MoveOn.org: Making Peace With the War in
Iraq
By Norman Solomon
ZNet
Sadly, it has come to
this. Two years after the invasion of Iraq, the online powerhouse
MoveOn.org -- which built most of its member base with a strong antiwar
message -- is not pushing for withdrawal of
U.S.
troops from Iraq.
With a network of
more than 3 million “online activists,” the MoveOn leadership has decided
against opposing the American occupation of Iraq.
During the recent
bloody months, none of MoveOn’s action alerts have addressed what
Americans can do to help get the U.S. military out of that country.
Likewise, the MoveOn.org website has continued to bypass the issue -- even
after Rep. Lynn Woolsey and two dozen cosponsors in the House of
Representatives introduced a resolution in late January calling for swift
removal of all U.S. troops from Iraq.
That resolution would
seem to be a natural peg for the kind of kinetic activism that established
MoveOn’s reputation. A movement serious about ending U.S. military
activities in Iraq could use the resolution as a way to cut through
political tap dances and pressure members of Congress to take a stand.
Down the road, generating grassroots support for a get-out-of-Iraq
resolution has potential to clear a congressional pathway for measures
cutting off funds for the war.
But, tragically,
MoveOn’s leadership is having none of it. Over a period of recent weeks,
the word “Iraq” appeared on the MoveOn.org home page only in a plug for a
documentary released last year. Inches away, a blurb has been telling the
website’s visitors: “Support Our Troops: Contribute your frequent-flyer
miles so that American troops can get home.” (But not stay home.) Many
soldiers are returning to the killing grounds of Iraq, while a growing
number are vocally opposed to this war.
Why won’t MoveOn
“support our troops” by supporting a pullout of our troops from Iraq? “We
believe that there are no good options in Iraq,” MoveOn.org’s executive
director, Eli Pariser, told me. “We’re seeing a broad difference of
opinion among our members on how quickly the U.S. should get out of Iraq.
As a grassroots-directed organization, we won’t be taking any position
which a large portion of our members disagree with.”
In sharp contrast,
early in the 2004 primary campaign, MoveOn committed itself to endorsing
any Democratic presidential candidate receiving more than 50 percent of
the Internet ballots cast by its activists. (Howard Dean fell shy of a
majority, so there was no MoveOn endorsement.) But now, evidently, a
majority of MoveOn members in favor of swift withdrawal from Iraq would be
insufficient if a “large portion” disagreed.
When I asked Eli for
clarification, he replied: “We’ve been talking with our members
continuously on this issue. We’ve surveyed slices of our membership in
January and in December, and surveyed our whole membership last spring.
That’s how we know there’s a breadth of opinion out there.”
But last spring was a
year ago. And any surveying of “slices of our membership in January and in
December” came before the Woolsey resolution offered an opportunity to
find out how the MoveOn base views the measure. In any event, there will
always be “a breadth of opinion” about this war -- a fact that does not
trump the crucial need for clarity of purpose.
If MoveOn leaders
were willing to submit the House get-out-of-Iraq resolution to MoveOn’s
rank-and-file in an up-or-down vote, the chances of a substantial majority
would be excellent. Too bad the leadership of MoveOn.org is currently
unwilling to find out.
The 29 members of the
House now sponsoring the resolution are hardly radicals. They recognize
the kind of grisly consequences of equivocation that occurred during the
Vietnam War: Refusal to speak forthrightly about the urgent need to end
military involvement only fuels the war’s deadly momentum.
It’s all well and
good for MoveOn.org to do superb work in the current battle over the
future of Social Security. And it’s very helpful to excoriate President
Bush for his many big lies in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. But
such activities don’t make up for going along with the basics of the
present-day Iraq war.
When a large
progressive organization takes the easy way and makes peace with war, the
abdication of responsibility creates a vacuum.
Ironically, a group
that became an Internet phenomenon by recognizing and filling a void is
now creating one. And other groups are bound to emerge to fill it.
Among the emerging
organizations is Progressive Democrats of America (www.pdamerica.org), a
fledgling national group with an activist focus on the Iraq war that is
laudably straightforward. “We’re organizing a new campaign in every
Congressional District we can to call for the end of funding for war and
occupation, and for the transfer of reconstruction assistance to Iraqis
themselves,” says Tim Carpenter of PDA. He contends that “public pressure
can awaken Congress to an opposition role.”
War in Iraq requires
continual funding, of course, so President Bush’s new supplemental boost
of $80 billion in war appropriations has been moving through Congress in
recent days. Tacitly accepting the war’s continuation, MoveOn declined to
take a stand against the essence of congressional backing for the war --
the money that keeps paying for it. Meanwhile, PDA launched an effort
against the $80 billion; the organizing included a National Call-In Day
aimed at members of Congress on March 10.
MoveOn.org pioneered
the use of email and web technologies as creative tools to further its
political agenda. Now that the MoveOn agenda on the Iraq war has tumbled
into the shallow depths of the Potomac,
some similar online activism will be needed if MoveOn’s dive is going to
be merely temporary. So, to help get the cyber-ball rolling, please
forward this article around the Internet and post it where appropriate.
Friends don’t let
friends drive drunk, and peace advocates do a lot more than shrug when a
previously great antiwar organization starts to get lost.
If MoveOn continues
to abandon its antiwar base, that base will get the picture -- and move
on.
Norman Solomon’s latest book, “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits
Keep Spinning Us to Death,” will be published in early summer. His columns
and other writings can be found at: www.normansolomon.com
March 11, 2005
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