Posted on 06/22/2006 8:51:09 AM PDT by areafiftyone
WASHINGTON - The Senate has rejected a proposal to make the Bush administration withdraw all combat troops from Iraq in the next year. It was the first of two votes today on Democratic proposals to pull troops out of Iraq.
Democrats demanded that the U.S. begin withdrawing troops from Iraq this year, while Republicans echoed President Bush's call to stay the course ahead of Senate votes on Thursday that illustrate the choice facing voters in midterm elections this fall.
"Withdrawal is not an option. Surrender is not a solution," declared Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who characterized Democrats as defeatists wanting to "cut and run" from Iraq before the mission is complete.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada, in turn, portrayed Republican leaders as blindly following President Bush's "failed" policy, and said: "It is long past time to change course in Iraq and start to end the president's open-ended commitment."
The GOP-controlled Senate is voting today on two Democratic proposals to start redeploying U.S. troops from Iraq this year. The vote comes a week after both houses of Congress soundly rejected withdrawal timetables.
Both proposals — offered as amendments to an annual military bill — were expected to be defeated, mostly along partisan lines.
Republicans argued the United States must stay put to help the fledgling Iraqi government while Democrats demanded the Bush administration make clear that American forces won't be in Iraq forever.
"We must give them that support and not send a signal that we're going to pull possibly the rug out from under them," Sen. John Warner (news, bio, voting record), R-Va., said.
"It is time to tell the Iraqis that we have done what we can do militarily," Sen. Russ Feingold (news, bio, voting record), D-Wis., answered.
Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill have staged bitter partisan debates for two weeks, with both sides maneuvering for the political upper-hand in a midterm election year.
On Wednesday, Senate Republicans welcomed the Democratic-engineered debate because it highlighted divisions in the Democratic Party little more than four months before Election Day and as the GOP is trying to overcome polls showing the public favors a power shift in Congress to Democrats.
Democrats, for their part, tried to deflect attention from differences in their party on Iraq, even though the debate was over two separate Democratic proposals on the fate of U.S. troops.
One of those proposals, sponsored by Feingold and Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, would require the administration to withdraw all combat troops from Iraq by July 1, 2007, with redeployments beginning this year.
The other proposal — which most Democrats and their leadership support — calls for the administration to begin "a phased redeployment of U.S. forces" by year's end. The nonbinding resolution would not set a deadline of when all forces must be withdrawn.
The Bush administration says U.S. troops will stay in Iraq until Iraqi security forces can defend the country against a lethal insurgency that rose up after the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 that toppled dictator Saddam Hussein.
Senate Republicans opposed any timeline. They said a premature pullout and a public pronouncement of any such plan would risk all-out civil war, tip off terrorists, threaten U.S. security and cripple the Iraqi government just as democracy is taking hold.
In turn, almost all Democrats chastised Republicans for walking in lockstep with Bush and they accused him of failing to articulate a plan for the way ahead in Iraq. Democrats said it is time for troops to start coming home and for Congress to send a clear signal that the U.S. presence is not indefinite.
Sensitive to talk of a divided party, Democratic aides circulated a memo from a Democratic pollster suggesting that Republicans will pay a price in November for standing with the president's war policies. But Republicans dismissed that notion.
Democrats also played down concerns, voiced privately by some party strategists, that the Kerry-Feingold call for a "hard-and-fast" deadline is hindering the party's efforts to project a unified position on Iraq for the fall.
Still, those dismissals did not explain why Democratic leaders spent more than a week trying to write a "consensus" proposal that they hoped would persuade Kerry and Feingold to drop their own, which would set a "date certain" for ending the U.S. combat mission.
In the end, the two potential 2008 Democratic presidential candidates were not swayed and votes on the separate proposals were scheduled.
Dear constituents:
Please stop voting for the following as they are willing and determined to do pretty much anything to undermine our beloved nation:
Akaka (D-HI)
Boxer (D-CA)
Durbin ("Turban") (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
(Jumpin' Jim) Jeffords (I-VT)
(Happy Hour) Kennedy (D-MA)
(John F-in') Kerry (D-MA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
("Leaky") Leahy (D-VT)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Wyden (D-OR)
Thank you, and God bless America.
Kerry is DEMANDING a recount !!
Hahaha! Did you hear Rush yesterday say that Chris Dodds rolled his eyes and winked at the reporter talking to jfn yesterday???
Hahahaha! What a loser!
testi'lyinLOL!
If a demoncrat who has the ear of the party introduced the same plan the vote would be different.
In the end, the dems only care about running away from terrorists with their tails between their legs. It matches their usual position of head up their rearends.
both slimeballs of my pathetic home state of NJ voted for this POS
wha..wha...WHAT???
Why pull out when we are just digging out the WMD's right now :-)
The really strange thing about pulling out is that that is exactly what Bush would like to do and plans to do - announcing the timetable would be one of the most stupid thing to happen in the history of warfare.The really strange thing is that Bush doesn't just come right out and say what you just came right out and said. Why doesn't he just honestly say what he honestly thinks and we all honestly know to be true: The Democrats Are Stupid.
What can they do to him? Call him the worst president since ____ ? They already do that.
From time to time, my wife and I talk about moving across the river to be closer to her family in Illinois. As much as I like living in Missouri, I would be okay with living in Illinois because then I would be able to vote for whoever runs against Turban.
John Kerry's still a big loser.
He is up for re-election, isn't he? And didn't a Republican win the last Senate race in Minnesota?
Tomorrow's headline - HEARTLESS GOP VOTES IN FAVOR OF KILLING MORE OF OUR SOLDIERS
Should US forces leave Iraq to the Islamists at certain civil war would follow and the radicals would prevail. Once in power they would unite with radical Iran and effectively rule the entire middle east.
With unlimited petro dollars and access to advanced weapons from Pakistan, Russia and China a united Islam would seriously threaten Europe, India and Africa. Maybe even Russia. No doubt Islam foot hold in the Balkans would be reinforced, Serbia, Greece and Italy would be targeted for conquest. The Islamic "stain" states on Russia's southern border would be embolden and Chechian would become Russia's Iraq.
Anyone that can not see the horrible consequences for the west, that a US defeat in Iraq would bring, is either blinded by hate of the GOP or an out and out traitor to the USA and Western civilization.
US/UK defeat
Can't forget the Brits.
Thank you for the short list of fools:
Wyden
Leahy
Lautenberg
Feingold
Durbin
Boxer
Akaka
Menendez
Harkin
Inouye
Kerry
Jeffords
Kennedy
and Rockefeller not voting (may still be out sick)
He is not runnin again,it's an open seat....Washington is too dangerous to work in,he's cuttin and runnin ;-) (if you do not know that which I am speakin of,search Mark Dayton and learn about the famous office shutdown)
I agree with you, schedule another and another and another every week until election day.
MAKE the Dims stand on their principles.
Then we'll see at the ballot box who the Public Trusts more.
My bet is, it won't be the cut and run party.
You have got a good point, but I guess the direct approach is just not diplomatic - on the other hand, it just seems like one could put together some words that are acceptable that say "demos are stupid" for calling for an announcement of a timetable. Frankly, the Bush team is not real good at 'responding' to such stupid stuff.
I doubt that there is anyone that wants to get out of here more than W. Just stating that there is a flexible timetable would work.
If you think about it - putting Saddam back in charge would be an interesting alternative to throw out there - I wonder how the Demos would react? They feel that Saddam is such a wonderful person with no WMD's, so why not go with him? He's available - at least for a short time.!
who were the 13 "Cut & Runners"
I didn't know he wasn't running again. Who is running and how does it look?
I do remember the office shutdown, now that you mention it.
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