Their anti-war base doesn’t like it, but Democratic leaders faced political reality in dropping from the Iraq war-funding bill their demand for a timetable for removing troops. President Bush won’t accept a timetable. They don’t have enough votes to override him. And unless lawmakers are willing to withhold funding — which most are not — they needed a new approach. That new approach includes progress benchmarks for the Iraqi government and new reporting requirements for the Bush administration. Critics complain that the benchmarks aren’t enforceable. But the governmental and military results will be key to debate when this funding bill expires on Sept. 30. And if there isn’t much progress between now and then, Bush and GOP lawmakers will be hard-pressed to keep asking for more time.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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63 Comments
Phillip
Bush is not playing politics with this issue at all, he is trying to win a real war on terror.
As time advances, and more terrorists are killed or captured, Bush will look better and better, since more intelligence documents can be released:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8PA6LM80&show_article=1
Meanwhile Bush gets everything he wants and the people don’t. Shame on Pelosi for backing down, rather than withholding funding until Bush had to cave in.
Bush just give America the finger and got away with it.
Gave
Murdering Iraqis is not killing “terrorists.”
Paul F. ROSELL,
“As time advances, and more terrorists are killed or captured,…”
Paraphrasing a sticker:
We are making NEW terrorists FASTER than we can kill or capture them!
71% of Israelis want to attack Iran and 80% of Americans don’t.
Bush announced that the CIA has a “black-opt” going on inside Iran to destabilize that government, while six more US warships entered the Gulf.
Bush is going to war with Iran to satisfy the Israelis, not us, and Pelosi just gave him the money.
Let the countdown begin. This is the last funding bill that will not have a timeline in it. By September all the reich wingers will be abondoning the presidents ship. The next funding bill will have a timeline and will be supported by both sides of the aisle. Nothing is going to change in the next 4 months that is different than today.
I believe the news was that he authorized the planning of black ops in Iran… not the actual thing.
I could be wrong…
This reflects nothing more than political reality. The President IS C-in-C, the Dems in Congress don’t have the votes to override the veto and force the President’s hand with the power of the purse, and not passing a funding authorization with troops in harms way in the field is politically disasterous.
Political realities rule. As always.
So. . .
The surrender monkeys gave up on giving up.
Now what? We’re doomed!
Hank
I don’t think the democrats ever planned on winning on the issue of placing withdrawl timelines on the funding.
I think it was nothing more than pure political posturing on their part.
They milked that cow dry.
Time to move on to cheap political tactic number 1034950349
This is over – the proposed bill will finance the war through September. The line is very clear, if the the Democrats capitulate the next time, they have lost any hope of retaining power and winning the presidency in 2008. They will be dead meat and they may as well resign because they will never get another vote.
They blinked when they should have been strong.
There will be no next time. Just like Bush they betrayed the trust of the American people.
The ballgame is all but over – there are two outs in the bottom of the ninth, bases empty and Todd Jones is on the mound.
The Democrats in Congress can go Cheney themselves – they have one chance and one chance only to make this right.
If they F’up with the next appropriation, they may as well commit suicide.
Literally.
WS
Has it ever occoured to you that, if your party does NOT have political courage to do what IT thinks is right —-
THAT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE WILL NOT BELIEVE YOU HAVE THE MORAL COURAGE TO LEAD THE COUNTRY IN A WAR?
Cosmos
If we do what the terrorists want do you think the terrorist will go away?
When you were in school, how much lunch money did you get to keep in your own pocket?
They are guilty, like the rest of America, of trusting Bush.
When we trust George W Bush, we all lose.
Politics is, first of all, about pragmatism. If the votes aren’t there then the decision about what to do next is based upon strategic considerations. This is nothing new. Proposed legislation often doesn’t get out of committee because the committee majority knows which way the votes will go…discretion is the better part of valor.
Both parties have stood up when they were in the majority. Lincoln’s actions, for example, were only possible because of a Republican majority. Johnson got the civil rights amendment passed because of a Democrat majority…to the party’s detriment in the South.
No one, not in private life, not in public life is completely forthright. You’d be silly if you were. Responses are measured aginst the responses they might get and against the atmosphere they might create. If your ife asks you if she looks fat in her new spandex cabana pants, you’d be wise to consider your words and actions carefully.
The line is very clear, if the the Democrats capitulate the next time,. . . . .
hehehehehehehehehe
Mohammed wept.
Hank
Paul – the majority of Iraqis believe that it is right for their countryment to resist the ccupation. It is the nature of an occupied population to resist and to use ‘unconventional’ means against the vastly supperior arms of the occupying power.
ALL occupiers have found that to be the case – Germany in the rest of Europe, France in Algeria, Soviets in Afghanistan, etc.
WS Clark,
Trusting Bush?
Did the Senate and House not have access to the same information Bush used?
I can dredge up all the quotes for you if you would like where they all were talking about how we needed to remove Saddam.
I don’t recall them saying that we needed to trust Bush.
Same old typical attempts to rewrite history.
Why don’t you just be a man and admit that your party supported the war and now they don’t? Why do you have to try and blame it on trusting Bush?
Can your party take no responsibility for their actions?
Hostage huh?
The comments about this war are getting more demented every day.
Paul F. ROSELL,
Al-Qaida WANTS the U.S. to remain bogged down in Iraq.
The presence of the U.S. there recruits new a-Q members.
Only about 5% of the insurgents in Iraq are a-Q, and they’re mostly new recruits, and outsiders.
The Iraqi insurgents tolerate the “outsider” a-Q, because they help attack the U.S. forces.
If the U.S. withdraws, the a-Q “recruiting” stops, and the “outsiders” are pushed out of Iraq.
Also, the longer the new a-Q members fight, the more ‘hardened’, and experienced they become.
Resist the occupation?
Wow, I guess that explains all the car bombs, suicide bombings, death squads, and gunman attacks targeting all the INNOCENT IRAQI people…
Nathan,
Yes, hostage.
I don’t care how long you were in Iraq. Your assessment of the situation there is a joke and has nothing to do with reality.
We have no “mission” being in Iraq, now, other than to keep the Bush Administration from having to take responsiblity for lying the U.S. into a dead-end, unwinnable conflict over oil. The troops and service personnel who are there, and those who are yet to be sent, are hostage to Bush’s inability to admit he was wrong and refusal to take responsibility for his error.
It pains me to no end that Democrats continue to enable this rogue President. Any Democratic representative who votes for these spending bills (you hearing me, Representative Boyda?) should count on losing the support of the Democratic base. And any Presidential candidate who votes for these bills (you hearing me, Senator Clinton?) shouldn’t bank on making it out of the Democratics primary season alive.
Nathan – several things lead to that. (1) Collaborators are always targeted. (2) Revenge killings then follow. (3) Placing one sectarian group atop the others leads to seactarian violence.
Then the process explodes into Civil War.
Bush knew or should have known this would happen. However, he followed a course of action that guarunteed it would happen.
CF2K,
I would argue that my assessment of what is happening in Iraq is far more in line with reality than your rants blaming this on the Presidents inability to admit he was wrong.
I understand the anti war dem’s issue with providing funding until the end of September. However, you cannot leave the troops in harms way without funding. Period! Cutting funding all together plays right into the GOP’s hands. Cut funding and you are the party that left the troops out in the cold and that will guarantee losing in 08. You have to fund the troops now and give the preznit enough rope to hang himself come fall. Republicans have already given the “decider” the deadline for their support. Dem’s are not going to cut funding all together as this poses a no win situation(except for those that are anti war). Ending this conflict needs to be handled delicately and cutting money is not the way(political third rail). Give the troops the money now and watch the republicans jump ship come fall.
Nathan,
Of course you would. So go ahead. But your record up until now assessing the reality of the situation on the ground in Iraq, and the likely strategic/geopolitical consequences, doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.
Mike,
Respectfully disagree. There are lots of ways to fund troops in the short term while holding the President’s feet to the fire, and making him own the continued occupation.
More to the point, the poll numbers suggest that a solid majority WANT Democrats to stand their ground and force the President to back down. With Bush at 28%, the majority simply no longer buys the whole ‘Democrats are anti-Troops’ meme.
Finally, in September, we’ll be hearing, again, that “the next six-eight-ten months are critical,” and Republicans will still be with the President. They’ll never, ever leave him. Period.
No one knows what’s going on…generally in war, specifically in this one. Some of this is aimed at the Americans, some of it is sheer religious hatred, and some of it is aimed at Israel, and some of it is aimed at creating a general Middle east war to reestablish the caliphate…among other reasons.
The situation in Iraq is coming close to resembling Europe at the time of the 30 Years’ war. Minor religious difference led to a brutal European wide war in which religion actually played little role. Catholic France funded Lutheran Sweden, for example. Countries on the periphery of Germany did what was in their perceived “best interest”. Eventually, everyone lost control. Mercenary bands wandered Europe doing as they wanted. In the end, exhausted and bankrupt, the European nations reestablished peace base on the antebellum status quo…30 years of warfare for nothing…
Duh! September 30 is the end of the Fiscal Year for the Government.
All Federally paid activities await new budget funding including the Military Budge.
(shakes head)
“I don’t care how long you were in Iraq. Your assessment of the situation there is a joke and has nothing to do with reality.”————————-
What unbelievable arrogance. Your egotistical attitude and know-it-all, strong-arm discussion tactics make it abundantly clear that you have little regard for truth, or facts. Nathan is very gracious in the face of your bulldozing tactics.
His observations are VERY valid here.
Your hate-everything-Bush philippic is wearing thin.
Lighten up, already.
BRIAN,
WRONG on this:
“Both parties have stood up when they were in the majority. Lincoln’s actions, for example, were only possible because of a Republican majority. Johnson got the civil rights amendment passed because of a Democrat majority…to the party’s detriment in the South.”
You said the above, Brian, but the Civil Rights Act you speak of won a MAJORITY of Republican votes and would not have had a prayer of passing without the Republican Party supporting it!
It’s okay GSheridan, CF2K just took a direct hit to the shorts on Political Reality.
He gets insane when that happens.
LMAO at CF2K – the looney who talks in third person.
A question for all of you righties:
If you were driving down a road and the bridge was out, would you keep driving down the road?
A simple yes or no will do.
If we could convince the hate-America-firsters to concentrating their invective towards the enemy – instead of their own countrymen, we might actually stand a chance in the war on terrorism.
As it is – I believe history will be kind to GWB. It will look upon him as a leader who tried to overcome radical Islam, Arab potentates, and terrorism, in the face of opposition from his own people.
I believe there will come a time when terrorism will grow to such a danger in the world that even those who now feel it is not worthy, as a target, will eat their words.
Just my thoughts.
CF2KWe agree most of the time on most issues. This one so far we disagree on. If you want to hear “Democrats are anti troops” then cut funding while they are still in battle. That will push most moderate conservatives(that are siding with Dem’s right now) away. The republicans that are standing with Bush now will leave his “lame duck” ass in the fall. They want to get reelected in 08. Dem’s do not have the votes right now to override a veto. Until they do their hands are tied. This bill doesn’t make the Dem’s pro war. It gives the troops what they need until the fall and the next round. This fight is a 10 rounder not a 1 round knock out. Dem’s control Congress, but they don’t have enough votes to override the preznit.
Remember this post….Republicans will run away from Bush the same way the Dem’s did Clinton towards the end of his 2nd term.
XXX – no, I wouldn’t.
But if I knew crossing that river was of tantamount importance – I would find a way across, even without the bridge.
XXX,let me check the public polls before I go one way or the other..
To be more exact:
The original House version:
* Southern Democrats: 7-87 (7%-93%)* Southern Republicans: 0-10 (0%-100%)
* Northern Democrats: 145-9 (94%-6%)* Northern Republicans: 138-24 (85%-15%)
The Senate version:
* Southern Democrats: 1-20 (5%-95%) (only Senator Ralph Yarborough of Texas voted in favor)* Southern Republicans: 0-1 (0%-100%) (this was Senator John Tower of Texas)* Northern Democrats: 45-1 (98%-2%) (only Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia opposed the measure)* Northern Republicans: 27-5 (84%-16%) (Senators Bourke Hickenlooper of Iowa, Barry Goldwater of Arizona, Edwin L. Mechem of New Mexico, Milward L. Simpson of Wyoming, and Norris H. Cotton of New Hampshire opposed the measure)
In short, the vote broke down along regional lines. So what? The point of the post was that NO legislation is brought up for a vote without a good probability of passing, unless it is in the majority party’s interest to allow it to come to a vote.
So, to correct myself, so that you will stop harping on minor points and see the “BIG” picture…politicians are willing to stand up when there is a high probability of success…otherwise they aren’t.
Does that satisfy you??
Uh Ben,
You forgot the US in the Philipines, US in Germany, US in Japan, US in Puerto Rico. . . .
Oh, nevermind. Thoise examples (though more pertinent) don’t prove your point.
Hank
XXX is trying to make a “Bridge Too Far” philosophical analogy. All muscled up and smart too. :D
OK XXX,
It’s important to get accross the bridge. The bridge isn’t really out, the dems just keep telling me that I need to stop because it is out.
Even though it’s hard to keep driving down the road with the dems doing every thing they can to prevent me from buying gas, I’ll keep going because not to is not an option if I want to be safe.
Hank
And there is GOOD NEWS in IRAQ:
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1624697,00.html
WooHoo – that IS good news, Econ.
Good news for America and the Iraqi people, but bad news for liberals, as they only prosper when America fails.
That should send up a warning flag.
Right now, I’m glad I’m not a Democrat.
I see that Republican still won’t enlist and fight the war he thinks is needed.
Nice try happy YAF (Yet Another Fister)
(yawns)
(smirks at happy)
What a maroon.
One thing is clear, a pull out and I believe that term is a misnomer because it makes believe we would totally leave. It would not happen, advisers, trainers and the like would still be there… The wise thing to do.But a pull out has to be bi-partisan, there for the Democrats holding strong would have done no good.
Each time there was a new bill, the support for “staying the course” chips away and more change over to the smart way of thinking. The Republicans gave too, they showed that their support will only be good till September. This gave two things, one is that now the administration is put on notice that they better be getting their act together and have a winning plan up and showing real progress by the next go around. Two that the time of partisan politics has taken a back seat to the best interest of the country.
No, the point was made and taken in September the real test will come. By then those that have so mismanaged the fight better have finally let the military make the planning for once. Some one in the administration if smart will have taken the general aside and told him to pick up the ball and move with it by September. Sadly it will not be Bush, he is still hamstringed but loyalty to Rumsfield and what he was told in the first place. The decider does not deal with facts, truth and reality, he made a decision and it is not in his character to change his mind. His cabinet need to simply say, “yes Mr. President” then do the smart things to bring about an acceptable outcome and then go back and tell Bush “all is well”. Bush will be happy thinking he was the one responsible and meanwhile the chain will have been broken from the failed policy. They need to get Rove on board as he is the only one who has any real sway with Bush. Rove could not care less how Iraq turns out. But he is a political animal and should know if they can not pull Bush’s fat out of the fire. Rove will be lucky after 2008 to get a job with a GOP candidate licking stamps for mailers.
Don’t believe they gave up anything, Bush and the Repugs. now have their name all over the continuing Iraq war, the chickens(make that chickenhawks) will come home to roost in four months, when things are still fubar in Iraq!
Yeah I don’t think they gave up much, either. There was no way Bush was going to sign a timetable bill. The only thing that was going to crack open in May was the Dem coalition.
If you’re going to lose a political fight *you’ve* picked, then you do that quick and you move on.
And Iraq will still be FUBAR come September (hell, come dozens of Septembers). The US will have all summer to see lots more folly; it is a shame that more good American blood will be shed there but…that’s a fight that couldn’t be won in May 2007. If the Dems are smart, they’ll stick together and watch the GOP crack open come fall.
But boy: you gotta give Augustus Stupidus credit. That capital “S” in Stupidus ain’t a cheap one when it comes to our Caesar. When that dipshit’s bein’ stupid, ain’t nothin’ gonna move him off it: he is a magnificent idiot. I believe he’s the proudest stupid president we’ve ever had!
The conservatives in congress are a bunch of crooks and after today, it looks like the liberal side of the aisle are a bunch of nutless wonders. We’re led by a president with the intellect of a trained monkey.
We are truly screwed.
? ? ? ?Laughing and Crying
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMANPublished: May 23, 2007
:..Here’s the sad truth: 9/11, and the failing Iraq war, have sucked up almost all the oxygen in this country — oxygen needed to discuss seriously education, health care, climate change and competitiveness, notes Garrett Graff, an editor at Washingtonian Magazine and author of the upcoming book “The First Campaign,” which deals with this theme. So right now, it’s mostly governors talking about these issues, noted Mr. Graff, but there is only so much they can do without Washington being focused and leading.
Which is why we’ve got to bring our occupation of Iraq to an end in the quickest, least bad way possible — otherwise we are going to lose Iraq and America. It’s coming down to that choice.”
http://select.nytimes.com/2007/05/23/opinion/23friedman.html? ? ? ?
Sure wish Friedman weren’t as gullible as he is smart. If he hadn’t been such a dupe to Augustus Stupidus in the marchup to war with Iraq in 2003 then just about all we’d talk about is how smart Tom Friedman is.
Since the 1970s, more than a dozen congressmen have been convicted in criminal court. Their cases and sentences include:
- Rep. Andrew J. Hinshaw, R-Calif., spent a year in jail after being convicted in 1976 of accepting bribes when he was county tax assessor. He lost the primary election and resigned at the end of his term.
- Rep. Charles Diggs Jr., D-Mich., was convicted in 1978 of operating a payroll kickback scheme in his congressional office. He served seven months of a three-year prison term. He was re-elected, then resigned in 1980.
- Rep. Michael Myers, D-Pa., served 20 1/2 months of a three-year prison sentence for accepting bribes from FBI agents impersonating Arab businessmen. He was convicted in 1980 and expelled from Congress.
- Four other House members were convicted in the Arab businessmen bribery scandal: Democratic Reps. John Murphy of New York, Frank Thompson of New Jersey, John Jenrette of South Carolina and Raymond Lederer of Pennsylvania. Thompson and Murphy were sentenced to three years; Jenrette, two years; and Lederer, one year.
- Rep. Mario Biaggi, D-N.Y., was convicted in 1988 of extorting nearly $2 million from defense contractor Wedtech Corp. He resigned from Congress and served two years and two months of an eight-year sentence. He was defeated for re-election in 1992.
- Rep. Mel Reynolds, D-Ill., was sentenced in 1995 to five years in prison for having sex with an underage campaign worker. He resigned from Congress, then was sentenced in 1997 to 6 1/2 years for bank fraud and other violations. The second sentence, which was to run at the same time as first, was commuted in 2001 by President Clinton.
- Rep. Walter Tucker III, D-Calif., was sentenced in 1996 to two years and three months in prison for accepting and demanding bribes while mayor of a Los Angeles suburb. He resigned from Congress a week after his 1995 conviction.
- Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, D-Ill., pleaded guilty in 1996 to two felony mail fraud charges, lost re-election and served 15 months in prison. Clinton pardoned him in 2000.
Do you know what these felons have in common?
They’re all, the still living anyway, collecting taxpayer funded pensions.
There have been weak attempts to ban any member of congress from receiving a pension if convicted of a felony. Has it ever passed?
Hahahahahahahahahahaha!
These morons can’t police themselves, so how the hell can they claim to know what’s best for America? We need new blood in there; blood not beholding to big business, or talking up some phony “religious” nonsense, or telling the public we have to put up with “national security” issues that restrict personal freedoms. We need people with the balls to say enough is enough! The Constitution and Bill of Rights were written for the American people, not they “chosen” few sitting in their golden rooms on the beltway.We need to take it back, so register and vote the bums out . . . all of them.
“WooHoo – that IS good news, Econ.”
Now there’s a moronic statement if I ever read one.
Just why is Al-Quida in Iraq in the first place? Do you think it has something to do with the great decider invading Iraq and putting the country in the dark ages again.
Al-Quida was not a presence in Iraq prior to the war. They are now. That tells me bushco’s claim al-quida and saddaam were in bed with each other pure nonsense, as what 99.9% of the thoughts coming out of bushcos head are.
I think the Democrats did a brilliant move! They made damn sure that 100% of the people in the US of A know that Iraq is soley owned by Bush and the Republicans. The Democrats don’t want to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs which is Iraq. It is why they regained the House and the Senate and in 2008 it can give them the Presidency and effective control of both houses. So why would they want to kill it? That would be stupid.
Not to mention pretty much horrifically amoral.
The only reason the Dems “did a brilliant move” is because they had no choice. They couldn’t win.
It’s just no more complicated then that. Thank god.
than that.
Damn vowels.
Seems like the Bush strategy has benn make a screw up, then while you’re starting to look real hard at that one, he’ll go off and screw up something else. Keeps America alway one, or many, steps behind!
Edwards said that the “war on terror” was a “slogan” { I ought to get a royalty on that one }.
“Paul – the majority of Iraqis believe that it is right for their countryment to resist the ccupation. It is the nature of an occupied population to resist and to use ‘unconventional’ means against the vastly supperior arms of the occupying power.”
OK I challenge- Let’s find out. Let’s have an election in Iraq and the only thing on the ballot will be a question: Should the USA and UK leave Iraq or should we stay? Let the Iraqi people vote. If they decide that we should leave (and I see zero possibility of that), then we pack up and leave.
The American people voted republicans out of congress because they want a change of direction as far as Iraq goes.So far the democrats have failed them once. when the war funding bill came up for vote, that was the first and probably the best opportunity to deliver. Instead, they gave the president a pretty much blank check just like the former do-nothing republican congress did.
I keep hearing that it was a tricky vote because they did not want the public to think they are abandoning the troops. The fact is that today the public makes a clear distinction between being anti war and supporting the troops.
I also hear that they did not have enough votes to override a presidential veto. They hardly needed that, all they needed was enough votes to keep the money from Bush and they had them. Bush could have sent the bill back again and again, but so could the congress. After all it is Bush that needs the money to conduct the war. sounds simple to me, and it is simple.
So grow a spine congress.
Maybe they are finally starting to do that:
http://www.kansas.com/wireupdates/story/96125.html
WASHINGTON – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid caused a stir Thursday when he said Gen. Peter Pace failed in his job of providing Congress a candid assessment on the Iraq war and that he was concerned Gen. David Petraeus might be guilty of the same.
A legitimate concern, as the admin. is already backpeddeling on the importance of the upcoming report.