We already know that San Francisco doesn’t want the battleship Iowa as a waterfront museum (see our posts here, here, and here). To that city, the Iowa represents the military and war, which are by their definition bad things. But when Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval went on Fox’s Hannity & Colmes last week to talk about the Iowa debacle, he not only reiterated his opposition to the Iowa, he said that the United States should have no military at all. And he said it again and again and again:

HANNITY: I rarely agree with Dianne Feinstein. And she even says this is not the San Francisco that I know. This is — and I guess this is the mentality. Do you think America should unilaterally disarm? Should we give up our weaponry and our war — our tools of war?

SANDOVAL: You know, that’s a very complicated question. But I would say yes, we should. We should invest our money in our kids.

ALAN COLMES, CO-HOST: This is Alan in New York. Should we not have military?

SANDOVAL: I don’t think we should have a military. Absolutely.

COLMES: We shouldn’t have a military? Wait a minute. Hold on. The United States should not have a military?

SANDOVAL: What good has it done for us in the last five years? That’s right. What good has it done us…

HANNITY: Good grief.

SANDOVAL: … in the last five years.

COLMES: Gerardo, wait a second.

SANDOVAL: We think about the billions that we’re spending in Iraq right now, if we spend it on schools. We should not…

COLMES: The United States should not have a military?

SANDOVAL: That’s correct.

COLMES: Are you kidding me?

SANDOVAL: The United States should not have a military. All in all, we would be in much, much, much better shape.

COLMES: You’ve got to be kidding me. We should have no military, we should have no ability to defend ourselves, we should have no armed forces in this country?

SANDOVAL: Well, we shouldn’t have a military that goes abroad and starts wars.

COLMES: You just said we shouldn’t have a military. I don’t want to give — I’m speaking out very forcefully to you, because I don’t want to give the impression that Democrats hate the military or don’t want a military. We may disagree with certain wars, like the ones fought now.

SANDOVAL: No, but you said should we give up.

COLMES: But to say that we shouldn’t have a military is absolutely absurd. It’s incredible. That’s a ridiculous fringe point of view.

HANNITY: That’s exactly what I was thinking, Alan. Welcome to San Francisco.

SANDOVAL: If you’re saying that we don’t have a right to defend ourselves that’s different from we shouldn’t have a military.

COLMES: What do you want to defend ourselves — what do you want to defend ourselves with?

SANDOVAL: Well, you got cops. It’s called the Coast Guard. There’s lots of things different.

COLMES: You want to send cops to defend our shores if we’re attacked? You want to send cops overseas if we’re attacked? Cops?

SANDOVAL: You want to send people abroad to start these wars.

COLMES: I don’t. Actually, Gerardo, you don’t know anything about what I stand for if you can say that. I’ve been one of the most outspoken people against this administration and the war in Iraq.

But that doesn’t mean we as Democrats hate the military or don’t want to defend this country. And I’m amaze you could get on national television and say we shouldn’t have a military in America?

SANDOVAL: Well, that’s the way I think a lot of people feel here in San Francisco.

(link to transcript)

Notice how many opportunities Sandoval was given to back up. And notice that he took none of them.

In subsequent comments, Sandoval said “… these days you can’t even suggest scaling back because of the hysteria that has built up around terrorism.” Yes, “hysteria,” as in “exaggerated excitement.” Funny, I thought it was one of the top security issues facing the United States.

Sandoval is no doubt back at work after his foray into geopolitics, planning San Francisco’s next resolution calling for impeaching President Bush.

—
H/t: Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross in their San Francisco Chronicle column

Technorati Tags: battlehip Iowa, Bay Area, navy, San Francisco, terror

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 22nd, 2006 at 2:37 pm by A Senior Administration Official and is filed under California Schemin', Politically Correct ... and stupid. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.