My reply to Senator Kennedy's request for money....

[cenacle]

Received this email which reads in part:

"Republicans apparently think it's acceptable to continue pouring billions of taxpayer dollars into the war in Iraq. They think it's acceptable to ignore the needs and priorities of our people here at home on dozens of vital domestic issues!

"But it's not acceptable to this Senator.

"If you agree with me - if you want to end the GOP's distorted priorities and get America back on track - help elect a Democratic Senate that will do it. Make a donation of $10, $20, $50 or $100 to the Committee for a Democratic Majority today"


Dear Senator Kennedy,

Your party was swept back into the majority in the Congress in 2006 on the promise to END THE WAR. A year later, your party has done nothing, and now there is news that another bag of war money is going to be approved with no strings attached, supposedly to pay for pet domestic projects.

Tell me, Senator, why should I send you a dollar? Your leading candidates for President do not promise an end to the War. They make vague promises of drawing down, by some number, at some point. Your leadership is hand in hand with the War Criminal-in-Chief in continuing this nightmare. The progressive base is ready to jump ship, really ready, and I'm betting a third party will emerge in the next year or so.

Disappointment is not the word I have for DC Democrats. Disgust doesn't go far enough. Your party's leadership is puke. And where are you, Senator? Where are you? Why are you letting traitors like Reid and Pelosi sell out this nation and this world? Why aren't you leading a real, credible well-announced opposition NOW instead of writing pathetic emails asking for money for someday's solution? Where is the revolt of REAL progressive democrats NOW? There is none. There is cowardice, raw great pathetic cowardice.

I will not send you a penny. You are a shame to your family's tradition. How many more soldiers and Iraqi citizens must die before you wake up to your own soft, sorry, moral blubber?

Wake up, Senator. This country's population is far ahead of you in DC in wanting the war OVER and the poor and vulnerable cared for. It will happen, whether the Democratic Party leads the way, or is swept aside with their bedmates in the other party.

Peace NOW,
{signature}

[Wizard777]

1. I keep it simple. I tell them, donations are off the table. n/t

[Joe Fields]

42. I like both yours and his responses.

Money and job security are the only thing they care about. Lack of money will definitely get their attention.

[Generator]

46. Bada Zing!

You do mean that as a nicely clever jab at Ms. Pelosi do you not?

Because I see where this could be used in everything.

Like "Voting for your is off the table, senator enabler."

[K Gardner]

2. Delete

Response made after misreading OP ! Sorry.

[SaveElmer]

3. Are you serious?

"You are a shame to your family's tradition. How many more soldiers and Iraqi citizens must die before you wake up to your own soft, sorry, moral blubber?"

You think this is appropriate for a letter to someone like Ted Kennedy...

[Vickers]

4. Hell yes it is appropriate.

"someone like Ted Kennedy..."

:wtf:

[K Gardner]

14. Actually, I completely misread the OP... I have no idea why I thought she was responding

to a letter from Senator Clinton's campaign for money. Maybe because I just got one and had thought of sending a letter back. I'm actually horrified to go back and read that it was Kennedy. I personally agree with the statements about the war, but I happen to be a great and longtime admirer of the Kennedy family and have been broken-hearted so many times over the course of my lifetime, over JFK and RFK and JFK, Jr and Rose and Jackie (yes, I include her). At any rate, sorry for the blurt and I'm going to try to delete my initial response ! Thank you for the nudge.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

19. With All Due Respect Rose Kennedy Died At 104

She led quite a life...

[DemocratSinceBirth]

5. That's Fucked Up... He Has Opposed This War From The Gitgo...He Deserves Better

I will not send you a penny. You are a shame to your family's tradition. How many more soldiers and Iraqi citizens must die before you wake up to your own soft, sorry, moral blubber?



"blubber"???????

[MannyGoldstein]

6. I Agree - But My Senior Senator Has been Playing His Part

Kennedy was, I believe, the first person in Congress to call Bush a liar.

[sniffa]

7. here was mine the other day

to a standard pitch for money..

"I love both of my Senators, but I plead with you to endorse someone to save our country.

Kucinich is closest to my (openly spoken by the candidate) values, but Senator Dodd would make a wonderful President. Please endorse someone soon, and someone the country can get behind.

Thank you

**** ********"

[gateley]

8. I hope responses are tallied and forwarded to those who should hear. When

you start holding back $$$, maybe that's when they'll start listening. Good letter!

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

9. Oh Jesus Christ!

what the fuck?

[MonkeyFunk]

10. How has Kennedy shamed his family's tradition?

He's been opposed to this war all along.

What a ridiculously mean-spirited, ignorant, over-the-top reply.

[H2O Man]

11. Legalize Lonnie Anderson's hair. n/t

[EstimatedProphet]

12. I know! Send money to his Republican opponent! That'll show him good!

[Blue-Jay]

13. I don't believe you.

[cenacle]

15. Not a letter I wanted to write...

but Senator Kennedy is not leading the progressives in the Democratic Party in revolt against the Reid/Pelosi traitor leadership. I know he opposes the War. I know he believes in progressive causes. I know his family has done so much to benefit the poor and vulnerable. But I would have written to many other allegedly progressive Senators and Representatives a similar letter. Feingold, Boxer, Byrd, etc. There are no more excuses on this situation. Another War funding approval no strings attached? Another? Are you kidding me? This has to end. People are dying, now, tonight. That Congressmen and women are sleeping in their nice beds and walking down their streets in perfect safety while Iraq is a bloodbath, a moral bloodbath, a literal bloodbath, a human failure at all levels, I cannot support them. I would not have written to Kennedy if he hadn't sent me an email asking for money, boasting of his own clean conscience anti-war stance.

RFK ran for President on ending the Vietnam War, and maybe he paid for this with his life, as some say Dr. King did too. It is said JFK was killed in part for his plan to draw down American presence in Vietnam. I don't know if all of this is true, but it is clear these men took unnuanced stances on War. Their brother is sitting back, showing his unblemished hands but not doing what needs to be done.

My letter to him was in my own words, reflecting my own thoughts. When I lived in Boston, I voted for him twice and was proud to. I am not proud of him any longer, or any of them. I don't believe them, their vows and promises. The vast majority of this country wants us out of Iraq. They are hindering this desire rather than representing us as elected to. I am angry, and asking me to give money to hypocrites just makes me angrier.

[Blue-Jay]

17. Nope. Still not convinced.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

20. Me Neither

He should write a letter apologizing for his libelous diatribe...

[cali]

22. sickening in a completely unjustified smug self-fuckingrighteous

way. What do you you want him to do? Shoot Pelosi and Reid?

[Cameron27]

45. Oh I like that!

:thumbsup:

[Forkboy]

16. Yeah, let's piss on one of the few good ones who does care about this shit.

That'll show 'em!

[Armstead]

18. Kennedy is the last Senator who should receive a reply like that

Of all the members of the Senate, it was Kennedy who was an often lonely voive against the rush to war in Iraq.

You should have not taken out your ire on him.

[cali]

21. What a repulsive, stupid and cowardly piece of shit letter

and you're proud of that turd? Amazing.

[cali]

23. Why I'm kicking this:

It's because I think it's disgraceful and represents the low we've sunk to here when we indiscriminately blame democrats for everything. That and the language is so vile.

"I will not send you a penny. You are a shame to your family's tradition. How many more soldiers and Iraqi citizens must die before you wake up to your own soft, sorry, moral blubber?"

[terrya]

24. That letter is disgusting.

As was pointed out in this thread, Senator Kennedy doesn't deserve this kind of crap.

[MonkeyFunk]

26. Hehe

I think this thread didn't get the response the OP expected.

[terrya]

27. Seriously, WTF?

He refers to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid as traitors (I'm sure Senator Kennedy will appreciate that) and insults Kennedy himself. It's a bullshit letter to a pretty decent man, Democrat and Senator.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

32. The "Blubber" Part Is Right Out Of The GOPU Playbook...

Too bad Bobby and Jack didn't live to be "large" old men...

It is interesting that most of the extended Kennedy clan is on the lean side except for Ted and Ted Jr...

[cenacle]

28. No, it pretty much did...

Some people are going to like a person's statement, some won't. That's what a democracy is all about. I don't have to think what you think, and you don't have to agree with me. Makes life interesting and keeps it unpredictable. I posted here as one more person who reads these boards and cares about what is going on in the world. It doesn't intimidate me that some people didn't like my letter. Why should it? I wrote my honest opinion in response to an email delivered to my in-box. I doubt Senator Kennedy will ever see what I wrote, but I hope he does.

As I've said before, he's a decent man, but he is a man of power right now, and I do not see that power being used effectively, and I see the deadly results of this. While men and women in DC blithely debate the issues, and plan their holiday breaks, soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are dying, and families in those places and here in the U.S. are suffering unbelievably, and *needlessly*. It's easier, perhaps, to debate these things civilly, at a leisured rate, but to my mind this is cowardice, it's treason to the commitment our elected representives make to do their best by us.

We live in one world, and what we do now, and how we do it, will have its effects in time. If we do right by one another, especially the downtrodden and the helpless but of course each one of us, each being on the planet, we have hope of a better future. If we do wrong, the bastards will keep us apart from each other, killing each other, poor and dying in vain. So you can argue whether or not it is more effective to go after the lazy heroes of the Democratic Party or the criminals of the Republican Party, but I take the stance that any man or woman in DC not acting defiantly and constantly to end the War is a person I oppose. And when one of those persons asks me for money, claiming some kind of moral superiority that in my opinion is not earned, I will reply from my convictions outlined here. It's really simple. Are those representing us in DC trying their best, their damndedest best, to get us out of Iraq? No. No noisy little hullabaloo of replies on a forum thread is going to convince me otherwise. A year since the Dems were swept back into power and they are now trading no strings attached war chests for pork??? No, sorry, I'm not on that boat. I'm giving them excuses no longer. Some of them knew about the torture going on? What else?

If the progressive representatives and senators in the party do not do more to stop the leadership from parking on a daily basis ass-high before Bush's big boot, then they are just as culpable. I can't parse it any other way than that.

[MaineDem]

35. That's what I thought, too. n/t

[Rowdyboy]

25. Your letter is a sickening peice of horseshit sent to one of the few decent men

in the senate. Pathetic.

[ronnykmarshall]

29. hmmmm?

[suston96]

30. "Your party was swept back into the majority...."

Sorry, that is not what happened.

Maybe the House was a "sweep" but the Senate was and still is a squeaker. With Liebermann taunting his ex-Democrats with possible defection there is no "power" for the Democrats in the Senate or the Congress.

The people are pissed at the Congress and they have good reason, but they don't understand why the Congress is stagnated - gridlocked.

Not enough votes to get past the 60% threshold for making things happen.

[mtnsnake]

31. Your letter wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for that one sentence

You are a shame to your family's tradition

That kind of ruined it for me.

That sentence aside, I think Nancy Pelosi would be a much better recipient of a letter like this. Kennedy is one of the real gems our party has left.

[cenacle]

33. I wish RFK or JFK were here...

I wish Dr. King was here. I wish John Lennon was here. Not being ever able to know, I just dream of them speaking out clearly and daily and gathering crowds to their speeches to rally action against the War. But if one of them was sitting back while this horror was going on, I'd be just as angry. You see, I want EK's actions in VOTES, in campaigning HARD AND THROUGH CHRISTMAS AND BEYOND for the War to END. It can be done. Washington can be shut down until this nightmare is over.

I just finished watching Tom Brokaw's "1968" on the History Channel. He interviewed Jon Stewart who noted that the difference between Iraq and Vietnam is the draft. I think he's right but I don't think that is all. Vietnam was a battlefront for the Cold War, fought by proxy with the US and USSR waving their nukes around in the background. The US has no combatant like that now, no Evil Empire to point at on the map, no sense that occupying Iraq is bringing us closer and closer to nuclear annihilation. There's a bully mentality that we can do it and nobody can stop us. The "opposition" arguing against this, in favor of reason and humility and brotherhood, politely introducing bills and then agreeably watching them die...the enemy to democracy is running our country, and I swear there is collusion with this on all sides.

And waiting for 2008? How is Hillary going to be convinced that her administration's success hinges on getting us out of Iraq if she sees no consequences for Bush in not doing so? How will any of her opponents? The disease is in the roots, the complacency of Empire, and it's hard to believe it will change enough through an election where the process is so choregraphed in advance. So if we want to change things, we can't have any sacred cows. Nobody is immune to the consequences of the changes needed.

It's really simple. We hire the representatives in DC through elections to do what we want done. They are our employees. Every 2, 4 or 6 years they can get fired. They are as good as how satisfied we are.

Very few of us are satisfied right now and for awhile. None of them are immune to being fired, just like none of us working joes and josephines are. They forget that and expect to be re-elected. The Republicans did it. Now the Democrats are assuming we are stuck with the lot of them.

Let me tell you. Times change. Rome fell. The French Empire fell. The Nazi 1000 year reign was over in about a dozen years. Empires rise and fall, so do democratic republics. That's the story of human history.

Reid/Pelosi and the rest of the treacherous, colluding leadership and their dogs can bite my shine metal ass. As for Kennedy and the more progressive bunch, I do not see balls on many of them either, so to speak. No politician gets my loyalty simply for a party affiliation or a family name. It just doesn't work that way. They have to learn this, over and over it seems.

I hate it the way things have been going, but I'm sure as hell not going to sit back quiet about it.

[MaineDem]

34. Do you have any idea what can be done with a one seat majority?

Nothing!

If we don't get more Democratic Senators our issues will not get moved through. In order to work we need 60 seats and writing letters like this to a good Senator trying to make things work will not help.

Your letter is a disgrace.

[cenacle]

37. I used to say things like that too...

but my breaking point was the news that Dems are negotiating no-strings-attached war funding in exchange for domestic spending projects. I've had it. I'm done explaining and excusing and watching the Republicans go on governing no matter what percentage of the Congress they represent at a given moment. I'm done defending the Democrats.

One day a person takes it once too often and says no. Says it again. Finds the world does not end, and the world is still spinning. We can say no to what is going on in Iraq and direct our wrath at DC which is directing this horror. We are not getting what we voted for in 2006, not getting anything close. In fact, what have we gotten? Nothing has changed.

Do we trust the Dems to stop Bush when he puts invading Iran up for a vote? Do we trust them for anything when they are failing us on the most important issue of our time? How does the War end at this point? How does it slow down? How do we not simply get used to being outraged and impotent, excusing those who have no justification to offer for themselves? There are no consequences for Bush. He has a 30 percent approval rating, lost the Congress a year ago, admits to torture, to wiretapping, disregards the UN, ignores his own intelligence community's explicit statement that Iran poses no nuclear threat. Consequences? None. He rolls along.

Will it change in 2008? I keep asking that. When Pelosi and Rockefeller knew about the torture of prisoners under American sanction? When Clinton and Obama talk in their reasonable, persuasive terms about attacking Iran or Pakistan?

The power is ours to end this, to re-direct the nation's path. We tried in 2006, it wasn't enough. The Machine is potent and it does not shift willingly. DC is disconnected from us, from our country, from our world, yet it drives the wheel still. They let torture, wiretapping, illegal war go on, right now. Get it, please, they are not on our side. Not now, not cowering in their fear and complacency and whatever else it is that is driving them. We can say no, louder and louder, more and more of us, until every one of them hears, and is driven by our will, the only one that should be driving them. The only one in DC they should be heeding.

[MaineDem]

38. "We tried in 2006, it wasn't enough."

Now that's something I can agree with. We don't have enough in the Senate. We need more Democratic Senators to be filibuster-proof. Senator Kennedy's letter was from the DSCC, to help elect Dem Senators. They need all our help.

I can appreciate the time it takes you to write out each of your responses but I disagree with you. Ted's request was legitimate and your reply to him was atrocious.

[Mz Pip]

36. I wouldn't call

Pelosi or Reid traitors, either. :eyes:

Mz Pip
:dem:

[DemocratSinceBirth]

44. Just Misguided

~

[Chrisy5558]

39. Wow

I think your letter was unfair.

He is one of the few who has repeatly spoken out against the WAR. He is one of the few who has stood for what he believes and didn't vote to fund the war. He has stood up to Bush time and time again.

Senator Kennedy is not perfect. HE is a man and he has his faults. The whole time I lived in MA I always knew that he cared about the people of our state and that he does have compassion and does care about the needs of the working and the poor people. Yes he has made mistakes, but every single one of us has made mistakes. Maybe if people showed more compassion,forgiveness, and understanding of people than this world wouldn't be in the sorry state of affairs it is.

Tell me how has he disgraced his family name? HE has continued to fight for the very issues that his brothers fought for and even died for. Civil Rights, Poverty, Education, and to seek peace over War and other issues that are important to all Democrats in this country.

I for one am glad he is in the Senate and fighting for us and is willing to stand up for the truth against all those who would want to continue to take this country down the wrong path we are going.

[ecstatic]

40. Hopefully you didn't hit send yet. Now that you've had time to cool off

Draft another calmer version that gets your point across with class.

[paulk]

41. thanks for your concern

I'm sure the second you mentioned "3rd party" you got deleted.

[cenacle]

43. haven't cooled off a degree...

I sent the note I intended, and discussing it here has confirmed my thoughts. I lived in MA for ten years and voted for Kennedy twice, and respect his family's name, and respect his long service. None of that, however, diverts me from my point which is he is one more Democrat being led calmly down Bush's chosen path. I can't see it any other way. I can't see war funding-for-domestic programs as something other than iniquitous. I can't see how they can take their month long vacation while people during that month will continue to die in Iraq. I cannot see these days in DC as business as usual. I can't do it. I can't excuse Dems for the number of times they have voted to fund the War, for allowing votes to come to the floors of Congress, for letting personal interest rise above what must be done. I am no less angry because nothing has happened to quell my anger. Not a thing, not today, not tomorrow. When?

The longer we occupy Iraq, the more danger we are in for reprisals overseas and domestically, the more innocent people die, the more parents receive the sober call notifying them their children have died, the more children lose parents, the more spouses lose their partners. Nothing is stopping this. This discussion isn't stopping it. Senator Kennedy isn't stopping it. The Democratic Majority isn't stopping it. Another soldier will die tonight. Another baby. Another suicide bomb will go off and horror upon horror will repeat itself.

What are we doing? I received an email asking me for money, and replied with little faith it would be read or considered seriously, and at best I have kept pushing this thread with my thoughts and opinions. Have I persuaded anyone here? I don't think so. So what has happened? I have solidified my ideas, for now, until events occur to change it, that what is happening is wrong and I see no solution being battled for with fist and blood and words of fire. Nothing. I appreciate being able to speak out here, and those who have read this thread, and responded. I respect you maybe more than you respect me, at least in some instances.

But is the War closer to ending for my efforts? Did I change anything in anyone else? It seems not. No more agree with my view now than before I posted this thread initially. For some here, the only thing that matters are the words I used, my alleged lack of decorum, respect for a name, a career. Those things, in this case, add up to nothing for me, not a slightest bit. Nothing. The War is not ending. Does anyone else see that? It's going on tonight, tomorrow, soon it will have more money without timetables, and more after that. Will the next President end it? If so, wonderful! But what if he or she doesn't? What will we do then? What if Hillary or whomever says, "no, it can't end, not now, but soon, I promise"? What then?

The days are now less than a year's worth until the next President is elected. What if hopes for the War ending then are not met? What if Bush and Company are busy making sure the War does not end? This is no game of words, no dance between alluring ideas. Someone just died over there, and another, and another. When does it end? Nobody can truly say. I have less hope now than I have had in a long time, and I can't think of anything anyone could say to me that would make me feel more optimistic.