Vote Niki Tsongas for Congress

Let the Generals decide what to do in Iraq not politicians. Let the military get the job done and then we can go home. Half the reason we aren't out of there yet is the Democrats and their uncanny ability to embolden the enemy.  All Al Qaeda needs to do is listen to the rhetoric and it gives them comfort that victory is right around the corner. 

Anyone know what Niki's stance is on immigration?

Nice Summary in Monday's Lowell Sun, page 6. Quoting directly from the article:

"We cannot send everyone back and we don't want to." - Tsongas

Tsongas backs a comprehensive immigration reform bill that would make productive citizens out of the nations's estimated 12 million undocumented workers.

"I can't imagine a process by which we could attempt reasonably or morally to return them home, given their longstanding presence here."-Tsongas

"I believe that family reunification should be an important element of immigration reform and I think that we should ease the way for immediate family members to enter the country"-Tsongas

Tsongas supports an "earned path to citizenship," referring to congressional proposals that would require immigrants here illegally to pay about $5000 in fines, learn English and steadily hold jobs before they could become citizens more than a decade later.

Does Ogonowski believe all twelve million illegal immigrants should be deported?  How would this be done?

What does he propose to do to stop illegal immigration?  Will he prosecute employers who offer jobs to undocumented workers?

> Let the Generals decide what to do in Iraq not politicians.

That is called a military dictatorship.  The "politicians" are our elected representatives.  Last time I checked, democracy was our chosen form of government. 

Even so, if you polled "the Generals," right now, you wouldn't get an unequivocal "stay the course."  I guess some of them are Democrats, eh?

Politicians start wars and the military finishes them. It's not up to Niki Tsongas to bring the troops home. These politicians should learn to listen to their military leaders and not popularity polls. Nothing to do with a dictatorship, it's about letting the military do their job and keeping politics out of it.

As far as the illegal immigrant issue she is 100% wrong. No one accepts a burglar in their house so why is OK to accept an illegal alien? There should be no incentive whatsoever for these people to come here. They're using valuable resources, taxpayer money and killing our citizens at a ridiculous rate. You can't have a secure country without security.

"I can't imagine a process by which we could attempt reasonably or morally to return them home, given their longstanding presence here."-Tsongas"

Oh the horror of accountability! That's like saying, "I don't think he should give that stolen car back since he's had it for so long". "Mr. Jones we're sorry the individual has been living in your barn but we don't want to make him leave since he's been there for a couple weeks and it would be unfair and mean to make him leave." Ridiculous.

Are these your positions, or Ogonowski's?

As long as you have immense economic disparity between neighboring countries, and corporations are offering jobs to millions of people who simply want to feed their families, people will find a way to cross. 

If cracking down on the companies who hire undocumented workers were the solution, why isn't it happening?  Do you think it might have something to do with the loss of cheap labor? Is this really what Ogonowski wants to do?  

There is no doubt that illegal immigration is a serious problem.  However, there aren't any easy answers to it.  What new ideas does Ogonowski have the courage to bring to the table?

The military doesn't, and shouldn't, decide when or whether to go to war, or whether we should leave.  Constitutionally, this is Congress's responsibility.

The military does the best it can do to carry out the orders of the Commander in Chief.  Soldiers will die trying, whether the war they are fighting makes any sense or not.  

It is our patriotic duty to protect our soldiers -- by putting the right people in Congress to have all the right debates so they can make the right decisions about sending people to war and bringing them home.  That is our form of government.

> Like many, I am tired of the political crap, it's nothing more than ignorant pandering.

On that, we agree.  However, like many, I'm not sure I share your definition of 'crap.'

What makes my blood boil is being lied to -- about why the war was started, about what it would cost in dollars and human lives, and about there ever having been a possibility of an outcome that would make Iraqis free and Americans more safe.  Doesn't that anger you? 

To put our troops in harm's way, let alone to leave them there, without clear moral justification, without clarity of purpose, and without achievable goals isn't just ignorant, it's unbelievably tragic.

We can argue the past but it will not change it.  And, we do not know how the past will play out 5, 10 or even 20 years from now.  As far as the claim that we were "lied" to I just don't buy that claim on it's face.  If the Bush administration was hell bent on lying about WMD then we would have found what we were looking for.  After all, what was preventing them from lying to support the original lie?  It's much more likely that they gambled with bad information and they lost.  Either way irresponsible.  If one wants to understand how fickle most politicians are we only have to look to those who were in on the "lie" and who now are calling it a "lie" to see the obvious hypocrisy involved.  Some of these people were privy to much of the same intelligence. 

That all being said, obviously the current mission is to provide enough security for the political process to mature.   That's a pretty clear mission and is perfectly justified.  It's not really a moral decision to leave Iraq to Iran and Al Qaeda.  When people at the highest levels of government announce that we have "lost" or that we need to leave immediately it announces to our enemies that we are not committed and that our resolve is weak does it not? We don't need a timetable here, what we need is to transfer the responsibility of progress to the Iraqi's.  Obviously we can't do this forever but if we leave it needs to be because they can either run things themselves or that there is no chance of them succeeding.  Either way we can walk away knowing that we either left a better place for them or that we gave them the tools and they threw it away.  

> We can argue the past but it will not change it.  And, we do not know how the past will play out 5, 10 or even 20 years from now.

But, we are spending American and Iraqi lives as though we did. 

> If the Bush administration was hell bent on lying about WMD then we would have found what we were looking for.  After all, what was preventing them from lying to support the original lie?

Very convoluted.  How do you pull that off? Our troops are our eyes on the ground. I think they were responsible for calling the bluff.  I don't think they would cooperate in a lie.

> Some of these people were privy to much of the same intelligence.

You mean the 'intelligence' that Collin Powell passed on at the UN?  Have you heard what he's had to say about being patsied?  Have you heard what George Tenet has had to say about being scapegoated?

> It's not really a moral decision to leave Iraq to Iran and Al Qaeda

Isn't it interesting, this situation we have created?  Neither was a possibility until we did what we did.  I don't think our troops' presence or absence will determine things, at this point.  What we need is a political solution that involves more of the world than just us.

> Obviously we can't do this forever but if we leave it needs to be because they can either run things themselves or that there is no chance of them succeeding. 

Just whose evaluation will determine that? 

>Very convoluted. How do you pull that off? Our troops are our eyes on the ground. I think they were responsible for calling the bluff. I don't think they would cooperate in a lie.

Do you really think this would be that difficult? We took over the whole country in a couple weeks, surely planting some evidence isn't too difficult. Why would the president lie knowing he would be caught in it? Calling it a lie is to insinuate that the administration purposely put forth an untruth. Do you really think it's that black and white?

>You mean the 'intelligence' that Collin Powell passed on at the UN? Have you heard what he's had to say about being patsied? Have you heard what George Tenet has had to say about being scapegoated?

Wasn't the armed services committee fully briefed in writing and presentation? George Tenet wasn't so "stand up" until his book was on the shelves was he?

>Just whose evaluation will determine that?

The Iraqi parliament should decide whether we leave or stay. Obviously I believe the situation will be resolved politically but I recognize that politics can't work without security and I'm unconvinced the Iraqi's can provide it.

> Why would the president lie knowing he would be caught in it?  Calling it a lie is to insinuate that the administration put forth an untruth.  Do you really think it's that black and white? 

In his state of the union message, George Bush made the yellow cake uranium claim that he knew had already been discredited.  That was a lie.  Cooking up a connection between Iraq and 9/11, and Iraq and Al Queda were lies.  Making an assumption about WMD and cooking the books with false evidence to support it was a lie.  Yes, it's that black and white.

Why would he lie?  Because it got him what he wanted.  He wanted to go into Iraq before 9/11, and 9/11 provided convenient justification -- a tissue of legitimacy which needed fleshing out.

Your belief that the Iraqi government, such as it is, can ever provide stability, is a belief that I don't share. The only thing that has ever provided stability in Iraq, that ever prevented tribal and religious factions from warring, was fear of Sadam Hussein.  That fear is now gone. A centralized Iraqi government that operates by consent of the governed is and always has been an extremely far-fetched notion.

The only choices we're left with are to pursue a political solution that involves neighboring countries, or a permanent and significant presence in Iraq. The current administration seems to be headed in the latter direction.  What evidence do we have that that wasn't always the intent?

Admittedly, your faith in the Iraqi govt isn't much less than me.  I've been to the Middle East and I understand how the culture doesn't lend itself to a representative government.  We'll see.

Yellow Cake explained:

http://www.uncoveror.com/niger.htm