I've finally gone political

Two posts in a week?  I knew this would happen sooner or later.  Anyway, drawing on this article;, I have some observations.Discussing today’s defense spending bill, the article states:

The bill would provide $2.2 billion to cover a 3.5 percent pay raise for service members. The administration objects and says its recommended 3 percent pay increase is sufficient.

Please, explain to me how Democrats are considered “anti-troop” when the President says the troops will be happy with a 3% raise instead of a 3.5% raise?  How?

And this little gem:

Murtha had prepared amendments to close the prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and require troops be fully trained and equipped before going to fight in Iraq. But facing the prospects of losing votes and inflaming partisan tensions, he withdrew them.

Again, how is it inflammatory, anti-war, or anti-troop to require the military to fully fund and equip them before deployment?  I think that, according to most standard measurements, I’m not retarded, and might in fact be considered a reasonable and intelligent person.  I think I should be able to get this, but I can’t.  I don’t think the statement “Let’s require all of our troops to be fully trained and equipped before we send them to war” is either inflammatory or partisan. 

Unless they mean inflammatory against the Dems, who apparently want nothing more than to prove the cowardice and failure of our armed forces by starving them, taking away their blankets, and not sending them any more bullets.  At least, that’s what Hannity tells me.

I will concede, in the interest of bipartisanship and in an effort to lower the level of vitriol in modern political discourse, that there are some valid debate points about Guantanamo.  Personally, I think it’s an affront to our constitution and diminishes our credibility with the world when we decide we can flaunt our own laws and due process by off-shoring the whole mess.  And, as a society, I think we’re better off long-term in suffering through a certain level of expected losses in war-time than if we do the damage to our national soul of torturing people.

Then again, there is something to be said for preserving our own self-interest – the reassurance to US Citizens that if you’re on US soil, you’re subject to US due process, and – so far, at least – you won’t get sent to Gitmo if you aren’t caught fighting for the Taliban in Afghanistan.  And security – it would be a much larger operation for people to break their buddies out when their buddies are on an island which is entirely under the rule of the US military who would have no qualms starting a fire-fight, with the full might and muscle of the US military to chase you across the ocean to where ever you’re running back to.

I don’t buy it, though, so I’m voting Barack in ’08.