House Iraq Hearings – Only War Party Allowed to Testify
by Justin Raimondo
September 16, 2002

The House Committee on International Relations is holding hearings this Thursday on the question of whether we ought to invade Iraq – and only one side, the pro-war side, is going to be heard.

Here is a list of the witnesses:

Richard Perle – a chicken-hawk of the first order, who has been all over television and in the op ed pages of the nation's newspapers calling for war.

R. James Woolsey – who has spent the last several months acting as the War Party's chief publicist.

Jessica Tuchman Mathews – President of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a leading proponent of the idea of "coercive inspections," designed to provoke Iraq into responding militarily and thus providing a casus belli.

Retired General Charles G. Boyd – Along with Ms. Mathews, an advocate of the "multitaral" "coercive inspections" approach, and also head of "Business Executives for National Security" (the "entrepreneurial" wing of the War Party). Boyd has said: "I would send them [US troops] in while banging the drums on the need for more opening to inspectors," Boyd said.

This is a "debate"? How come only one side is being presented? There is no room, we are told, for advocates of non-intervention. Peace is not an option. We want to bring "democracy" to Iraq – but what about Washington, D.C.?

Will America launch a war of conquest with no debate?

It doesn't have to be that way! I urge you to call the office of Rep. Henry Hyde, Republican chairman of the International Relations Committee, and urge him to schedule at least one advocate of non-intervention. Let's have a real discussion before we plunge the entire Middle East into chaos, sink our economy, and send our sons and daughters to die – and to kill uncounted Iraqis.

Call Hyde's office now: (202) 225-4561.

Also call the ranking Democrat on the committee, warmonger Tom Lantos (D-California), and let him know what you think of this farcical charade: (202) 225-3531

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