Politics and Passion

Everyone who cares about the upcoming presidential election is motivated by a deep passion for at least one issue. My passions are for economic fairness, the right of women to control their own bodies, and the right of our children to inherit a viable and healthy planet.

But the issue that brings up my strongest emotions is war. As a mother, and as an American citizen who lived through and remembers the Vietnam war, I am horrified by the thoughtless bellicosity of the Bush administration, and I worry - a lot - about a new draft:

Digby says:

If there was ever a man with less moral authority to call up a draft than the phony AWOL flyboy, I don't know who it would be. He has even less than someone who went to Canada --- at least that person had to live with the consequences of his actions. This was a guy who had the gall to shove to the front of the line, play around with a million dollar airplane for a couple of years and then check out early for reasons we can only speculate about. It takes a lot of nerve for a man like that to tell soldiers who volunteered to go over and fight his losing battle for him. For a man like him to draft young men and women against their will is simply unthinkable. Yet, that is exactly what he is thinking.

All young people in this country should vote for John Kerry and they should drag their slacker friends to the polls with them. He faced all these choices head on in the crucible of his generation and he came out a man of strength and integrity. Bush ran away. Young people should realize that he will not hesitate to put their lives on the line to cover his ass. He did it to his fellow young men when he was twenty one years old, he's doing it to reserves and national guard troops today and he'll do it to young people with a draft tomorrow. It's in his character to make others fight his battles and clean up his messes for him.

I can tell you this: if we were ever forced to fight a war during a Kerry presidency I would be confident that everything possible was being done to protect our soldiers' lives. I would be able to believe that the war itself was necessary. Conversely, I have no confidence in the leadership abilities of Bush. None. Through his lies he has forfeited the right to be trusted. He is not worthy of our trust. We cannot entrust to him the lives of our children.