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| Fifth Column |
| Senate Signals Support for Iraq Timeline |
| 2007-03-27 |
| The Senate today narrowly endorsed a Democratic-led effort to set a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq a year from now, voting down a Republican amendment that would have stripped the provision from a $122 emergency spending bill. Senators voted 50 to 48 to reject the amendment, which was introduced by Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), the top Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee. The vote came after the White House reiterated President Bush's threat to veto any bill that sets deadlines for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. In intensive floor debate before the vote, supporters of the amendment argued that including a deadline for withdrawal from Iraq -- even though it is put forth in the Senate bill as a nonbinding "goal" -- would hand victory to America's enemies, while opponents of it said it was time to stop giving President Bush a "blank check" to continue a failed war policy. The $122 billion bill would fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this fiscal year and would provide about $20 billion in domestic spending. The Cochran amendment would have removed language in the emergency spending bill that requires U.S. combat troops to begin leaving Iraq within four months of enactment and sets a goal of completing their withdrawal by March 31, 2008. However, the amendment would have left in place a set of nonbinding political and economic benchmarks for the Iraqi government. The benchmarks, originally put forward by the Bush administration, were added to the bill last week to win the support of a key conservative Democrat, Sen. Ben Nelson (Neb.). In a statement before the vote, the White House said the withdrawal provision and other components of the bill "would place freedom and democracy in Iraq at grave risk, embolden our enemies and undercut the administration's plan to develop the Iraqi economy." But Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said the bill's language was needed to "send a message to President Bush that the time has come to find a new way forward in this intractable war." In debate on the Senate floor, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) argued strongly against setting a timetable for troop withdrawal, saying a new strategy to secure Baghdad through a "surge" of U.S. combat troops is "succeeding." He told the Senate, "What we must not do is to give up just at the moment we're starting to turn things around in Iraq." Setting a timetable "risks a catastrophe for American national security interests," said McCain, who canceled a series of fundraisers in Florida for his presidential campaign to return to Washington for today's expected close vote. "This legislation is a plan for failure," McCain said of the underlying bill. "It demonstrates to the [Iraqi] government that they cannot rely on us. It tells the terrorists that they, not we, will prevail." Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), another potential contender for the GOP presidential nomination, expressed strong opposition to the Cochran amendment, saying, "I will not support sustaining a flawed and failing policy in Iraq." He lambasted the Bush administration for sending more and more U.S. combat troops to Iraq at a time when allies are pulling their forces out and for "taking us deeper and deeper into this quagmire with no exit strategy." The bill does not cut off funding for U.S. troops and "does not impose a precipitous withdrawal" from Iraq, Hagel said. "This idea that somehow you don't support the troops if you continue in a lemming-like way to accept whatever this administration's policy is -- that is what's wrong," he said, "and that is dangerous." The House last week narrowly passed an emergency spending bill that includes a binding timetable for withdrawing U.S. combat troops from Iraq by the end of August 2008. Bush vowed to veto it if it ever reached his desk. Traitors. |
| Posted by:Dave D. |
| #4 Hagel might have a shot in the Democrat primary, but not a ghost of a chance as a Republican. |
| Posted by: RWV 2007-03-27 21:02 |
| #3 Perhaps not the presidential one, but I'll vote for Traitor and Vermin of the year for him. I'm sure he'd tie with the Hildebeast. |
| Posted by: Silentbrick 2007-03-27 19:58 |
| #2 Sen. Chuck Hagel, another potential contender for the GOP presidential nomination He can't possibly think he can get the GOP nomination - can he??? |
| Posted by: ryuge 2007-03-27 19:02 |
| #1 This could work for the good guys. Bush will veto this surrender bill, of course. But over in Iraq this vote does drive home that 2007 is Iraq's very very last chance. Bush can't bluff with the "last chance" stuff because he wants to win and everybody knows it. But the Dems? When it comes to CUT & RUN, they have all kinds of credibility. So in a perverse way, this vote could actually help us win in Iraq. |
| Posted by: Glavise Bourbon1167 2007-03-27 18:59 |