Rep Dennis Kucinich blasts 'Operation Cast Doubt'
“Today we journey from Operation Cast Lead to Operation Cast Doubt. Almost as serious as committing war crimes is covering up war crimes, pretending that war crimes were never committed and did not exist.” — Dennis Kucinich
The US House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a nonbinding resolution (344-36) that urged the President and Secretary of State to oppose the endorsement of the Goldstone Report condemning Israel’s war crimes during its war on Gaza. Of the 36 representatives in the US Congress who voted against the obscene resolution (H. Res 867 a. k. a. the Ros-Lehtinen/Berman resolution) condemning the Goldstone Report as ‘biased’, the responses of Dennis Kucinich and Brian Baird are worth highlighting. Kucinich’s blazing two minute statement on the floor can be watched in the clip below and the transcript appears over the fold, as does a list of Congressional representatives who voted against the resolution. Americans living in those districts might consider writing to their representatives to thank them for their integrity and voting for justice.
TRANSCRIPT
Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) made the following statement on the House Floor about H. Res 867, which condemns the ‘Goldstone Report’ or the Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict:
Today we journey from Operation Cast Lead to Operation Cast Doubt. Almost as serious as committing war crimes is covering up war crimes, pretending that war crimes were never committed and did not exist.
Because behind every such deception is the nullification of humanity, the destruction of human dignity, the annihilation of the human spirit, the triumph of Orwellian thinking, the eternal prison of the dark heart of the totalitarian.
The resolution before us today, which would reject all attempts of the Goldstone Report to fix responsibility of all parties to war crimes, including both Hamas and Israel, may as well be called the “Down is Up, Night is Day, Wrong is Right” resolution.
Because if this Congress votes to condemn a report it has not read, concerning events it has totally ignored, about violations of law of which it is unaware, it will have brought shame to this great institution.
How can we ever expect there to be peace in the Middle East if we tacitly approve of violations of international law and international human rights, if we look the other way, or if we close our eyes to the heartbreak of people on both sides by white-washing a legitimate investigation?
How can we protect the people of Israel from existential threats if we hold no concern for the protection of the Palestinians, for their physical security, their right to land, their right to their own homes, their right to water, their right to sustenance, their right to freedom of movement, their right to the human security of jobs, education and health care?
We will have peace only when the plight of both Palestinians and Israelis is brought before this House and given equal consideration in recognition of that principle that all people on this planet have a right to survive and thrive, and it is our responsibility, our duty to see that no individual, no group, no people are barred from this humble human claim.
36 voting against (and 22 ‘present’) on H. Res. 867:
The Nays:
| Baird Baldwin Blumenauer Boustany Capps Carson (IN) Clarke Clay Davis (KY) Dingell Doggett Edwards (MD) |
Ellison Filner Grijalva Hinchey Johnson, E. B. Kilpatrick (MI) Kucinich Lee (CA) Lynch McCollum McDermott McGovern |
Miller, George Moran (VA) Olver Pastor (AZ) Paul Price (NC) Rahall Snyder Stark Waters Watt Woolsey |
Present:
| Becerra Cooper Dahlkemper DeFazio Delahunt Duncan Eshoo Farr |
Heinrich Hirono Honda Johnson (GA) Jones Kaptur Loebsack Lofgren, Zoe |
Luján Obey Speier Tierney Welch Wu |
How typical of my country. Not a proud moment for me as an American.
I am British and do not know the meaning of ‘Present’. Would that be those who abstained. Perhaps someone would be kind enough to explain.
I expect AIPAC must be very pleased with the work of their operatives Ros-Lehtinen and Berman. How disgraceful. I heard two very eminent British lawyers, Sir Geoffrey Bindman and Baroness Helena Kennedy describe Judge Goldstone as highly regarded internationally and only capable of reporting the utmost truth.
Mary,
It’s an abstention without actually having to say “you’re abstaining.”
Shameful, but not surprising. Good for Kucinich!
Salaam/Shalom/Shanthi/Peace
Namaste -ed
Al Jazeera segment with Brian Baird interviewed. Unfortunately, for “balance”, Steve Rothman was also interviewed, though the interviewer gave him a good serve, how disingenuous and deceitful is this clown:
MORTIFYING.
The Goldstone Report isn’t good enough by many miles, lets Israel off the hook for a LOT and still our pack of whores condemns it? Pathetic. Evil. Mortifying.
And… they only let Dennis get away with this stuff because he had to live in the car with his homeless family for a while as a boy, and because he makes sure to come off goofy enough often enough that no one ever views him as a threat.
I’m surprised to see Marcy Kaptur on the “Present” list. I guess she’s been too outspoken lately and needs to ease the pressure.
Fuck.
You have a better understanding of the machinations involved than most msm pundits, 99. I just hope Dennis’s “goofiness” continues to enable his continued critiques.
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Dennis Kucinich appears to be one of the only courageous, sensible men of integrity in Congress. Shame he was not elected president. Thank you Mr. Kucinich for blasting the cowardwice, ignorance and illegal machinations of a bought out bunch of jelly backs.
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What U expect? I am surprised that 36 are brave enough 2 be against & 22 abstained, that is an achievement, knowing the AIPAC & Zionism control over the so-called Zionist-slave congress, the racist Nazist Fascist Zionist AIPAC, will punch them fore this stand. Palestinians are the recent Red Indian of this British Army made terrorist Zionist Multi-National killing Mafia in PALESTINE, of Jesus the Palestinian. There is an Arab say about when a person with no morality (like USA) is sick with a bad illness , and he wishes every body had the same sickness, so that he want stand out as the only bad one, it says “may every body be sick like me”, so America had commited the “mother of all crimes on Richter crime scale “, by ethnically cleansing the Red Indian, and by doing so , The Zionist Mafia is making them not the only bad ones, and by the same token they loved the white Australians and the white racist South African minority’s Apartheid. And that is why the Australian committed every crime with both the American & British Armies like been their in Iraq , Vietnam and PALESTINE, as all Zionism in Palestine & white racism in South Africa,the whites Genocide in Australia, and the white European Genocide against the Red Indian, ARE ALL the criminal sons of the British Army. These Genocides are the most distinguished “achievements” of the British Empire, that inspired Fascism, Nazism, and created & manufactured Zionism. As the British people themselves acknowledge.
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