would you protest a "democratic led" war ?

[JI7]

would any of you protest a war under a democratic president ? WHEN one of our democratic candidates are elected in 2004 and then get into office and decide on military attacks, would you protest ? i understand you need more information than this, such as it would depend on why they did it, and other factors involved. so you can list yourself the reasons if you were to protest or not, under what circumstances. and if any of you would refuse to protest against a democratic president. did you protest any of the military actions under the clinton administration ? do you wish you had ? the only thing i can think of right now is there should have been more opposition to the sanctions with regards to iraq.

[Jacobin]

1. Depends.

If a "dem" president continued following the PNAC agenda (Holy Joe comes to mind) I would protest.

[Iverson]

2. can, have

The idea, not the official party label, is the thing.

[Kitsune]

3. ditto *nt*

[PissedOffPollyana]

17. Exactly!

It's a bit of a silly question and a little insulting, if I might add. Perhaps there may be some here who would protest the atrocity we are perpetrating upon Iraq simply because there's a Republican at the helm, but they are just as frightening to me as any blind zealot.

I would hope that most people here would protest any illegal, unecessary or immoral war. For the record, that would be any that is not defensive or part of a _defensive_ unilateral force. This does not include the canards of "pre-emption" or "regime change". There is no such thing as a moral, offensive war, at least in my opinion.

[Monte Carlo]

4. Possibly, but the phrasing is everything.

With someone like Bush, the message should be "we don't like you or what you are doing". With someone like Clinton, it should more be along the lines of "we love you, but what the hell are you doing!?"

[Some Moran]

29. I've felt that way about Clinton many times...

lol

[shamanstar]

5. yeah

seems like a strange question no one i know is against the war because they feel they have to hate everything bush does because he is a republican.

[JI7]

yes, i know

but there are republicans who opposed every military action clinton did just because he was a democrat.this was evident in their lack of serious reasons for opposing what clinton did and instead focusing on his sex life.and these same people support EVERYTHING bush has done/does. we actually give reasons for why there is opposition to bush and it's about the issue involved.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

6. I would and I have

I protested against the war in Serbia, and the bombings of Iraq.

[KG]

7. yes.

[eissa]

8. Can and have also

I despised Madeline Halfbright. That's the difference between us and them; we have no problem critcizing our own (like I needed to point that out here!). We allow dissent among the ranks. They don't. It's both our blessing and our curse.

[wtmusic]

9. Aw come off it

Under any circumstances? Should we disband the military?

:silly:

[JI7]

13. i didn't say that

i said "under WHAT circumstances". i'm asking under what circumstances would they oppose or support the war.

[Scott Lee]

10. Anything short of a defensive war - you damn right

I don't see how party makes a difference in warmongering.

[DUreader]

11. I did and I would again, depending on circumstances

[ulysses]

12. sure.

The conditions under which I consider war legitimate are rare.

[Eloriel]

14. I will protestANY illegal, immoral, unjustified and unjustifiable

war of aggression. Period.

And your question makes me wonder if you realize Vietnam happened under Democratic presidents.

Eloriel

[JI7]

25. yes

i know it was started under democratic presidents, though some say eisenhower started it by sending some , but it doesn't change the fact the democratic presidents continued it. and that's why i included the question about whether you protested any of the military action under the clinton administration.

[TSElliott]

15. Nope

I did not protest the war in Iraq or Afghanistan so why would I protest one in the future.

[JI7]

18. may i ask why ?

did you support the war in iraq and afghanistan ? or did you oppose 1 or both but just didn't protest them ?

[TSElliott]

20. I did not support nor disagree with them.

I look at it like this, no matter what happens there, it will fall under a republican administration and when we take control we can still benefit from their work while chastising how they handled it.

It's a classic us win they lose situation.

[JI7]

22. benefit in what way ?

how do we benefit from it ?

[TSElliott]

36. Couple things come to mind.

No more negotiations with Saddam.

Lowers our dependency on Saudi Oil.

Pulls our troops out of Saudi Arabia and places them in a new base in Iraq.

Gave more reasons for Kim Jong Il to come to the negotiation table.

You see we get all this and the blood is on a republicans hands.

[SeattleRob]

16. Yes....

If it was a phony war, based on false or questionable evidence, I would protest. I protested the last war, not because it was done by a Republican. I protested because I took the time to gather information from different sources and I concluded, like most of the world, that we were being lied to.

[CMT]

19. if a dem president had gone into Iraq the way

Bush did I would have opposed him too.

[dfong63]

21. you can bet your britches on it

did you protest any of the military actions under the clinton administration ? do you wish you had ? the only thing i can think of right now is there should have been more opposition to the sanctions with regards to iraq.

yes i did protest Clinton's wars, including the one that Wes Clark is so proud of having commanded. and about the "sanctions" - let's be honest, Clinton was having Iraq bombed on almost a daily basis, even though war had not been declared. the so-called "no-fly zone" was itself an act of war, and not sanctioned by the UN. can you imagine if some other nation or group of nations tried to unilaterally impose a "no-fly zone" over 1/3 of OUR country, and it not being considered an act of war? of course not. it was an egregious provocation.

WHEN one of our democratic candidates are elected in 2004 and then get into office and decide on military attacks, would you protest ?

if it's not a war to defend our country, then hell yes. the US is not and should not be the world's cop. the US govt does not have the wisdom, the maturity, the objectivity, nor the riches needed for that role. it corrupts our democratic system here at home, makes us more of a target for terrorists, and frankly it will bankrupt us.

a war that doesn't have UN backing is an illegal war.

[mike_c]

23. of course!

eom

[buddhamama]

24. yes.

if i didn't believe in what we were doing; if i thought it was based on lies as the Iraq war was and Viet Nam.

[Bandit]

26. Evidently you were not around in the sixties

The last real "war" that the US was involved was considered by most to be a Democratic war even though Ike was the one to first get us involved. I was one of the protesters of that war also a participant in it. It was no more just than the Iraq war and I protest this war also even though most Democrats voted for it.

[JI7]

30. true, i wasn't

i wasn't born until the vietnam war was over. but i know about it. and i know it wasn't really being protested until some years later. and it was mostly because we could not win rather than it being wrong in itself.this is one reason why i ask in what cases you would protest in the future, and when you wouldn't.

[Bandit]

31. What you say you know is incorrect

The war was protested from the very first days in early sixties and the protests continued into the seventies. It was about the purpose of the war and not whether it was winnable or not. Read up a little more on the subject. Ever heard of the Democratic Convention of 1968 in Chicago? Seven years before the end of the war.

[JI7]

34. yes, there was some opposition

but was it as much as it was in later years ? wasn't it only later that the large protests begin to happen ? and do you remember if there was any protest for the first gulf war ?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

33. My first anti-vietnam protest was in 1965

When I refused to extend my enlistment in the marines to go to Vietnam. My first "organized" protest was in 1966. And, at that time most people thought it inconceivable that the USA could lose to a bunch of "yellow dwarves with switchblades" as LBJ called them.

The war was wrong, terribly wrong, and the people who protested it didn't do so because they thought the USA couldn't win.

Too bad Kerry, who rose to fame because of his anti-war stance, didn't hold on to his principles when it came to Iraq.

[Fleshdancer]

27. Yes, if war was not the very last option.

I'm not a pacifist, so it depends on the circumstances more than anything.

I'm still undecided about whether I support Clinton's actions or not. I was living overseas at the time and while I read the news stories, I never felt like I got a comprehensive view on things. Keep in mind I didn't know about DU at the time :)

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

28. Absolutely.

Kennedy and LBJ led the country to war in Vietnam while I was in the military to show that they weren't "soft on Communism". I protested then. And, would do so again.

Just as some of the candidates voted for BushCorp's invasion of Iraq to show their "patriotism". Bullshit then, bullshit now.

We can expect the likes of Bush to put on his cowboy boots and go to war to protect business and seek cheap votes by waving the flag and boohooing over the dead that he sent to die. But, it really pisses me off to see Dems to do it with the same cynicism in the name of playing "pragmatic" politics.

Protest against Democrats who would shed blood to gain votes? Hell, yes. Vote for them? Hell, no.

[David__77]

32. I have and I'm sure I will again.

I was in the streets against the bombardment of Yugoslavia.

[VOX]

35. Hell yes. Was in the streets against LBJ in 1965-68.

He personally escalated the hell out of that war.

[adriennel]

37. anti-war is anti-war

whether a Dem or Repug leads us!!

I really agonized over the Bosnia and Kosovo crises under Clinton. At that time it was pretty clear the people were suffering a large scale genocide, and I still found it hard to accept US military involvement. I am a strong proponent of multi-national organizations and feel that the international community should be able to provide assistance to nations in crisis without politicizing the goals of one nation over the will of others.

There was genocide en masse in Iraq under Saddam. This is not why the US went to war. The 1988 gassing of 100,000 Iraqis was mentioned a number of times prior to the latest Iraq offensive. At that time, the US did nothing. After the Persian Gulf War, the genocidal leader was left in place. It is hypocritical for the Bush Administration to claim that Operation Iraqi Liberation was for humanitarian reasons.

[elperromagico]

38. If a war is wrong,

it's wrong no matter who's in charge.

I'm sure some DUers are old enough to have protested LBJ's action in Vietnam. Vietnam was wrong, and LBJ was wrong. Lots of Americans called him on it, and rightly so.

So, if President Dean or President Clark or President Kerry or President Whatever starts a war for no real reason, I'll protest it. Our military should not be sent into combat unless absolutely necessary.

[frank frankly]

39. my opposition to this war has nothing to do with Rep/Dem

I am a pragmatist most of the time and I don't toe any party line.

This particular war was 100% wrong, on every conceivable level. If a Democratic POTUS had suggested it, I would have responded exactly the same.

This invasion and occupation of Iraq is uniquely awful to my lifetime. I found the timing of Clinton's Iraq bombings in 1998 to be very suspect, and if they had lead to war I would no doubt have researched it more.

No POTUS is above the law.

[durutti]

40. Probably

I opposed all of Clinton's military actions. I'm not a pacifist, but I have a rigorous standard of support for wars. There has not been a U.S.-led war that I supported in my lifetime.

At this point, the only war I could possibly support is one similar to the civil war, in which part of the country secedes to establish a reactionary regime. In that case, I would support the more progressive side in its fight to maintain the union.

[Tinoire]

41. Have & Will... Iraq & Yugoslavia & Latin America

I protested Clinton's continuation of the war against Iraq, the war against Yugoslavia, the wars we waged vicariously in Latin America (Columbia for example).

Democrat or Republican, it doesn't matter. I'll still protest their rear-end.

[cmd]

42. I have and might n/t

[ma4t]

43. uncomfortable question because of uncomfortable truth

JI7 poses a difficult question because the uncomfortable truth is that the vast majority of those opposed to the war in Iraq were silent about the invasion of Haiti, the war(s) in the former Yugoslavia and the cruise missle strikes against Iraq during the Clintom administration.

Now before anyone flames me, I'm passing no judgement here about the rightness or wrongness of those actions or of the current Iraqi war. I'm meerly pointing out that there was no protest effort to speak of for the military actions taken under the Clinton administration by the same people who are protesting now.

Why is this so? I think the inescapable conclusion is that pretty much no one protested because pretty much no one was upset. And unless someone can put forward a rationale for justifying war in Haiti and Kosovo that simultaneously excludes justification for war in Iraq, I'll have to conclude that the prime motivation for the protest is the occupant in the White House.

OK. JI7 asked the question. I've laid down a theory. Will anyone offer a rational response or will we resort to name-calling?

[Tinoire]

44. A combination of that and the fact

that this occupant did it so openly and so brutally that it was thrust in our faces. Usually we try to pretend these things aren't happening.

Clinton had the full compliance of the media when it came to Yugoslavia, Iraq, Haiti and like other Presidents, Latin America.

Can you imagine the outcry if Bush had bombed the Chinese Embassy? We'd never hear the end of it but because it was under Clinton, not a peep.

It's indeed maddening and this, I fear, is why things will never change. Both Parties are war-mongering but we delude ourself into thinking that ours is so righteous that it would never do such a thing. But it has and it does and it will until we stop being hypocrites and holding our own just as accountable. Hopefully, this is already changing thanks to the internet. There are plenty of people here who did denounce the war in Yugoslavia and who did protest. It just wasn't as huge because the thing was spun so brilliantly that to this day, some decent people believe it was a :puke: humanitarian intervention.