Boston Globe, August 30, 2006

By Rep. Barney Frank

A WAR is missing. Sadly, it is not missing from the physical location in which it is taking place, and people continue to die as it is waged. But it has largely disappeared from our national debate, and that debate has been sorely distorted as a consequence.

The war in question is in Afghanistan, and it isn't missing because it's no longer of consequence -- in fact, conditions there appear to be deteriorating -- but because of a conscious, unfortunately successful effort by the Bush administration and its conservative allies to ignore it. That's because acknowledging the war there would invalidate their charge that their political opponents are unwilling to take a forceful stand against terrorism.

During the years after World War II, academics popularized the concept of the ``big lie." This is a technique successfully used by some European regimes to manipulate the public perception of reality. It turned out that if enough people in official positions simply repeated things that were not true, and found elements in the media ready to reinforce them, lies would be believed and truths forgotten.

U.S. House of Representatives
Speech of Congressman Barney Frank
June 15, 2006

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, first let's note what a degradation of democracy is taking place here.

The majority party has put forward a resolution that allows no amendment. There will be a debate in which those of us who think some things are good and some are bad, contrary to every reasonable democratic procedure, will have no opportunity to say so.

Here is the tactic that is being used: they take a number of things that people agree with, they mix in with them things which are quite controversial. They treat them as if they were not separable.

Let me say what I have said again before. The majority party thinks the way to legislate is the way you feed a pill to a dog: you take the unpalatable with the popular.

Now I will have to say this: one of the things we are trying to do is to persuade the people in Iraq to be able to work together and make democracy work. We are trying to persuade, we are told, the Shiia and the Sunni to work together. We are trying to tell the majority Shiia to share power.

"Saddam Hussein badly misgoverned the citizens of Iraq, but there are…a number of countries that are badly governed," Frank said. America should consistently express its disapproval of despotic regimes, but invading other countries does more harm than good, he said…immediately after the invasion he believed the United States had a responsibility to try to rebuild Iraq. But he said he now believes the occupation of Iraq is only harming all parties involved and called for America to withdraw within months. (Excerpt from New Bedford (MA) Standard-Times Report on Public Meeting Attended by Congressman Frank in Massachusetts.)

Speech of Hon. Barney Frank of Massachusetts in the House of Representatives, Wednesday, June 8, 2005

Mr.FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, one the ablest Members of the current Congress, JIM MCGOVERN, has joined with one of the ablest Members in the history of the Congress, [Former Senator] George McGovern to address the troubling issue of Iraq, and they make an eloquent case--with which I completely agree--that ``the United States must now begin an orderly withdrawal of our forces from this mistaken foreign venture.''

[T]he authors…do a superb job of explaining why we should pull out of Iraq. I will note that I join them not only in their basic argument, but in their note that as ``earlier opponents of the U.S. invasion of Iraq . . . we hoped that our concerns would be proven wrong.'' None of us take any joy in the fact that this has worked out so much worse than the Administration had predicted, but we must draw the consequences from this mistake and not continue with a seriously flawed policy which drains us financially, costs the lives of our military, and makes the situation in the Middle East worse rather than better in so many ways.

"If things are going so well, why does it take 150,000 troops to face a relatively small number of rebels? When can we leave? Are we there forever?"

September 28, 2004 - Frank speaks out on security situation in Baghdad

June 24, 2004

January 9, 2003 - Article from The Wellesley Townsman

May 6, 2004 - Excepts from House debate on a resolution deploring abuse of prisoners in U.S. custody in Iraq

November 22, 2001 - Read why Barney Frank supported the war in Afghanistan, opposes the war with Iraq and Bush's attack on civil liberties, and thinks Clinton's military legacy is just fine