BENICIA BASTILLE DAY
JULY 14, 2007
Town Hall Meeting with U.S. Rep. George Miller
Benicia City Hall

This morning, Saturday, July 14th, I attended Representative George Miller's Town Hall meeting down at City Hall. In fact, I wound up bringing most of my vigil sign collection to set up out front beforehand. Unfortunately, the ground at City Hall was as hard as concrete, so trying to get my signs on poles to stand up was nearly (but not quite) impossible. Worse, there was enough of a breeze that quite a few signs simply blew over ... and kept blowing over despite our best efforts. In fact, the ONLY sign I didn't have a struggle with was Tom's huge bright red peace symbol which we strapped to the flag pole with a bungy cord! [Many, many thanks to Susan and Matt who came early to help me prop everything up ... and re-prop everything up ... and re-prop everything up ...]

The "George Miller moment", when our elected rep actually arrived and entered through the front door, was rather anti-climatic, to put it mildly. I think there might have been as many as 20 people standing out front, many holding the signs I'd brought. But he came and went so fast that I know he didn't read a thing. Sigh. Isn't that the way things seem to go? An hour of struggle for 30 seconds of exposure ... and then you blink and it's all over. And all you can do is pick it all back up and pack it all away.

Things were much livelier inside City Hall by the time the meeting got underway. It was packed, with people sitting along the walls and on the stage and peering in from the doorways. And if there were any George Bush supporters there, they were pretty quiet! Iraq hung in the air and ... well, let's say it was the elephant in the room (in more ways than one), and Mr. Miller knew it. He took the first half hour to give us a rapid fire rundown of everything going on in Congress ... but he began those remarks with Iraq, and he ended those remarks with Iraq. I'm sure he knew what was coming when the question session started. And actually things got a bit, shall we say, "confrontational" right off the bat, particularily with one very angry gentleman who wanted our troops home NOW and wanted the dying to STOP. After that, however, people stayed civil. But they didn't cut Mr. Miller any slack. Many, many of the questions addressed impeachment and stopping funding for the war ... and they were eloquently and intelligently put. And I was glad to hear them. Miller acknowledged the disagreements various people had with him, but insisted that impeachment had to take a back seat to getting the troops out of Iraq, and that focusing on impeachment would only detract from solving the Iraq crisis. Of course, many people in the room wanted to see BOTH of those goals given equal priority. And many people stressed that the only real power Congress has to stop Bush's war is the power of the purse strings. Miller made it very clear that he will not support cutting off funding for the war. Instead, he wants to craft a funding bill with a mandated pullout by April of 2008. No, he doesn't think such a bill can pass right now. The Repubs aren't quite yet willing to abandon Bush. But he thinks by September they'll have the votes they'll need.

Of course, by September, a whole lot more of our troops will be dead. And that was clearly on the minds of many.

An unsettling point: Miller won't vote to cut off funding because he thinks George Bush can't be trusted to stop the war even then ... that he could continue the war on a shoestring, pulling funds from other places, putting the troops in even worse danger. He didn't say it in so many words ... but the implication was definitely there.

A personal observation. I have the feeling that not having impeachment on the table troubles many more people than Miller may think. Yes, there are valid reasons why impeachment is a difficult issue. But is George Bush truly going to be allowed to skate back to Crawford scot free and care free after all the misery and death that that man has inflicted on this planet (him and Cheney and Rumsfeld, etc. etc.)? Will there never be justice done? For people who sincerely care about justice, that is the question.

Miller did get solid rounds of applause for many other things, however: his total commitment to "fixing" that wretched mess called "No Child Left Behind" ... his solid belief in single payer health insurance ... his support of public financing for elections ... his "pay as you go" fiscal good sense ... and his belief that global warming is very real and needs urgent attention.

But the questions always came back to Iraq.

It's just a shame the meeting couldn't have lasted for more than an hour (actually, it went from 9:30 to about 10:45). There was just so much more to talk about ... so many people who didn't get to ask their questions.

Iran never came up. Not once. That's ... scary.

Peacefully yours,
Pat