Senate Rejects Renewed Effort to Debate Iraq

The Republicans have managed, yet again, to avoid a debate of Bush's Iraq policy in the Senate, although they managed to do so by a vote of 56-to-34, meaning that the vote fell a mere four short of the sixty needed to trigger a debate.

Seven Republicans split from their party to join with the forty eight Democrats calling for a debate, which is five more than joined the Democrats the last time an attempt was made to discuss this matter.

The tide is slowly moving away from Bush and towards the democratic argument.

The Republicans who broke ranks were Senators John W. Warner of Virginia, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, Gordon H. Smith of Oregon, Norm Coleman of Minnesota, and Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins, both of Maine.

Senator Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, the majority leader, said the result showed that Senate sentiment was running against the president.

“A majority of the United States Senate just voted on Iraq, and a majority of the United States Senate is against the escalation in Iraq,” Mr. Reid said as he withdrew the resolution. He and other party leaders said they intended to introduce quickly more substantive proposals on Iraq when the Senate returns from a weeklong break and begins considering legislation to enact recommendations from the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission.

“We will be relentless,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, the third-ranking Democrat. “There will be resolution after resolution, amendment after amendment, all forcing this body to do what it has not done in the previous three years: debate and discuss Iraq.”

The Republicans continue to attempt to tie any debate on the government's Iraq policy to a discussion of troop funding, hoping to convince the public that the Democratic Party is somehow harming troops in the field by withholding funding.

There is an understandable reluctance amongst the Democrats to get into this argument, although there are many occasions in the past when Congress has repeatedly placed limits on military spending and deployments; so, even were the Democrats to do this, it would not be without precedent.

Indeed, "sizeable majorities (of Americans surveyed in late 2006) agree with the goal of pulling out nearly all U.S. combat forces by early 2008, engaging in direct talks with Iran and Syria and reducing U.S. financial support if Iraq fails to make enough progress", so the Democrats appear to be more frightened of using this tactic than they need be.

When asked about some of [The Baker Report's] specific recommendations, respondents are dramatically more supportive. Seventy-nine percent favor shifting U.S. troops from combat to support; 69 percent support withdrawing most combat forces by early 2008; 74 percent support reducing aid if Iraq fails to make progress toward national unity and civil order; and about six in 10 support talking with Syria and Iran to try to resolve the conflict.

The Republicans seem to relish the Democrat's fear of being portrayed as unsupportive of the troops:

If you think we are in the middle of civil war, cut off funding,” Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, said to his colleagues.

Graham and the Republicans might be convincing themselves that they have the Democrats on the back foot here, but the truth is that the public themselves favour withholding money from a war that many now concede is lost.

I think there's another reason why the Democrats are reluctant to withhold funding. I think they suspect that to do so would give Bush the excuse he needs to claim that defeat was because the Democrats withdrew funding rather than because he sent too few troops into a region he barely understood.

The blame for the Iraq debacle lies fully on Bush's shoulders and, perhaps, the Democrats are determined that it should remain there. However, Democratic reluctance to withhold funds shouldn't be an excuse for Congress to avoid debating the Iraq war.

And, as the vote yesterday showed, the day of that debate is coming ever more near. No matter how many games the Republicans play in an attempt to avoid it.

Tags: Iraq war, debate, Congress, Democrats, Republicans