hearings — Day 1

I watched Carl Levin give his speech, his opening statement, he’s talking to General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, and he’s going on and on and on about how the Maliki government in Iraq has not met its benchmarks and has not found a way to pay its own way on anything, and they better do that or we’re going to get outta there, they’re free to do what they had until November, and after that all bets are off, is what the Democrats are saying.

I find this fascinating. Here is a liberal Democrat senator from Michigan, Carl Levin, telling another nation’s government, fess up, shape up, make sure that you can pay your own way and meet the benchmarks that we have given for you. In other words, they’re telling the Iraqi government to become self-sufficient.

Wouldn’t it be great if liberal Democrats told their own voters the same thing? In this country, liberal Democrats look at their own voters, and they see permanent dependents, and they smile. They do everything they can to generate permanent dependents: under-educating kids in school, ongoing entitlement programs, advertising for peopling to get on the food stamp program, and yet, when it comes to the Iraqi government, why, they sound very conservative. Ya’ll need to shape up, ya’ll need to become self-sufficient, ya’ll need to be able to pay your own way, ya’ll need to meet the benchmarks that we are saying.

By the way, Carl Levin, a suggestion. If you’re going to be out there demanding that the Iraqi government meet benchmarks and come up with mechanisms whereby they can pay their own way and don’t need any aid from us, Senator Levin, you are from Michigan. You know, it might be helpful, if you would enforce and demand benchmarks on your state and the Democrat governor and the legislature there to fix the mess that is Michigan. You’re demanding all these things from the government of Iraq while at the same time not demanding anything like that from your own constituents, your own voters, or your own governments.

While Carl Levin can sit there and lecture the Iraqi government on meeting benchmarks and learn to pay its own way, become self-sufficient, he would nowhere near say that to Jennifer Granholm, the governor of his own state nor of Democrat voters and constituents all over the country.