Sunday morning, before dawn, I read in the New York Times that “the
Pentagon is planning to add more than 20,000 troops to Afghanistan” within
the next 18 months -- “raising American force levels to about 58,000” in
that country. Then I scraped ice off a windshield and
drove to the C-SPAN studios, where a picture window showed a serene
daybreak over the Capitol dome.
While I was on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal” for a live interview,
the program aired some rarely seen footage with the voices of two
courageous politicians who challenged the warfare state.
So, on Sunday morning, viewers across the country saw Barbara Lee
speaking on the House floor three days after 9/11 -- just before she
became the only member of Congress to vote against the president’s
green-light resolution to begin the U.S. military attack on
Afghanistan.
“However difficult this vote may be, some of us must urge the use of
restraint,” she said. The date was Sept. 14, 2001. Congresswoman Lee
continued: “Our country is in a state of mourning. Some of us must say,
Let’s step back for a moment, let’s just pause just for a
