Senate Says No to Retreat

[Yoshie Furuhashi <critical.montages@xxxxxxxxx>]

Thus will the Iraq Warriors soldier on, for four more years at least,
and won't leave until they take the fight to the Iranians.  The
Russian Right (for the lack of a better term) are itching to push the
Kremlin hard to wash its hands of the Iranians altogether.  Ordinary
Americans are still asleep, and so are their European and Japanese
counterparts.  The Iranians, you are on your own, and you had better
fight for your country when the time comes, _no matter what your
opinion of your leadership is_.  Otherwise, you can see your future,
in countries to the East and the West of yours.  -- Yoshie

<http://www.nysun.com/article/50566>
Senate Says No to Retreat
A United GOP Rebuffs Bid by Democrats
BY ELI LAKE - Staff Reporter of the Sun
March 16, 2007

WASHINGTON — The Democratic Party's presidential field is dividing
over the question of funding American soldiers in Iraq, with senators
Obama of Illinois and Clinton of New York voting with an 82-to-16
majority for a Republican resolution against cutting any money for
troops in the field. Senators Biden of Delaware and Dodd of
Connecticut were in the minority.

The vote, along with the narrow 50-to-48 defeat of a binding
resolution calling for the withdrawal of soldiers from Iraq by March
31, 2008, was a major victory for the Senate minority leader, Mitch
McConnell, a Republican of Kentucky who quietly worked for two months
to persuade his caucus to vote together.

Assisted by two Democrats, Senator Pryor of Arkansas and Senator Ben
Nelson of Nebraska, and by an independent who caucuses with the
Democrats, Senator Lieberman of Connecticut, the Republicans defeated
a resolution sponsored by the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, a
Democrat of Nevada, which would mandate that the military begin a
retreat from Iraq within 120 days of its passage. They did so even
though a strong hawk, Senator McCain, a Republican of Arizona, was
absent. He was in Iowa campaigning for the presidency.

The victory for the GOP also sends a warning to the House Democratic
leadership, currently drafting a supplemental troop funding bill that
would also impose timelines for withdrawal.

The Democrats yesterday, behind the scenes, were glum. Following the
votes on three war resolutions (a Democratic-sponsored resolution
supporting troop funding and money for veterans passed with only two
dissenters), Mr. Obama voiced regret. "I am disappointed that today
Senate Republicans blocked a redeployment plan, similar to the Iraq
De-escalation Act I introduced, that would set a target date of March
31, 2008, to remove our combat troops from Iraq," he said.

Mrs. Clinton yesterday offered no public statements on the resolutions
and did not debate the proposals on the floor.

In the debates preceding the vote, Mr. McConnell told his colleagues
that the Reid resolution "will regrettably, prove Osama bin Laden
right. This is the vote he's been waiting for." Meanwhile, Mr. Reid
appealed to the American people. "My hope, my prayer, is that we will
stand with the American people. We must have a new direction in Iraq,"
he said.

Asked for a reaction yesterday after the votes, the communications
director for Mr. Reid, Jim Manley, did his best to spin the results in
his favor.

"Republicans are willing to march lock step with the president over a
cliff," he said. "They made a strategic decision to stick with a
failed policy. We feel very good about the vote."

This view however, represents a concession that the Democrats' earlier
strategy of picking off Republicans to support resolutions critical of
the troop surge in Baghdad and Anbar had failed. As early as December,
leading Democrats like Senator Biden, a Democrat from Delaware,
acknowledged that they could not stop the Iraq war unless enough
Republicans also voiced their demands to the White House. Yesterday,
only Senator Smith, the Republican from Oregon who first signaled
shortly after the November elections that his patience with the war
was waning, voted with the Democrats on the Reid resolution.

Meanwhile, other Republicans who voiced dissent from the troop surge
when the president proposed it on January 10 voted with the
president's party. One such Republican was Senator Brownback from
Kansas. Mr. Brownback, who is running for his party's presidential
nomination, switched emphasis yesterday, attacking Democrats. "The
withdrawal resolution presents a choice between pursuing victory and
calling for retreat," he said. "I believe victory is still possible
and that failure is unacceptable."

"The Democrats united the Republican caucus," the communications
director for Senator McConnell, Don Stewart, said yesterday. "By
making this a binding resolution that tied the president's hands and
told the enemy the exact date we would leave, we kept all but one." A
senior Senate Republican aide yesterday said Mr. McConnell's strategy
on the war resolution was to listen to the wide range of views of his
members and deliberately to avoid enforcing party discipline on votes
for resolutions, focusing instead on procedural unity to allow a vote
on the resolution that won the day on troop funding.

That resolution, sponsored by Senator Gregg, a Republican from New
Hampshire, stated, "No funds should be cut off or reduced for American
troops in the field which would result in undermining their safety or
their ability to complete their assigned missions." It is a direct
rebuke to the strategy favored by the left wing of the Democratic
Party, which seeks to impose conditions on funds in the supplemental
bill funding the troop surge.

For nearly two months, Mr. Reid would not agree to give the resolution
a vote on the floor, leading Mr. McConnell to muster a filibuster of
the earlier non-binding resolutions. Mr. Reid, however, relented, at
first last Thursday, according to Mr. Manley. The final tally on the
Gregg resolution, of 82 in favor and only 16 opposed, surprised even
Republicans. The minority included Mr. Reid, as well as presidential
aspirants such as Mr. Dodd and Mr. Biden. Senator Schumer of New York
voted with Senators Clinton and Obama in the majority, as did the
former Democratic presidential nominee, Senator Kerry of
Massachusetts, who was criticized by President Bush during the
campaign for an earlier vote against funding for the war.

Part of the surprise came during the floor debate. Mr. Reid in his
speech signaled his members were free to vote their conscience. "There
is no caucus position on this," he said. When asked what happened, Mr.
Manley said he did not wish to get into those details.

Democrats may take some solace in the one Democratic resolution they
did manage get passed yesterday. That resolution, sponsored by Senator
Murray, a Democrat from Washington State, affirms the role of Congress
in setting war policy while pledging not to cut funds for soldiers or
veterans.

--
Yoshie