Topic: Foreign Policy
Paul: Pelosi spiked Iran bill Congressman Ron Paul charges that Pelosi "deliberately removed" part of a bill, which would have blocked the U.S. from attacking Iran without approval from Congress, at the behest of AIPAC.by George Dance
(libertarian)
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
A one-minute audio clip of Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX) is currently sweeping the blogosphere (with 35 separate stories in less than a week), but so far receiving no notice in the mainstream media. In it, Paul charges that House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) removed a section from a bill, which would have barred the U.S. government from going to war without a congressional vote, at the behest of the "leadership of Israel" and "AIPAC" (the American Israel Public Affairs committee).
Paul made the allegation at the Future of Freedom (FFF) conference, 'Restoring the Republic 2008: Foreign Policy and Civil Liberties', earlier this month in Reston Virginia. Paul, who was awarded the FFF's Lifetime Achievement Award on June 6, addressed the conference that day on "A Foreign Policy of Freedom." (His speech, which was recorded by C-SPAN, can be ordered using the link at the end of this article.)
The audio excerpt has Paul declaring:
The Democrats finally win the election in 2006, and it was a mandate, the Republicans get thrown out; what's the first act that Pelosi does? There was a supplemental bill that had a bill of ours we had gotten put in, and the bill said -- you shouldn't need a bill like this! -- it said, you can't go to war with Iran without getting approval from Congress. And she removed it, she removed it deliberately. And then, the astounding thing is, they asked her why, and she said the leadership in Israel asked her to. That was in the newspaper, that was in the Washington Post, that she was asked by AIPAC and others not to do that." (1)
A quick search of newspaper accounts of the bill -- which was ultimately vetoed by President Bush -- from that time reveals only one, in the strongly pro-Israel Washington Times, that mentions AIPAC at all:
Last week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi received a smattering of boos when she bad-mouthed the war effort during a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the Democratic leadership, responding to concerns from pro-Israel lawmakers, was forced to strip from a military appopriations measure a provision meant to weaken President Bush's ability to respond to threats from Iran. (2)
However, Paul's allegation is corroborated by a contemporary account (from the Asia Times), which cites a different congressional source:
In March 2007, the US Congress was trying to attach a provision to a Pentagon spending bill that would have required President George W Bush to get congressional approval before attacking Iran. AIPAC was strongly against it - because it viewed the legislation as taking the military option "off the table". The provision was killed. Congressman Dennis Kucinich [D-OH] said this was due to AIPAC. (3)
John Nichols of The Nation also covered the story at the time, as did Patrick Buchanan of The Conservative Voice. Here's Buchanan's take:
If George W. Bush launches a pre-emptive war on Iran, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will bear full moral responsibility for that war.
For it was Pelosi who quietly agreed to strip out of the $100 billion funding bill for Iraq a provision that would have required President Bush to seek congressional approval before launching any new war on Iran....
According to John Nichols of The Nation, Pelosi's decision to strip the provision barring Bush from attacking Iran without Congress' approval "sends the worst possible signal to the White House."
"The speaker has erred dangerously and dramatically," writes Nichols. Her "disastrous misstep could haunt her and the Congress for years to come."...
Nothing in the provision would have prevented Bush, as commander in chief, from responding to an Iranian attack or engaging in hot pursuit of an enemy found in Iraq. Nor would the provision have prevented Bush from threatening Iran. It would simply have required him to come to Congress -- before launching all-out war....
Why did Pelosi capitulate? Answer: She was "under pressure from some conservative members of her caucus, and from lobbyists associated with neoconservative groups that want war with Iran, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)," writes Nichols. (4)
Salon reporter Ben Kamiya also mentioned the incident, in his 2007 report on that year's AIPAC conference:
AIPAC showed its true power -- and its continuing ability to steer American Mideast policy in a disastrous direction -- when a group of conservative and pro-Israel Democrats succeeded in removing language from a military appropriations bill that would have required Bush to get congressional approval before using military force against Iran.
The pro-Israel lobby's victory on the Iran bill is almost unbelievable. Even after the nation repudiated the Iraq war decisively in the 2006 midterms, even after it has become clear that the Bush administration's Middle East policy is severely unbalanced toward Israel and has damaged America's standing in the world, Congress still cannot bring itself to stand up to the AIPAC line. (5)
Ron Paul, Stephen Kinzer, Andrew Bacevich, "Foreign Policy and Civil Liberties," C-Span Video Library, June 13, 2008. http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/index.php?main_page=product_video_info&products_id=205870-1
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Since when do we do what Israel tells us to do??? Isn't this America? Have the Democrats sold us out? Who do they think they are? How do you fire Pelosi?
Let me tell you that the war against the Peoples of the World has begun. The 35 articles of Impeachment would have , in normal circumstances, been front page of all newspapers, CNN, etc, and there has been a total gag order on a global scale, unprecedented, total silence while he has tea with HMQ. Secondly, contrary to popular beleive, that the EU is America's foe, is not true. It's like bad cop, good cop, although I don't see who would be the good cop. If they were foes, then the EU, would certainly have showed plentifully on their own channel, the Impeachment proceedings going on. They did not, Total silence. They are all on the same side. The MSM is I can say totally controlled on a global scale. Another very obvious gag order was Ron Paul, his name was nowhere to be seen in any country. These are serious crimes, as is Pelosi's actions, which oders do not come from the People or her own Parti, but from an overseas entity. That is treason. As for Bush, treason seems to be a family tradition, as evidenced by the overwhelming and well documented unclassified and in the public domain of this family's many treasonous actions, for starters, google "trading with the ennemy act". The world is watching and learning more day by day, and it is time to wake up from the long sleep you were in. Governments do not represent the people, they represent their Corporate financiers, who have no loyalty to America or it's laws. The world is watching and counting on your courage, because the U.S.A. is the last bastion of real freedom, if you can restore the government as planned by the framers, I pray for your success. May God bless you who have awoken and are taking action.
Disgusting...how do they get away with this? I would have never thought another country could have so much control of our foreign policy until someone linked me to this documentary...
Pelosi, whose House Speakership rests upon a 233-201 Democratic majority in the House was told forcibly by Blue-Dog and pro-Israeli Democratic Hawks that they would not support the appropriations bill with the Iran language. The 25+ votes those factions represent, along with the loyal puppy dog mannerisms of the GOP House members was enough to doom the bill. Ron Paul blames Pelosi, but he knows damn well that it is the Republican House, voting as one big happy group that was the real force causing the change in language.
Once again, with his distortions and misrepresentations of the truth, Paul proves himself to be right where he belongs;
In Under The Big Three-Ring Circus Tent Of Republican Inclusiveness.
Iran is not Iraq. I was one of those who believed that Saddam Hussain never posed a threat to the United States. Hussain wanted the resumption of normal relations with the US and did not bear animosity towards the US, only Iran and Israel. Iran is a different beast. You do yourself an injustice when you lump together vastly different foreign policy considerations.
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