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Joe “Leader-Man” Speaks
Joe Lieberman was brilliant on the floor of the Senate today speaking on the Iraq war funding bill. After noting that public sentiment has largely turned against the war, he said:
But, leadership requires sometimes that we defy public opinion if that is what is necessary to do what is right for our country. In fact, at a time like this, we are required to do what each of us believes is right, and that might not be what is popular.
And what is right, I firmly believe, is that we cannot allow our nation to be defeated in Iraq by the same terrorist enemy with which we are engaged in a world-wide conflict. The global war on terrorism which we are waging is a world-wide struggle against a barbaric totalitarian foe that is Al Qaeda. And today, it is Al Qaeda that we are fighting in Iraq. Al Qaeda itself has declared Iraq to be the central front of their larger war against our way of life.
All of us who are privileged to serve this great country in positions of leadership have a very serious choice to make.
Our judgment can be guided by the polls and we can withdraw in defeat. We can rationalize our action with the reassuring but falsely hopeful words like redeployment. No matter what we say, our enemy will know that America’s will has been broken by the barbarity of their blood lust—the very barbarity we declare we are fighting, but from which we would actually be running. Mr. President, my main point is this: Now is not the time for more delay, for prolonged legislative posturing and bargaining over the supplemental appropriations bill. It is the time to do our duty to fund our troops, stand by our allies, and do everything we can to help them win the war against Al Qaeda in Iraq.
Rather than inventing new ways to vent our frustration with the war on Iraq, or with the President by handcuffing General Petraeus and undermining his strategy, let us give him and his troops our support as they and their Iraqi allies fight to win for us.
Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.