Go to the mobile version of this Web site.

Login | Contact Us | Site Map | Paid archives | Electronic edition | Subscription Questions | Extras

Militias a bad idea in Iraq, Polis says

By Chris Barge, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published November 23, 2007 at 7:34 p.m.
Updated November 23, 2007 at 7:34 p.m.

Text size  

The United States' use of private contractors to provide security in and around Baghdad is pervasive and extremely risky, a candidate for Colorado's 2nd Congressional District said Friday.

Jared Polis spoke in a conference call from Amman, Jordan, having just returned from three days in Iraq.

He said he saw many checkpoints being guarded by soldiers-for-hire from countries like Peru and Chile. By outsourcing military work to private companies, which in turn hire soldiers from around the world, the Unites States is inadvertently training armed forces which could rebell or otherwise cause trouble, Polis said.

"I think those private militias should be banned," Polis said. "I think we should pass a law that no corporation should be allowed to operate a militia."

He also said he was disappointed there was so little news about mercenaries in Iraq, and he urged Coloradans to keep pressure on the media for more in-depth reporting.

Polis' trip to Iraq was criticized as a publicity stunt by some, including former Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald and environmentalist Will Shafroth.

But the Democrat made it clear from the outset he was taking his campaign to Iraq because he thought the first-hand experience he would gain with Congress' No. 1 policy debate — the war — would be invaluable.

Polis, a multi-millionaire entreprenuer and former member of the state school board, met with leaders of several Iraqi nonprofits, which were only allowed to emerge after Saddam Husein was overthrown, in order to help connect them to potential donors back home. He also met with local Iraqi officials.

"I would characterize the feelings of the municipal government toward the Americans as that of a clumsy giant that tends to crush what it tries to hug, and punches up the wall to kill a fly," Polis wrote in a blog posted Friday on his campaign Web site. "They are slow to request American help in many matters because they usually think that the medicine is worse than the disease and while we might be well-intended we are grossly incompetent."

During his call, Polis said his views on Iraq align most closely with Democratic presidential candidates Dennis Kucinich and Bill Richardson, who advocate a prompt transition to a self-governed Iraq.

He added that in the coming year, Americans can expect to hear less about violence in Iraq and more about corruption of all sorts, including war profiteering by private corporations.

"It's stifling," he said. "It's a cancer. It just eats at peoples' ability to get the job done."

Polis will spend this weekend visiting with Iraqi refugees in Jordan. He said he plans to be back home by Monday or Tuesday.

bargec@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5059

Comments

  • November 24, 2007

    5:25 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    nobody writes:

    Gee Sparky, do ya think you might have guessed what he would say? I know of 16 other people that have dedicated several years of their lives in Iraq and not one of them says the things that Polis says he heard. Such a dichotomy is not reasonable. So once again Bush and our military are incompetent due to them being too big and clumsy..

    I find Polis too large of ego and clumsy with words. He doesn't articulate well what actual percentage of the Iraqi's he talked to. Do these "humanitarian" organizations have the backing of America bashers? They make a pretty good living doing just that. We not only have them there, we gottem home grown too....

    Get elected off of people frustration is one thing but to not fully inform is propaganda. I consider this report no more than that.

    Nobody is saying that. That's why I'm voting for NoBody this November. It is not a sign of patriotism to continue our participation in a "rigged" game. Every Party, in their own ways, require that we incrementally forfeit more of our rights based on personal choice and give them up to the almighty "common good".

    Nobody is talking about that too. I love this Nobody guy.

    So his "report" back to you I would wager was the product of him going there to fulfill his "suspicions". Found all the evidence in line with his agenda, disregarding the rest. Much like the global warming fiasco the U.N. has convinced everyone of crisis and speed.

    Alexander Hamilton explained why we have two houses of Congress. It was a built in braking system to discourage hot, mood of the moment, legislation to go through. He knew that too often the repercussions of such acts are worse than the good envisioned.
    We find ourselves in such a state with CO2 being a pollutant as we did in 2003 before Iraq. Speed was of the upmost importance there too. Kinda funny? No? Then the "scamnesty" bill failed because too many people knew the legislators were not listening. They became too arrogant, too quickly and the public caught it. Thank god. Technology might save our freedoms yet.. Faxes, emails, communication.. our globalists are just now finding that a more informed, more communicative populace will thwart their "this is the way it is" philosophy anywhere from Amnesty to taxes on Global Warming and why the rush?

    Well Nobody is talking about this fear mongering and what it does to our freedoms? Nobody cares. That's why I'm voting for Nobody this November, I really like the things that we don't talk about.

    I wonder if Mr. Polis is familiar with ROE that is dictated not by us, but by the Iraqi's? Mr. Polis should try googling ROE and see what it comes up with since he might be unfamiliar with the term.

    I would encourage the media to do in depth stories too, from a nuetral perspective, unlike Polis has done.

    We actually have live heroes returning home, not just dead ones.

    Well Sparky, same old sh*t, different name...