The war in Afghanistan was mentioned, in passing, just four times in hours of speeches comprising tens of thousands of words at the Republican convention. Mitt Romney, the nominee, avoided any mention at all. Not even a shout-out to the troops.
Danny Westneat
Seattle Times staff columnist
September 1, 2012
Thank you, Clint Eastwood. At least you went there.
OK, sure, your thoughts didn't neatly track from one to the next, to put it mildly. You're now officially the nation's crazy uncle, due to that rambling, imaginary talk you had with your invisible friend ... I mean, president.
But you said it. You said the word lost down the national memory hole: "Afghanistan."
When state Sen. Michael Baumgartner told me a week ago that he expected to hear "close to zero" talk at the Republican convention about how we're bogged down in the longest war in our history, I figured he was exaggerating.
There would be a forum or a protest or something. There'd at least be countless nods to the sacrifices of the troops.
Nope. The war was mentioned, in passing, just four times in hours of speeches comprising tens of thousands of words.
For the first time since 1952, the AP reported, Mitt Romney accepted a Republican nomination for president without mentioning the topic of war at all. Not the cost of war, which seems relevant. Nothing about what the mission is. No suggestion of what we might do.
Afghanistan was so out-of-mind Romney didn't even give a standard shout-out to the troops (roughly 80,000 of whom are still over there fighting — and probably wondering if they've been marooned).
read more here
My two cents on this one.
Well put except Afghanistan is not the longest war. Vietnam is still the longest.The date on the Wall ends at 1975.
I don't know what reporter decided to call Afghanistan the longest, but it seems everyone jumped on that one.
I didn't watch the convention coverage. I've read about what they have to say too much along with people on the other side. I've also been fed up with all the coverage on politicians with hardly nothing on what they do after they get elected. Reporters have a habit of just letting all of them say whatever they want, without having to explain anything. Unless they say something so outrageous as what Ryan claimed, their fact checkers have been AWOL.
I have a feeling the Democrats' convention will be just about the same way but considering how the GOP convention left out our troops and veterans, I hope the Democrats learned something from that. Time will tell.
Romney doesn't care about the troops. He doesn't care about our veterans either. He doesn't even know the difference between TRICARE and CHAMPVA. Reporters are not really interested Afghanistan anymore than they were interested in Iraq.
Really strange considering after 2001, that was all we heard all the time from politicians trying to explain what they were doing, what they were spending money on and how much we needed to allow them to do it if we supported the troops. In 2004 that was all we heard with September 11th and Iraq in nearly every speech while Afghanistan was hardly mentioned at all. It was repeated in 2008 so much so they could have just played a tape.
Do you think that they have finally proven all the talk about supporting the troops from them really boiled down to support of defense contractors instead?
UPDATE at 8:38 est
I am really pissed off so here's some more to think about.
At a Pentagon press briefing on Monday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said congressional tinkering with the $613 billion 2013 Defense Department budget could have unintended consequences and result in a hollow force. Flanked by Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Panetta also defended the long-term Defense strategy unveiled in January, saying it will help the Pentagon to slash its budget by $487 billion over the next 10 years.
In March, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., chairman of the House Budget Committee, told a National Journal forum that senior military commanders were dishonest in presenting Congress with a budget request he doesn't believe they fully support. After Dempsey charged Ryan with calling senior military leaders liars, Ryan backed off and said, "I really misspoke."
Paul Ryan is behind the cuts to funding. Plain and simple. The cuts to Defense spending were a product of the Tea Party politicians screaming about the deficit. The fact that Ryan's budget cuts.
Budget panel may cut VA care for 1.3 million vets The House Budget Committee, led by Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has told a veterans’ group it is studying a plan to save $6 billion annually in Veterans Affairs health care costs by canceling enrollment of any veteran who doesn’t have a service-related medical condition and is not poor.
Defense Cuts
An Associated Press "fact check" in July after Mitt Romney made a similar claim said that Romney "ignores the central role that Congress played last summer in setting the stage for such a massive cut in the Pentagon's budget."
The House-passed bill to which Ryan referred passed in May without a single Democratic vote and has no chance of passing in the Democratically-controlled Senate. The bill would swap defense cuts for sharp reductions in spending for social programs, specifically Medicaid and food stamp spending, and reduce money for Obama's health care reform law while taking away the ability of regulators to wind down failing financial firms and end a White House program meant to assist struggling homeowners.
Joseph Beaudoin, president of the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association (NARFE), said in a statement today that the Ryan plan would cost the national security bureaucracy 100,000 jobs.
"Chairman Ryan's belief that it is permissible to penalize middle-class federal workers, who protect Americans and keep our nation moving forward, is frightening. Whatever happened to 'shared sacrifice'? What does he hope to gain by prolonging pay freezes, pinching paychecks, and eliminating employees, including those who inspect the safety of our food and nuclear power plants?" he said. "It's worth remembering that losing one in 10 federal workers means losing more than 100,000 employees at the U.S. Departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs, Justice and Homeland Security."
And then there is this
Here is where the $11 Billion cut to veterans is even though Ryan's budget much like the convention, didn't mention the word "veterans" at all.
Veteran spending missing from Paul Ryan’s budget
Martin Bashir
Aired on March 23, 2012
Jon Soltz, chairman of VoteVets.org, joins guest host Karen Finney to explain the billions of dollars cut from veterans spending under budget plan offered by Rep. Paul Ryan.
UPDATE
He just made it worse for himself. His "spokesman" said that Romney talked about Afghanistan the day before,,,,,,so, what? Does Romney think it is just too tiring to talk about men and women risking their lives in Afghanistan two days in a row?
Fehrnstrom told CNN that Romney didn't talk about war in his convention speech because he had already talked it in a previous speech.
"The day before the convention speech, Candy, Governor Romney traveled to Indianapolis on Wednesday and he gave a speech before the American Legion," he said.
Then he said the defense cuts were Obama's fault? I'm sure you're wondering if he has a real clue about anything.
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