Do you believe the Bush regime's goal in Iraq was ever to have a stable and secure situation there?

WASHINGTON - June 9 - Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Oakland) condemned Republican efforts to quietly remove a provision to prevent spending to establish permanent military bases in Iraq during the conference committee on the emergency war supplemental spending bill.

"The House and Senate went on record opposing permanent bases, but now the Republicans are trying to sneak them back in in the middle of the night," said Lee. "The Republicans willingness to abuse the legislative process is clear evidence of their unwillingness to level with the American people about their plans for Iraq."

Although both the House and Senate unanimously approved amendments introduced by Lee and Senator Joe Biden (D-DE), respectively, to prevent funds appropriated in the bill from being used to establish permanent military bases in Iraq, Republican members of the joint committee appointed to reconcile the House and Senate versions voted to strip the provision from the bill.

Lee was emphatic that the upcoming floor debate on Iraq, expected next week, explicitly clarify the nation's position on permanent bases.

"The perception that the U.S. intends to occupy Iraq indefinitely is fueling the insurgency and making our troops more vulnerable. We need to make it perfectly clear that there will be no permanent US military presence in Iraq," said Lee. "If we are going to have a real debate on Iraq next week, it must explicitly address this question, and Republicans need to go on record as to whether they think we should stay in Iraq permanently."

Not a bad time to contact yr congresscritter.

From America's Endless Race Wars and Massacres, well worth the read:

Mark Twain, an anti-war activist, wrote of how 30,000 U.S. troops caused the deaths of a half-million Filipinos. One episode of many in the imperial butchery occurred in 1906 when a whole village sought refuge from the invaders in a dormant volcanic crater on the southern island of Jolo.  Sixteen-hundred were massacred by American artillery, rifles and machine guns. U.S. officials reported:

“This action was absolutely necessary to the welfare of the people of Jolo. The position was first shelled by a naval gunboat and then assaulted by the troops and constabulary. The Moro women fought alongside the men and held their children before them, having sworn to die rather than yield. In this way a number of women and children were among the killed – an unfortunate but necessary evil."

The same script we hear today had been written, even then, just as the U.S. was stepping fully onto the global stage. We will not list the atrocities that U.S. soldiers have committed against (almost always) non-white peoples in the 100 years since the Jolo Crater Massacre, the Philippines. They are legion, as were the massacres that occurred in the previous centuries of the evolution of American Manifest Destiny.