Tom Brokaw: ‘Immoral to Send 1% of Population in a
Uniform into Harm’s Way Over and Over Again’
by Michael Patrick Leahy 25 Nov 2015
Retired NBC anchor Tom Brokaw says, “It’s immoral for a democracy to
send 1 percent of its population in a uniform into harm’s way over and over
again.”
Brokaw is also criticizing President Obama’s tepid response
to the Paris terrorism attacks and proposing that the war on Islamist
terrorism, which he says will be a long haul requiring a huge national
commitment, can be financed by a 5 cents per gallon tax on gasoline.
Brokaw appeared with former New York City Mayor Rudy
Giuliani on MSNBC’s Morning Joe Wednesday.
“About a week after Paris, there’s still such a disconnect
between the president and his own party. He had 47 members of his own party
vote with the Republicans to oppose the Syrian refugees coming into the country.
At the same time, it’s very unseemly for a lot of Republican candidates to be
exploiting this just for getting votes,” Brokaw said.
“I’ve been talking to David Petreaus and
Gen McChrystal… they all say the same thing [about the fight against
terrorism]. It’s long, it’s hard, and we have to get the whole country behind
this,” Brokaw added.
ISIS, the Islamic State, Brokaw said, is “very sophisticated
and to clear it out, then you have to hold the territory.”
Giuliani agreed with Brokaw.
“Tom is absolutley right. We have no strategy and that’s
exactly what we need,” he said.
As for the Syrian refugees, Giuliani said the United States
should establish no fly zones. “The refugees should be in the no fly zones,” he
noted.
Giuliani also agreed with Brokaw that the fight against
terrorism will take a long time. “Tom is right. This will take five years,
this will take ten years,” Giuliani said.
Leadership, Giuliani said, is what America needs to
win. “America wanted to quit the Civil War in 1863, but America had a leader
who said no,” Giuliani said.
Brokaw hit hard on the need for a national commitment to
winning, saying, “I think there has to be real urgency, kind of a sense of
alacrity” to get the job done.
That will likely require ground troops, he added.
“If you talk to the national security experts, they say,
‘look we cannot put Saudi troops in Iraq,'” he said, adding that we can get
help from Saudi Arabia in other ways, such as bombing terrorists in Yemen.
“Everybody’s saying, ‘oh, we got to send more troops.’ That’s
1 percent of our population—1 percent. I’ve said it here before: I think it’s
immoral for a democracy to send 1 percent of its population in a uniform into
harm’s way over and over again,” Brokaw told
host Joe Scarborough.
“So I would start with a five cent gasoline tax. So every
time you go to the pump, you have to think about what’s going on elsewhere.
We’re going to have to finance this. It’s going to be very expensive at the
same time. And it is long curve.”
Brokaw also criticized President Obama’s response to the
Paris attacks.
“There is a clash of cultures going on here. When you look
at Paris, the president says he [the Islamist terrorist behind the attacks]
wasn’t a mastermind, these are just killers,” Brokaw said dismissively.
“That was a very sophisticated operation. They did a lot of
damage, not just physically but emotionally as well. We’re dealing with a very
sophisticated group of people here,” Brokaw concluded
One conservative website quickly pounced on Brokaw’s gas tax
proposal, ignoring his point on the unfair nature of placing the burden for the
nation’s defense on 1 percent of its population.
At Newsbusters, Mark Finkelstein’s headline
read “Tom Brokaw Goes Tom Friedman: Raise Gas Taxes to Fight Terror.”
“You name the problem, Tom Friedman’s got the answer: raise
taxes on gasoline. Looks like Tom Brokaw’s caught Friedman’s gas tax raising
fever,” Finkelstein wrote.
Conservatives generally oppose tax increases of any kind,
though there are some recent exceptions.
Fox News commentator
Charles Krauthammer has
proposed an increase in the gas tax, offset by a decrease in FICA
withholdings.
In 2014, the editors at National Review blasted
Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) 51% for his proposal to raise the gas tax in
order to bolster the dwindling federal Highway Trust Fund.
You can watch the full segment on MSNBC’s Morning Joe
here.
Fox News
Media Matters monitors Fox
News.
Note: Foundation
to Promote Open Society was a funder for Media Matters, the Robin
Hood Foundation, the Center for American
Progress, and the International
Rescue Committee.
George
Soros was the chairman for the Foundation
to Promote Open Society, and a supporter for the Center for American Progress.
Alexander Navab
is a leadership council member for the Robin
Hood Foundation, and the head, North American Private Equity for KKR & Co. LP.
David H. Petraeus
is the KKR Global Institute chairman for KKR
& Co. LP.
KKR
& Co. LP was a funder for the Center
for American Progress.
Tom
Brokaw was a director at the Robin
Hood Foundation, an anchor for the NBC
Nightly News, and is an overseer at the International Rescue Committee.
Harold E. Ford Jr.
was an overseer at the International
Rescue Committee, is a political commentator at MSNBC, and a 2008 Bilderberg conference participant (think
tank).
Morning
Joe is an MSNBC program.
International
Rescue Committee is a partner with the ONE
Campaign.
Michelle
Obama was an advocate for the ONE
Campaign.
Condoleezza Rice was a director at the ONE Campaign, is an overseer at the International
Rescue Committee, and a 2008 Bilderberg conference participant
(think tank).
Tom
Brokaw is an overseer at the International
Rescue Committee, was a director at the Robin Hood Foundation, and an anchor for the NBC Nightly News.
Jeff
Zucker is a director at the Robin
Hood Foundation, and was an executive producer for the NBC Nightly News.
Brian Williams is
a director at the Robin Hood Foundation,
and was an anchor for the NBC Nightly
News.
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