President Obama will announce his intention Tuesday evening to send a significant and expedited troop increase to Afghanistan. Liberal Democrats have shown strong and at times bipartisan opposition to sending another 30,000 US troops to battle, which a senior administration official said will be complete by next summer.
Sen. Jim McGovern, (D-Massachusetts), said Tuesday that he believes a troop escalation is the wrong move, and could have serious consequences.
“I just don’t see how increasing our military footprint in Afghanistan is the right thing to do. The Karzai government is corrupt and incompetent. The original use-of-force authorization in 2001 was targeted at Al Qaeda, which has moved to Pakistan.,” he said. “And we are spending billions and billions in borrowed taxpayer money to finance this effort. I would strongly urge the President to reconsider.”
McGovern, Sen. Russ Feingold, (D-Wisconsin), and Rep. Walter Jones, (R-North Carolina), have been part of the bipartisan effort to oppose the increase, which has a projected price tag of more then $30 billion, or $1 million per soldier.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, (D-Vermont), a long-time critic of the plan to send more troops to the region, said, “Where is the rest of the world standing with us on this issue? Why is it just the taxpayers of this country and our very brave soldiers having to bear all of the burden?”
Sen. Barney Frank, (D-Massachusetts), chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said the only way to continue to finance the war in Afghanistan at this rate is a graduated income.
“It’s important for people to understand how these wars are adding to our deficits,” Frank said.
Rep. Dennis Kucinich, (D-Ohio),asked: “Why is it we have finite resources for healthcare but infinite resources for war?”
Other legislators, such as Lynn Woolsey (D-California), were not surprised by Obama’s failure to deliver on many of the left’s key issues. “I didn’t expect him to be a progressive, so personally, I’m not surprised.”
Obama will detail his plan Tuesday in a primetime address from the US Military Academy at West Point, NY, Tuesday
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