Tell Your Congress Critter to Join the Out of Afghanistan Caucus

Not a day goes by without yet more bad news out of Afghanistan: American deaths now over 1,000, massive corruption among our putative "allies," Pakistan using our own money to pay Taliban terrorists who kill U.S. military, suicide bombs and attacks on NATO headquarters ....

Foggy Bottom and the Pentagon seem to think all that is just hunky-dorry, but at least some members of Congress are trying to put a stop to the clusterfuck, as Down with Tyranny explains:

The most common caucuses consist of members united as an interest group. These are often bipartisan (comprising both Democrats and Republicans) and bicameral (comprising both Representatives and Senators)." And as of this week, there's a new one: The Out Of Afghanistan Caucus. This is how Tom Hayden explained it:

Representative John Conyers, frustrated by Congress's inaction towards the Afghanistan War, is forming a new Out of Afghanistan Caucus to focus Congressional opposition to the continuing conflict. The action came as the death toll for American soldiers crept over the one thousand mark and conservative estimates place the cost of Afghanistan-Iraq at more than $1 trillion.

According to a House source, the new caucus “creates a channel for members who are united against the war,” after months in which the Congressional Progressive Caucus has not taken an oppositional stance. “There is a lot more conflict among Democratic members who don’t want to oppose the Obama administration or who still believe this can be a humane war,” the source added.

There are seven members so far: John Conyers (D-MI), Maxine Waters (D-CA), Jim Moran (D-VA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Bob Filner (D-CA), Pete Stark (D-CA) and Alan Grayson (D-FL). And there's plenty of room for support-- first from among the nearly three dozen Democrats who stood up to Obama on June 16 last year when he continued Bush's shameful and financially devastating policy of dishonestly funding wars with supplemental budgets (i.e.- borrowing against our grandchildren's futures). Then there are the 88 co-sponsors of HR 5015, Representative Jim McGovern’s bill that would "require a plan for the safe, orderly, and expeditious redeployment of United States Armed Forces from Afghanistan." That group even includes a small handful of conservative Republicans: John Duncan (TN), Timothy Johnson (IL), Walter Jones (NC), and Ron Paul (TX). Three new members signed on this week, Ann Eshoo (D-CA), John Tierney (D-MA) and Mary Jo Kilroy (D-OH).

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