An open letter to Indiana Congressman Joe Donnelly


Mr. Donnelly,

When you said, "I will be an independent voice in Congress for the people of Indiana's Second Congressional District,"
I had no idea that you meant that you would become another part of the status quo. We did not elect you to go to Washington and leave your spine at home. The people of this district, and furthermore the people of this country voted in a new House in opposition to an illegal war which is causing young men, American and Iraqi, to die every day....last month 83 of our boys!

And now you have the audacity to sit on the fence. How will you sleep at night knowing that each day you delay, each day you keep silent, each day you fail to fulfill the duty that you were entrusted to do, resulted in more blood, more coffins, more grieving mothers? How will you sleep sir?

When you said, "I will be an independent voice in Congress for the people of Indiana's Second Congressional District." it didn't mean anything, did it?

No, we can't trust anyone anymore because you are proving to be no better than the last guy (I won't mention his name because he was a disgrace). We need moral courage right now...courage in the tradition of other great Irish-American leaders like Robert F. Kennedy. Where is your moral courage? Where is your promise to be an independent voice? What I'm hearing you say now doesn't sound any different from what the cheats in the current administration have been saying. YOu are mereley another echo in their cacophonous chorus, beating the war drum.

And here is proof:

"The most important part of this to me is standing up for the troops and making sure we have full funding for them," Donnelly said Tuesday, after a weekend meeting with veterans' groups and constituents back home in his conservative north-central Indiana district. "I haven't made up my mind yet."

If you want to "stand up for the troops," keep them out of coffins which are multiplying because of an illegal war which was based on lies from the very beginning.

Sir, we beseech you to stand up for what is right. Bring these soldiers home tomorrow or I can assure you that you will have to live with the knowledge that you did not do the job you were elected to do. And that you played us all as fools as most politicians do. Time is running out...

With Great Concern,

Clinton