Sunday, April 08, 2007
The Washington Post's blog has a disturbing round up of appearances by leading democrats on this week's political gabfests.
Last Sunday, senior Democrats said that they would not hold back funding for the war if the president vetoed a bill including an Iraq withdrawal timetable. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee, reiterated that point on ABC's "This Week." He said, "We're not going to vote to cut funding, period."
Should he veto this bill, which means he will be vetoing the money for the troops, we will try to come up with a way, ... trying to compromise with the White House, that both supports the troops and yet changes the strategy in Iraq, which we feel is misguided," Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on "Fox News Sunday."
Let me be blunt here. The democrats are being cowards here. President Bush knows that they were going to blink. Why compromise when you know the other side isn't serious? There appears to be two problems here. The democrats don't have the will to fight on this issue. 70% of americans do want us out of Iraq within a year. George Bush's approval rating is in the low 30's, yet democrats still seem to be institutionalizing their fear of the "popular" president, which only exists in Karl Rove's imagination these days.
The other reason is frankly more cynical. Democrats might think that they can run against the GOP and their war again in 2008 to electoral victory. If they say they tried to stop Bush, but couldn't because of the veto pen, they will run on getting the White House and congress back so they can finally stop the war. This frankly is bullshit.
They can defund the war period. The President has until July until funds run out. The democrats could stand firm and say take our bill or leave it. If you leave it, we will appropriate enough money to hold the troops until the end of summer and to redeploy them. If Bush refuses to go along, then the troops will have to come home for lack of funds to prosecute this war. It is Bush's choice to refuse any compromise. He will be responsible. The democrats are trying to have it both ways here. As a democrat this offends me deeply.
It reminds me of Republican abortion and bashing homosexual promises. No, really, we want to put homosexuals in camps and execute abortion doctors, but those pesky (fill in the blanks) are preventing us from doing it. We just need a few more seats, or the white house, to get it done. A tip to any fundamentalist reading this. They are bullshitting you. They are Lucy, you are Charlie Brown, and if you ever kick the football, you may grow tired of the game.
What isn't being spoken of enough is the fact there are over 3,200 dead americans, an Iraqi nation in shambles, and cynical politics is trumping any of those considerations. The american people are not "as political" as many would imagine. They want leadership. They ache for leaders. It's why Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton were popular even though their policies were not the same.
The right thing to do, the popular thing to do, the only thing to do is to end this war. Do not look at me next summer for campaign donations to "end the war" by electing you, if you failed to do what you can do now. If you play this game over the dead bodies of those in the Iraq quagmire, you are not much better than the Republicans.
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