Posted on 01/05/2007 8:04:54 AM PST by shrinkermd
WASHINGTON, Jan. 3 — Some key Senate Democrats say they could consider supporting a short-term increase in American troop levels in Iraq, a stance that reflects division within the party and could provide an opening for President Bush as he prepares to announce his revised plan for Iraq as early as next week.
Mr. Bush is expected to outline a strategy that would include adding to American forces, but would link that increase to a plan for economic development in Iraq. He has vowed to consult Congressional leaders before delivering his speech to the nation, and he began that process on Wednesday night by inviting House and Senate leaders to a White House reception, though officials said Iraq was not discussed.
Senator Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrat who will lead the Armed Services Committee, said he would not “prejudge” the president’s proposal. While he would oppose an open-ended commitment, Mr. Levin said, he would not rule out supporting a plan to dispatch more troops if the proposal was tied to a broader strategy to begin reducing American involvement and sending troops home.
“The American people are skeptical about getting in deeper,” he said in an interview. “But if it’s truly conditional upon the Iraqis’ actually meeting milestones and if it’s part of an overall program of troop reduction that would begin in the next four to six months, it’s something that would be worth considering.”
But Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Delaware Democrat who will become chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, has said he is opposed to increasing troop strength regardless of the plan, calling the idea the “absolute wrong strategy.” In interviews on Wednesday, several Democratic senators echoed Mr. Biden’s view, saying they believed that sending more troops would not resolve the predicament in Iraq.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
And yes the Dims are correct, the American people really are dumb sheep.
They are immature, egotistical, selfish people who do not care a whiff about the peeples or the country, just their personal power, their position, their donors, their business partners and their party.
Let me guess... they'll be critical of it.
May the Democrats have to answer to God Almighty for what the have done.
The Dem'crats are gaming this whole response thing, with one thing in mind - they are running against George W. Bush in 2008. They are trying to second-guess WHAT proposal the President will present to Congress, at the State of the Union address, and have one of perhaps a dozen or so reactions all ready to go the moment the applause dies down.
One thing they CANNOT do, is to come out with some position which supports Bush. Everything they come up with will be predicated upon the President calling for renewed and more vigorous action to end the violence in those few provinces in Iraq where it still prevails, and they will have all sorts of nuanced responses based on that perception. They would deny additional funding, or any shifting of resources to counter the insurgencies, just at the moment when these same insurgencies are most vulnerable to being dismantled altogether.
But what if, in some perverse application of logic, Bush not only comes out with a position which they are unable to raise objections to, but insists they provide the necessary tools to implement that course of action as swiftly as possible? This sort of sudden reversal has been pulled before, and the Dem'crats will be left in the position of "put up or shut up" on their pledges, when they realize that they will then own the problem.
Don't ever sit down to play poker with this man, especially if you do not respect his native intelligence.
Democrats will give Bush everything he asks for after recommending otherwise. They are building a 2008 campaign issue, anticipating that Bush will fail during his Presidency to create a Democracy in Iraq friendly to us and his neighbors.
In Texad Hold-em parlance, Bush is going 'all in' with an empty hand, hoping to be bailed out on the flop and the river.
No to national security, no to supporting our allies, no to sound economic policy.
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