“Stand Up Against the Surge” - Molly Ivins

Feb 01, 2007 - 05:25 AM | by Violet Bliss Dietz

There are many people in our nation who see the folly of escalation in Iraq and have spoken out against. We’ve lost one of our brightest and certainly most irreverently humorous voices in that choir.

The DCP blog introduced her last column written at the beginning of January this way:

“Brave warriors come in all shapes and sizes. Some fight with swords, some with pens. One of the bravest of the pen-fighters lost her final battle yesterday, when Molly Ivins passed away after a years-long and painful struggle with cancer. She kept on fighting right until the very end. And in her final column, published on January 11 of this year, she charged us all to do the same.”

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Stand Up Against the Surge

by Molly Ivins
The purpose of this old-fashioned newspaper crusade to stop the war is not to make George W. Bush look like the dumbest president ever. ...the challenge with this misbegotten adventure is that WE simply cannot let it continue. 
It is not a matter of whether we will lose or we are losing. We have lost. Gen. John P. Abizaid, until recently the senior commander in the Middle East, insists that the answer to our problems there is not military. "You have to internationalize the problem. You have to attack it diplomatically, geo-strategically," he said.
His assessment is supported by Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the senior American commander in Iraq, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who only recommend releasing forces with a clear definition of the goals for the additional troops.
[...]

A surge is not acceptable to the people in this country — we have voted overwhelmingly against this war in polls (about 80 percent of the public is against escalation, and a recent Military Times poll shows only 38 percent of active military want more troops sent) and at the polls.

We know this is wrong. The people understand, the people have the right to make this decision, and the people have the obligation to make sure our will is implemented.

[...]

We are the people who run this country. We are the deciders. And every single day, every single one of us needs to step outside and take some action to help stop this war. Raise hell. Think of something to make the ridiculous look ridiculous. Make our troops know we’re for them and trying to get them out of there. Hit the streets to protest Bush’s proposed surge… We need people in the streets, banging pots and pans and demanding, “Stop it, now!”

Thanks Molly for all the laughs and truths delivered with your Texas twang. We’ll keep on with the fight to set a deadline and get our troops out of Iraq.

5 Comments

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Molly Ivins wanted us all to speak up, to be heard, to let our voices ring out load and clear. She wanted us to set deadlines, demand compliance, and keep on holding the administration’s feet to the fire until they finally listened to us.

(And speaking of setting a deadline and making sure that our voices are heard loud and clear, he segued smoothly…)

There is already an unofficial merchandise site set up by supporters of setadeadline.com where one can get some t-shirts, bumper stickers, buttons, and other nifty stuff to help you get the message out loud and clear to everyone around you:

http://www.cafepress.com/setadeadline

We know you would’ve wanted one of those T-shirts, Molly, and we know you’d approve of what we’re doing to make our voices heard nice and loud. And we’ll bet that you’d be right there with us chanting in the streets:

“Hey, Shrubya! We’re here! We’re clear! Get used to it!”

Posted by Otter | 02/01/07, 07:11 AM EST

Mourning for Molly, you’re right—the best tribute is to continue the fight.

I just read through the excellent suggestions on the Brian Freeman thread about how best to get the word out about http://www.setadeadline.com/ and I think all need to be implemented. This is indeed a full-out “campaign for our country” and a mission to honor and carry on the fight for the fallen.

I like the two-pronged approach I’m seeing in the suggestions:
1) get people to the site via bumper stickers, buttons, flyers, postcards, wristbands, coffee mugs and other displayables as well as online ads and videos.
2) get them to come back often once they’ve signed the petition and participate in the campaign in other ways via a place for personal stories and activism news/suggestions.

I also like the idea of reaching out to specific communities—campus populations, veterans, etc. and think we could brainstorm many more ideas for communities to target. This war is abhorrent to most Americans and we will find many willing to help if we give them ideas for how to do it.

My own suggestion is modest—I want the people who come to http://www.setadeadline.com/ to get some sense of how the movement is shaping up. Something as simple as a counter that updates with how many people have signed up to cosponsor the Senator’s legislation. Personally, when I have signed something online and I know there’s a counter, I’m compelled against my will to return every few days and see how the total has mounted up! Also, it would be great to have some kind of tally, maybe with the good ol’ bar chart, showing how the responses to the site’s questions are coming down. People like to see a continuing story and if you get them back for that, they’ll see the news and action items. OK, off to cafepress to see what I can pick up and strew around…

Posted by Kerryvisionary | 02/01/07, 01:45 PM EST

Bill Moyers is a Texan, a journalist, and a good friend of Molly Ivins. Here’s what he had to say in noting her passing:

“What a foot-stompin’ reunion there must be at this very moment in that great Purgatory of Journalists in the Sky. I can see them now—Ida Tarbell, Lincoln Steffens, Ray Stannard Baker, Upton Sinclair, Henry Demarest Lloyd, Ida B. Wells, David Graham Phillips, George Seldes, I. F. Stone, Walter Karp, Willie Morris — welcoming our darlin’ to their bosoms.

“Oh, my, how she comes trailing clouds of truth-telling glory! Look at her — big-hearted as ever, leaning over the balustrade and reaching down to the tormented of Hades, moistening Tom DeLay’s lips, patting down Bob Perry’s hair, erasing George W’s sandstone scribblings. In the celestial light she glows as irrepressibly and vividly as she did here on Earth, where she made the mighty humble, the wicked ashamed, and the good ol’ boys reach for the barrel to hide their forlorn nakedness. And, oh, the stories she must be telling as we speak.”