Coming Soon: Bush Campaign For War On Iran

Barnett Rubin, Afghanistan expert at NYU, has posted on the Bush plan to promote war with Iran: Informed Comment Global Affairs: Post Labor Day Product Rollout: War with Iran. This piece excerpts NY Times reporting from 2002 laying out how Bush and Co. prepared America to accept the Iraq war, and shows how the White House is doing the same now for Iran.

Josh Landis, Syria Studies expert and professor at Oklahoma U. posts a roundup at his blog, Syria Comment, with links to a report by two more professors expert in the field.

Patrick Lang, former chief of US Army Middle East intelligence, posts about the Iran propaganda war on his blog, Sic Semper Tyrannis. He believes "the train has left the station" and war is already in the offing.

People of America, you can make this stop. If enough of us protested to our congressional leaders and demand they use their Constitutional powers, we could stop this President's insane war. He can be removed from office (there are ample reasons already). He can have his power to make war on Iran cut off.

We are not a fascist state yet. We do have the right to make this man and his minions cease their insanity. But we must exercise that right.

What are you willing to do to stop more war in the Middle East?

Update: Here's a diary from Daily Kos describing the effectiveness of protest in shaping policy. Yes, as a commenter pointed out, tens of millions protested before we invaded Iraq, and couldn't stop the debacle. But this diary cites studies that show how protests can and do make a difference.

Call your senators and congresspeople Tuesday. OK, if your representatives are pigheaded warmongers, call them anyway. They log the numbers. They do pay attention.

I also call congresspeople from neighboring districts if they are powers on Capitol Hill. In my case, that would be Nancy Pelosi's office. They know that Oaklanders are almost as much her constituents as San Franciscans. She may run for Senate one day. She listens to her neighbors and her staff does log our calls.

Phone calls and snail mail letters are taken more seriously than email, but do whatever you can.

Some people get together in groups and go to the congressional offices, locally or in Washington. They make appointments and speak with staffers (or maybe the rep. if they're lucky). A group of Arabs and Jews from the Bay Area did this recently.

Comments

[rootlesscosmo]

I think we haven't taken full account of how deeply demoralizing it was when literally tens of millions of people, in the US and around the world, protested before the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 and were simply ignored. I recall Chomsky was upbeat about how this anti-war movement was years ahead of the Vietnam-era equivalent; unfortunately we were also years ahead on the disillusionment and despair timeline. To be very specific: my Congressional representative is Tom Lantos, whose foreign policy positions (he's actually a mainstream liberal on domestic issues) come straight from the Likud playbook. Should I write and urge him to oppose an attack on Iran? Is there a mass movement somewhere that I can join? No, we're not living under fascism; I post this comment without fear of a 2 am knock at my door (I'm a white, US-born, 65-year-old pensioner; I demonstrated in 2003 but basically I've been quiescent for 20 years.) But for all the effect we can have on US policy, we might as well be.

[rootlesscosmo]

P.S. Although I followed a link from your comment at Tony Karon's blog, I'm not Tony but another rootless cosmopolitan.

[rootlesscosmo]

I looked at that study and while I applaud the intentions, I think it's a pretty slender reed. The increase in laws passed correlates only weakly (at least from a glance--they supplied no math) with the measured level of protest and in fact seems to correlate more strongly with who was in the White House, rising under Carter, declining under Reagan and Bush I, staying low under Clinton, and still low under Bush II. And environmental protection is generally defined as a domestic issue; on foreign policy, and above all Middle East policy, there's a long-standing bipartisan consensus that's much less amenable to protest. I don't mind sending Lantos or Pelosi or Boxer or Feinstein a letter, but I can't make myself believe it will make a shred of difference.

When you read literature and journalism from the late 30's (Auden's ":september 1, 1939" for example) it's striking how many people saw the next war coming, had indeed foreseen it in the shape of the post-1918 world; these were people with vivid memories of the WW1 slaughter, let they knew (as Auden said) "we must suffer them all again." There's a terrible sense of inexorability in the world these days, about the attack on Iran, the climate-change tipping points, and much else; we can go down protesting or quietly, and if there's a posterity to remember us that may matter to them, but I think we're for the chopper either way.

[Leila]

Well rootless, even if you are right, I plan to squeak a little as the Giant Raccoon of Fate chomps me in its jaws. You ought to hear the horrible noises from our city garden at night as the raccoons (or feral cats?) slaughter roof rats in the dark. RRRRR (growling) and PEEP PEEP PEEP. THe peeping is quiet but terrible. I shall go down like that, peeping and squeaking like a valiant rodent.

[rootlesscosmo]

"Quiet but terrible," a disturbingly vivid description. I will phone Lantos' office about the Barbara Lee resolution; as you say, there's a certain minimum of self-respect we rodents have to cling to.

[Leila]

Thank you, rootless, I am grateful for your effort.