Earl Blumenauer's Betrayal
author: Betrayed Constituent
Earlier today, I read an article on this site ( http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2006/08/343750.shtml) informing us that Earl Blumenauer will not support House Resolution 450, calling for an immediate and unconditional cease fire from Israel. Many thanks to the author, because I almost made a terrible mistake. I almost continued to believe in the decency of congressman Blumenauer. How wrong I would have been.
|
I have to tell you, first, that I believed in Mr. Blumenauer. I did. It's sappy and hard to admit at this moment, but I have believed in him for a long time. I supported him as far back as I can remember, when he was still on the Portland city council, and even before that when he worked with Multnomah county. I remember him standing up for some difficult and unpopular issues that were politically difficult to support, but were the right thing to do. He came to marches that I was part of, he gave speeches that I liked, he voted the way I would have on issues that meant something to me. So I liked him. How shallow that seems now, now that I have his knife planted in my back. Now that I see the blood of babies on his hands.
I followed Joe Rowe's advice, and I read Mr. Blumenauer's statement on the current crisis, and I called his office. In his statement, he actually, in his words, "places the blame squarely on the shoulders of Hezbolla" for what has happened to little Lebanese babies, who died in the sand under a terrifying rain of bombs from Israel. He actually looked into the dead little eyes pleading from the morning papers, and he spit on them. He refused to speak up against their killers. Instead, he blamed HEZBOLLAH. He blamed the ONE group of people in all the world actually willing to stand up to Israel, actually willing to defend the dying Arabs from the madness and avarice of Israel. He failed to place the blame where it belongs: On ISRAEL. And, on us. Because we keep paying for the bombs, and we keep looking the other way when they are dropped on Palestinian homes and now Lebanese babies. How many innocent people have died, are dying, will die, because no one will stop Israel? If the United States stood up and made them stop dropping the bombs that, let's face it, WE paid for, it would stop. Good God, it's time. It's time to make it stop.
I thought it had to be some sort of mistake. I believed in Earl, and I thought surely he would use his voice, the power that he has, the power that we gave him, to MAKE it STOP. So yes, I called his office. I used my one small voice to at least do that. It's all I could think to do in this madness. It's so disempowering, so disemboweling really, to be in this strange place in history. It's a place where we must do anything we can do, however large or small. But it all seems so hopeless. It's so hard, so very hard to know what to do. Little babies have died before our eyes, with bombs we helped pay for, and all I could do was make a phone call to deaf and heartless ears. All I could think to do was call this congressman's office and beg him to make it stop because, after all, that is what we elected him for. To be our voice in congress, to do what is right, to use the power WE GAVE HIM to stand up and do what is right.
And he refused.
When I told the man who answered the phone how I had read Joe Rowe's article here, and how I read the statement that the congressman had allegedly made, and how that statement said that the congressman refuses to blame Israel for the bloodshed they have wrought, I wanted him to tell me that it was wrong. I wanted him to say that the statement was a fake, a lie, a forgery. But he paused, and then he said, "That sounds about right."
No. It does not sound right. It sounds as wrong as hell. It sounds evil.
No good and decent man could have spit on dead babies like that. No congressman who works for me would refuse to stand up and make Israel stop dropping those bombs. This is not Hezbollah's fault. It is Israel's fault, and Earl Blumenauer's fault for not making them stop, and it is my fault for ever voting for this man. My fault for not figuring out SOMETHING more to do than trying to change things by lamely calling my congressional representative like they tell me to do in civics lessons, foolishly thinking he would do the right thing.
God, I will NEVER vote for Earl Blumenauer again. I feel so very, very betrayed. And I still do not know what to do to stop the bleeding, to save the babies in Lebanon.
All I can do is ask you, if you care too, to please at least make a telephone call. It's not enough, I know. But I can't think of what else I could possibly do. If you can, please tell me. And in the meantime, please call and tell Mr. Blumenauer that his refusal to do the right thing today will be costlier than he thinks. His number is 503-231-2300. And please call your other representatives as well, and make them use the power we gave them to do the right thing. Make them understand that they are supposed to speak for US. Not for the money that flows from Israel, but for US. And we speak for the little Lebanese babies.
|
add a comment on this article
add a comment on this article
|
This is from his statement about the crisis. He says nothing at all about disarming Israel. Nothing. Children died in Lebanon, less than a month after a Palestinian family on a picnic was blown to bits by lying Israelis, less than a week after 4 unarmed UN workers were intentionally blown up by lying Israelis, and less than a decade after more than a hundred people were blown up by Israelis in a UN shelter in the same town, Qana, where these babies just died. And Earl Blumenauer can do no better than this? He refuses to demand that Israel take the blame and stop the blood? This is the very best he can do? Then we can do better than him.