Intelligence or counter-arguments

Intelligence or Counter-arguments (not covered in talking points):

We are spreading democracy:
1) NOT. We have bombed over 25 countries since the end of WWII – not one of them has resulted in a democracy
2) The people of Iraq have to decide what kind of government they want – how dare we try to violently force them to choose democracy
3) We cannot ignore the fact that Iraq sits on the 2nd largest oil reserve in the Middle East – Bush is proposing to “give” Iraqis a share in that oil

Chaos, civil war will ensue
1) there is already chaos, civil war – we are the lighting rod for this chaos and civilwar
2) the first suicide bomb incident happened AFTER we attacked both Afghanistan and Iraq
3) no one is sure what will happen after our soldiers and contractors are withdrawn – nothing can be worse than what is happening now
4) we are totally sure of ONE thing: not one more American life will be taken when we are no longer occupying that country
5) for the first 3 ½ years we occupied Iraq, we were told we HAD to do so to prevent civil war; now that there is civil war, we are told we HAVE to stay because there is civil war. Excuses, excuses, excuses

We cannot be seen as losing this war
1) We’ve already lost this war
2) What does winning this war look like to you? 30,000 U.S. soldiers dead, ½ of the Iraq population dead, all the oil fields controlled by U.S. corporations? What?
3) Why are you attempting to allow Bush to ‘save face’ when you could be saving lives?

Benchmarks
1) it is too late (not to mention obnoxious) to establish hoops for Iraqis to jump through
2) there’s been enough ‘benchmarks’ – it is really a delaying tactic – Hussein has been captured, tried, and killed; Iraqis have had an election; Iraqis have adopted a constitution
3) ‘benchmarks’ is another diversionary tactic – we’re not buying it & neither should you.

Listen to the people
1) we already have an administration and military industrial complex that is not listening to the people of this country; don’t join them as one of our leaders who is not listening & implementing the will of the people
2) if you cannot listen to the will of the people, listen to the soldiers – over 70% of them polled last year said we should be out of Iraq by December 2006!
3) If you cannot listen to the will of our soldiers, listen to the Iraq people: many times, many polls close to 95% of the people want the US troops OUT of Iraq
4) If you cannot listen to the will of the Iraq people, listen to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Generals, the Iraq Study Group, the many officials in the State Department that are supporting prompt withdrawal

It’s not going to pass anyway
1) We will not get into that argument - whether it passes or not, it is YOUR position on this resolution that we are concerned with, not a defeatist attitude
2) if you really believe it is not going to pass, we suggest you identify the barriers, make a plan, and go about doing the work it will take to make it pass – as we’re sure the republicans, business people, anyone does when there are barriers to what they want
3) it is not important whether Bush will veto or Republicans won’t vote for it – it IS important what YOU stand for. Everyone else will get their due, not to worry