From the President
Our Meeting with Jane Harman
Early this
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month, about 20 club presidents and vice presidents from the 36th Congressional District had a long meeting with Rep. Jane Harman to discuss the Iraq War, and Congress's efforts to get us out. I was joined by our Vice President Ray Waters and several other BCDC members who are officers of other Democratic Clubs, as well as other club leaders.
 The first thing that was noticeable is the efforts that Rep. Harman is making to help get us out of Iraq. Although she voted for the authorization in 2002, she twice said that she had been mistaken to vote for the war. She mentioned that her husband "lords it over" her that he was right to be opposed to the war from the outset, and she was wrong.
A lot of Democrats voted for the authorization in 2002. Most of us were against it, but I understood why they did it, even while I disagreed. But the real test of character and judgment in politics is not always getting it right in the first place -- but admitting you were wrong, and working to fix it. Rep. Harman gets it. Unfortunately, we have had a president for six years who has not been able to do that, and the country has suffered because of it.
The second thing that was interesting about the meeting is the efforts the Democrats in Congress are making, even despite the difficulties they face. By now, you have probably read about the appropriations measure
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that Rep. Harman told us about, which requires the Iraqi government to reach certain milestones and the President to certify readiness. It is not the most aggressive legislation, but even that is difficult with such a slim Democratic majority -- 15 seats in the House, and a margin of Joe Lieberman in the Senate.
Rep. Harman's hope was clearly to get legislation passed that would get us out of Iraq, but between a foolishly united Republican caucus dedicated to blindly following Bush, and a president unwilling to admit his mistakes for the good of the country, we have a long way to go. We will need to keep pushing on the issue until we get enough Republican members of Congress to realize that they are on the wrong side of the issue, or we elect a Democratic President.
The last thing of note was that, just as in Washington, the Iraq War overshadowed all of the other issues that we talked about. Rightly so, in many ways. But as Democrats, we still must remember that there are 47 Million Americans without health insurance; that working families are living on a minimum wage that has not risen in 10 years; that tuition at the UCs and the State Universities were just increased by 7%, making it more difficult for kids to go to college; that oil prices are still rising; that classrooms are still overcrowded; and the federal surplus that existed just 6 years ago has been replaced with massive deficits; and that we are Democrats because we want to fix all of these things too. This month, our meeting is going to focus on just one of those issues -- the environment and the global climate crisis -- but we have to keep working on all of these, even as we try to bring our troops home from Iraq.
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