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.
Kerry is DEMANDING a recount !!
Buried at the very end of the Asso Propaganda story. Should of been the banner headline.
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Proving again my template for reading DBM articles. The last two or three paragraphs contain the Real Story.
As usual, the Democrats are beating a dead horse.
Jay Rockefeller is MIA.
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Has anyone seen or heard any "news" article about the AWOL status of Sen Rockefeller? I know he had back surgery in March, but West Virginia is not too far to travel to get to the Capitol Building.
If he was a Republican ranking member on the Intelligence Committee and was MIA for three months all kinds of mentions, all negative, would have been made.
A quote from a LIBERAL overheard screaming with his/her head burried in the sand !!
BTTT
BTTT
Fred Grandy this morning said Kerry should just go for January, 2039 - at least he may pick up additional votes! :0)
BTTT
The media won't say it - we MUST not forget to say it. The MAJORITY of American people agree with Democrats.A quote from a LIBERAL overheard screaming with his/her head burried in the sand !!
Want to see a sand geiser? Tell that lieberal that a majority of 'RATs agree with the majority of Americans that we shouldn't cut and run at a date certain.
Dmocrats: The Party of Cowardice
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2691703
Check out this article from DU.
And Russ el-Slimeroad's hissy fit over the spectacular failure of his and Ketchup Boy's call for retreat and defeat in 2007 (otherwise known as a 1-man filibuster) failed 98-1.
"Both proposals — offered as amendments to an annual military bill — were expected to be defeated, mostly along partisan lines. "
Hmm.. 86-13 is not along party lines.
It's Kerry laying the foundation for his 2008 nomination by the Loonies and Cowards who are in the majority of the Democrat Party.
I loved how she voted No after giving that lecture of her's yesterday
LOL, that's good. My FIL is an old-school KY Republican, so I understand where a guy like Senator McConnell is coming from. Good to see him doing well in the Senate leadership, he's good people.
And having 6 'RATs voting against the cut-and-jog, with only 1 RINO leaping to the Dark Side, isn't exactly party lines.
Everyone voted for him. Before they voted against him.
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