I happen to believe that the preemption school is correct, that the risks of allowing Saddam Hussein to acquire his weapons will only grow with time. Nonetheless, I can both understand and respect those few Democrats who make the principled argument against war with Iraq on the grounds of deterrence, believing that safety lies in reliance on a proven (if perilous) balance of terror rather than the risky innovation of forcible disarmament by preemption.
What is hard both to understand and to respect, however, is the delay school. They tell us that this war will be both terrible and unnecessary -- and then come out foursquare in support of starting it later, after Saddam Hussein has refused to play nice with inspectors. They manage to criticize the war, and still come out in favor of it. A neat trick -- and, given the gravity of the issue, an unseemly one.
MR. RUSSERT: But if you pass a resolution different from the one in the House, then it has to either go to a conference committee or the House has to pass your resolution, it could further delay this entire debate.
SEN. DASCHLE: Well, I think it’s unlikely that the resolution would be delayed. I think that we could negotiate something, just as we have done in the last couple of days. It took the administration a matter of days to get to this point. It would be a matter of hours, really, to negotiate the balance of it. Senator Lugar, Senator Specter, Senator Hagel, along with Senator Biden and others, have said, “Look, we’ve got to tie down this question, if we can, about what the use of force would be appropriately employed or how it would be employed,” and I think tying it to the weapons of mass destruction is exactly what we’re trying to do here.
MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the president would be open to those changes?
SEN. DASCHLE: Well, I think that we often cite the ’98 resolution as our precedent for this action. That’s exactly what we did in the ’98 resolution. We tied it down to the use of force. We weren’t as broad as this resolution now implies, and so I think that it’s appropriate to go back to that precedent and to work with the administration to ensure that that’s their understanding, as well as ours.
MR. RUSSERT: You raised the ’98 resolution. There was a resolution back in January of ’98, which you know well and I’ll put it on the screen. These were the words: “Resolved by the Senate...That Congress...urges the President to take all necessary and appropriate actions to respond to the threat posed by Iraq’s refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs...” And you’ll see that’s one Tom Daschle from January 28. But you also went on, Senator—and this is quite striking. These are words you uttered in February of 1998. And let me show you and our viewers. You were talking about the Clinton administration: “The administration has said, ‘Look, we have exhausted virtually our diplomatic effort to get the Iraqis to comply with their own agreements and with international law. Given that, what other option is there but to force them to do so?’ That’s what they’re saying. This is the key question. And the answer is we don’t have another option. We have got to force them to comply, and we are doing so militarily.” [whooptie do, clintoon lobed a couple of bombs at Iraq and what was the result? Zip, zero, nada. Except perhaps killing some innocent Iraqi's.]
The Bush White House will suggest that you were trying to give President Clinton more support when he was taking on Saddam Hussein in 1998 than you’re willing to give a Republican president in the year 2002.
[Here comes the tap dancing.]
SEN. DASCHLE: Tim, I have said we support strongly the president’s position for regime change in Iraq. We have said from the very beginning if there is no other recourse, we will do everything possible to ensure that that goal can be achieved, as long as it’s tied to the weapons of mass destruction. That, in our view, is what we’re attempting to do here. Let’s explore to the maximum degree possible our options through the United Nations. Let’s ensure that we have the broadest international support for whatever it is we decide that we can achieve. That’s what we’re doing. I think in large measure, that’s what the resolution will acknowledge when we pass it sometime later on this week or sometime shortly thereafter. We will first attempt to use every diplomatic means available. That’s what I said we ought to do before. We ought to, if no other option is available, after we’ve exhausted those diplomatic means, use preemptive force, unilaterally if necessary.
Enjoy your special place in Hell Mr. Weasel.