The Paul Hackett thing was great to watch. It was exciting. Part of what made it exciting was he was an Iraq vet who had the nerve to stand up to Bush. He questioned the whole war entry thing, criticized the administration's strategy, Bush's lack of interest in providing adequate benefits for soldiers once they return from service. Because Paul was an Iraq vet, this gave what he said a validity that carried additional weight.
Before jumping on the bandwagon, I pulled up Hackett's website and read his views on various issues. I had to feel comfortable with his positions, before determining if he was a candidate I wanted to get behind. I didn't have to agree with all of Hackett's views, but I certainly wanted to know what they were prior to offering my support.
When Kos began posting a series on "Fighting Dems," featuring Iraq veterans seeking political office, I was interested in following up. What I saw on the part of the bloggers rather surprised me.
I'm not sure if David Ashe was the first spotlighted person, but I believe this was the case. The first thing I noticed was what appeared to be overwhelming acceptance and joy. What a great idea. A whole group of Iraq vets running for congress is just the thing we need to set the country straight. As I scanned down, most of what I saw were short comments of support and excitement about getting the word out to friends, etc. There were only a few voices of skepticism. But even these I found disappointing. Disappointing because the impression I got was that no one was speaking about any details of what the candidate was saying. The dialog all seemed to be framed within a pre-existing assumption. I guess it was something we picked up from the Hackett experience, and just sort of carried it over. I believe the purpose of the feature was to expose us to the candidates who fit into a category of Iraq veterans running for office as Democrats. But I don't think the intention was to cast them all in the Hackett mold. Instead of exploring, we all seemed to be jumping.
Did anyone pull up the Ashe website to determine what he stands for? Do you know how he feels about issues that are important to you? Somehow, I feel that a lot of those making comments did not bother to do this because the specific comments a person would make for why he/she supported Ashe were sometimes flatly contradicted by the stand Ashe took on that issue in his website.
This bothers me because I was hoping for more than blind jumping. I am not saying some did not explore and then decide to agree. But I am convinced most did not. Once I looked at the candidate's actual site to see how he stands on the issues, I wanted to jump as far away from the wagon as I could get. You may not feel as I do about the issues, and that is not my point. My point is that I believe the purpose of providing the link to each candidate's website is to make it easy for us to examine the individual.
A summation of my examination is that David Ashe believes a strong military is the answer for most of the problems we face. To quote from his website: "When the enemy sees our equipment and our training, they simply melt from the battlefield. Maintenance of our military power and our commitment to equipping and training our military must always have the highest priority." Also, "It's time to press for action. The stakes are too high to bicker over partisan and election politics. . . It is time to support the strongest position on the ground in Iraq that is possible so that we will follow through with the mission and have success." He is in total agreement with Bush's decision to use force against Saddam Hussein because Hussein posed a threat to Israel. Under the category of "The Responsibility of the US Congress," the first thing listed is, "Congress must be united in its support of Israel and in support of Israel's leadership." Ashe feels America has failed to give adequate support for key issues regarding Jerusalem, "Such equivocation is dangerous and wrong and David Ashe will work against anything less than full support of Israel." My impression is that Ashe would like to extend our military presence even further, and apparently Iraq and a few other countries better watch out! And there are those continued threats the Palestinians pose to Israel, so they better watch out, too! I, personally, did not like where all this was leading. I suggest you read the ENTIRE "Issues" section on his website so that you can make an informed decision.
Please look before you jump. I believe that was the purpose of featuring these individuals, so that we could be informed and then make our decisions.
(By the way, I hold absolutely no position in the whole Israeli/Palestinian debate. My sympathies alternate between the two. The references to this topic appear in what I have quoted simply because that is what his website contains. You may agree or disagree, depending on where your sympathies lie.)