The Quickest Way to End the War

E.J. Dionne, Washington Post: Would conservatives and Republicans support the war in Iraq if they had to pay for it?

This is the immensely useful question that Rep. David Obey, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, put on the table this week by calling for a temporary war tax to cover President Bush’s request for $145 billion in supplemental spending for Iraq.

The proposal is a magnificent way to test the seriousness of those who claim that the Iraq war is an essential part of the “global war on terror.” If the war’s backers believe in it so much, it should be easy for them to ask taxpayers to put up the money for such an important endeavor.

Obey makes the case pointedly. “Some people are being asked to pay with their lives or their faces or their hands or their arms or their legs,” he said in an interview this week. “If you’re going to ask for that, it doesn’t seem too much to ask an average taxpayer to pay thirty bucks for the cost of the war so we don’t have to shove it off on our kids.”

Or as Obey said in a statement, “I’m tired of seeing that only military families are asked to sacrifice in this war.”

Unfortunately, the Democratic leadership ran away from this idea as fast as you could say the words “Republican majority.” That, of course, is what Democrats are afraid of. “Just as I have opposed the war from the outset,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, “I am opposed to a war surtax.”

Obey doesn’t hold this against his leadership. “They don’t want to be demagogued by the White House when they have other fish to fry,” he said.

But it’s a shame that Democrats remain so defensive on the tax issue that they aren’t willing to bring this proposal to the floor. What if the price for passing President Bush’s supplemental appropriation were a tax to cover its costs? What if opponents of the war voted no because they are against Bush’s policy, and Republicans voted no because they think low taxes are more important than national security, as they define it?

That’s an aggressive way to frame anti-tax “no” votes, but it’s also accurate. If a war appropriations bill with a tax included went down to overwhelming defeat, wouldn’t that tell us something about the depth of commitment to this war?

... Here is a president who signed one bloated spending bill after another—as long as they were passed by a Republican Congress—posing as a fiscal conservative now that Democrats hold the majority. He’s so tough and determined that he’s also drawn the line on ... children’s health care.

LSB: Rep. Obey is correct - let's see how much support there is for this civil war if those voting for it actually have to pay for it. The Democratic leadership needs to get out in front of the issue and frame the debate as a fiscally responsible means for paying for what the White House says it wants. Speaker Pelosi and the Dem leadership should be supporting this instead of running away for fear that the Repuglicans are going to call them names. Just because the chickenhawks at FAUX News will be bellicose about a tax that will finally extend the pain to those that have felt no pain to date is no excuse not to do the right thing. Show some backbone and do what is right! Give the electorate some credit - as we demonstrated in the 2006 election, we get it.