Written By Lynn Goya

There are a lot of armchair soldiers in politics, but not that many who have actually strapped on body armor and faced an armed enemy. Those who have, typically remember and, when in office, are fierce advocates for sane military policy and remembering warriors after they leave the field of battle.

Senator Jim Webb was elected to his first term in office in 2006.  The Vietnam veteran was strongly against the Iraq invasion and introduced legislation to ensure that then-President George Bush could not invade Iran without specific congressional authorization.

An Annapolis grad, the Naval Academy graduate went on to serve in the U.S. Marine Corps where he won numerous medals including the Navy Cross for his action in a search and destroy mission in  enemy territory in Vietnam. After serving, he got his law degree and wrote his first book, Micronesia and U.S. Pacific Strategy.  Upon graduating, he took a job as a staff member at the House Committee on Veterans Affairs and began his lifelong commitment to serving other Vietnam veterans.  At 38, he went to work for the Reagan Administration as the country’s first Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs and then, three years later, as Secretary of the Navy.

After resigning over the size of the Navy – Webb wanted it increased – he began his writing career as a fiction and non-fiction author and journalist where he consistently warned against going to war without a coherent strategy in place.  Webb believed that Vietnam was lost because the policy was mismanaged and that the U.S. was following the same lack of strategy in its dealings in the Middle East.  He called the invasion of Iraq, “the greatest strategic blunder in modern memory.”

When he ran for Senate in 2006, he ran as an anti-war, pro-gun Democrat.  His son was a Sergeant serving in Iraq and Webb wore his son’s used combat boots throughout the Senate campaign.  Elected by a slim margin, Webb has been a loud voice for veterans as a Senator.  He decries the growing income inequality that has escalated since his war service that he thinks is leading “toward a class based system.”  

In the age of globalization and outsourcing, and with a vast underground labor pool from illegal immigration, the average American worker is seeing a different life and a troubling future. Trickle-down economics didn’t happen. Despite the vaunted all-time highs of the stock market, wages and salaries are at all-time lows as a percentage of the national wealth. At the same time, medical costs have risen 73% in the last six years alone. Half of that increase comes from wage-earners’ pockets rather than from insurance, and 47 million Americans have no medical insurance at all.

Manufacturing jobs are disappearing. Many earned pension programs have collapsed in the wake of corporate ‘reorganization.’ And workers’ ability to negotiate their futures has been eviscerated by the twin threats of modern corporate America: If they complain too loudly, their jobs might either be outsourced overseas or given to illegal immigrants.

This ever-widening divide is too often ignored or downplayed by its beneficiaries. A sense of entitlement has set in among elites, bordering on hubris. When I raised this issue with corporate leaders during the recent political campaign, I was met repeatedly with denials, and, from some, an overt lack of concern for those who are falling behind.”

He also worked for prison reform, spearheaded the new G.I. Bill and led the charge to investigate contractor fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Most recently, he wrote that the recent oil price increases and related increased In home heating fuel and at the gas station, are the result of the Iraq war.  “I recall when the Congress voted to go to war in Iraq, oil was $24 a barrel.  It went up to $143.  Today, it’s about $102,” Webb said while questioning James Jeffrey, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq.

On February 9, Webb announced he would not seek a second term saying he had decided to “return to the private sector,” adding that he has “every intention of remaining involved in the issues that affect the well being and the future of our country.”