March 23, 2007

My Letter to Congressman Walter Jones (R-Surrender)

Ed Note: Since Congressman Jones, contact from will not allow me to submit my inquires to him without a NC 3rd District zip code if you live in his district and would like to send my letter to him please feel free to do so.

Congressman Jones I’m curious to find out how you could have voted in support of the bill to withdraw from Iraq that just passed in the House 218-212. You and Congressman Gilchrest (R-MD) were the only Republicans to vote in favor of surrender.

I’m especially curious because just a mere month ago you sent a letter to Congressman John Murtha, Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense (D-PA) urging him not to cut off funding for U.S. troops in Iraq. You wrote in that letter: “Any attempt to “starve” the war as a way of bringing it to a conclusion, rather than through a serious policy debate about the best way forward in Iraq, would be wrong.”

Can you please explain to the American people and the troops you have just taken hostage for pork how it was right of you to do the wrong thing? Especially in light of the fact that you have stated “I have assured the citizens of Eastern North Carolina, and our brave men and women in uniform, that I will never vote to cut off funding for our troops in the field. Those troops were sent on a mission created by elected officials in Washington, and until those elected officials – operating under the system of checks and balances enumerated in the Constitution – change that mission, their funding should be unfettered by appropriations strings that are in reality a way for Congress to avoid straight up or down policy votes on the House floor.”

The American people, the members of the Republican Party and the troops who deserve full funding and support await your apology.

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