Posted on 02/14/2007 11:16:47 AM PST by smoothsailing
This story brought to you by Politico.com
House Democrats' New Strategy: Force Slow End to War By: John Bresnahan February 14, 2007 01:06 PM EST
Top House Democrats, working in concert with anti-war groups, have decided against using congressional power to force a quick end to U.S. involvement in Iraq, and instead will pursue a slow-bleed strategy designed to gradually limit the administration's options.
Led by Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Pa., and supported by several well-funded anti-war groups, the coalition's goal is to limit or sharply reduce the number of U.S. troops available for the Iraq conflict, rather than to openly cut off funding for the war itself.
The legislative strategy will be supplemented by a multimillion-dollar TV ad campaign designed to pressure vulnerable GOP incumbents into breaking with President Bush and forcing the administration to admit that the war is politically unsustainable.
As described by participants, the goal is crafted to circumvent the biggest political vulnerability of the anti-war movement -- the accusation that it is willing to abandon troops in the field. That fear is why many Democrats have remained timid in challenging Bush, even as public support for the president and his Iraq policies have plunged.
Murtha and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., have decided that they must take the lead in pressuring not only Republicans but also cautious Senate Democrats to take steps more aggressive than nonbinding resolutions in challenging the Bush administration.
The House strategy is being crafted quietly, even as the chamber is immersed this week in an emotional, albeit mostly symbolic, debate over a resolution expressing opposition to Bush's plan to "surge" 21,500 more troops into Iraq.
NPR's Interview with Rep. Murtha
Murtha, the powerful chairman of the defense subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, will seek to attach a provision to an upcoming $93 billion supplemental spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan. It would restrict the deployment of troops to Iraq unless they meet certain levels adequate manpower, equipment and training to succeed in combat. That's a standard Murtha believes few of the units Bush intends to use for the surge would be able to meet.
In addition, Murtha, acting with the backing of the House Democratic leadership, will seek to limit the time and number of deployments by soldiers, Marines and National Guard units to Iraq, making it tougher for Pentagon officials to find the troops to replace units that are scheduled to rotate out of the country. Additional funding restrictions are also being considered by Murtha, such as prohibiting the creation of U.S. military bases inside Iraq, dismantling the notorious Abu Ghraib prison and closing the American detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
"There's a D-Day coming in here, and it's going to start with the supplemental and finish with the '08 [defense] budget," said Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawaii, who chairs the Air and Land Forces subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee.
Pelosi and other top Democrats are not yet prepared for an open battle with the White House over ending funding for the war, and they are wary of Republican claims that Democratic leaders would endanger the welfare of U.S. troops. The new approach of first reducing the number of troops available for the conflict, while maintaining funding levels for units already in the field, gives political cover to conservative House Democrats who are nervous about appearing "anti-military" while also mollifying the anti-war left, which has long been agitating for Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to be more aggressive.
"What we have staked out is a campaign to stop the war without cutting off funding" for the troops, said Tom Mazzie of Americans Against Escalation of the War in Iraq. "We call it the 'readiness strategy.'"
Murtha's proposal, which has been kept under tight wraps, is likely to pass the House next month or in early April as part of the supplemental spending bill, Democratic insiders said, if the language remains tightly focused and does not threaten funding levels for combat forces already in the field. The battle will then shift to the Senate. Anti-war groups like Mazzie's are prepared to spend at least $6.5 million on a TV ad campaign and at least $2 million more on a grass-roots lobbying effort. Vulnerable GOP incumbents like Sens. Norm Coleman of Minnestoa, Susan Collins of Maine, Gordon Smith of Oregon and John Sununu of New Hampshire will be targeted by the anti-war organizations, according to Mazzie and former Rep. Tom Andrews, D-Maine, head of the Win Without War Coalition.
Mazzie also said anti-war groups would field primary and general election challengers to Democratic lawmakers who do not support proposals to end the war, a direct challenge to conservative incumbents who are attempting to straddle the political line between their pro- and anti-war constituents.
If the Senate does not approve these new funding restrictions, or if Senate Republicans filibuster the supplemental bill, Pelosi and the House Democratic leadership would then be able to ratchet up the political pressure on the White House to accede to their demands by "slow-walking" the supplemental bill. Additionally, House Democrats could try to insert the Murtha provisions into the fiscal 2008 defense authorization and spending bills, which are scheduled to come to the floor later in the year.
"We will set benchmarks for readiness," said a top Democratic leadership aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity. If enacted, these provisions would have the effect of limiting the number of troops available for the Bush surge plan, while blunting the GOP charge that Democrats are cutting funding for the troops. "We are not cutting funding for any [unit] in Iraq," said the aide, who admitted the Democratic maneuver would not prevent the president from sending some additional forces to Baghdad. "We want to limit the number who can go ... We're trying to build a case that the president needs to change course."
Mazzie, though, suggested that Democrats ought to directly rebut the Republican charge that Democrats are threatening the safety of American forces in the field by pushing restrictions on war funding. "Cutting off funding as described by the media and White House is a caricature," Mazzie said. "It has never happened in U.S. history, and it won't happen now."
Andrews, who met with Murtha on Tuesday to discuss legislative strategy, acknowledged "there is a relationship" with the House Democratic leadership and the anti-war groups, but added, "It is important for our members that we not be seen as an arm of the Democratic Caucus or the Democratic Party. We're not hand in glove."
Andrews's group has launched a new Web site, MoveCongress.org, and he has already posted an interview with Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., one of the founders of the "Out of Iraq Caucus" in the House. An interview with Murtha on his legislative strategy will be posted on the site Thursday.
"I don't know how you vote against Murtha," said Andrews. "It's kind of an ingenious thing."
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NEVER FORGET
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NEVER FORGET
Last time a Democrat Congress cut the funding for Freedom-Fighters =
Pictures of a vietnamese Re-Education Camp
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I totally agree.
And just look how emboldened the antiwar protesters are getting.
RINOs are better than Rats any day. It would be easier to get rid of RINOs in 2008 than the Rats, and gain back the majority.
If the MSM weren't so biased, we would have kept our majority.
Now I predict there will be a Rat in all three Houses after '08. I say this because those who stayed home last election will stay home again because they won't see a viable Presidential Pub candidate. Then our troops will really suffer.
[Mr] T
Here's my letter to the editor today praising Congressman Davis 1st TN who was publically critized for "wrapping himself in the flag" and standing up for the war and America.
"In an era where left wing pacifists drool at the possibility of an American defeat in a war,
In an era where the treasonous Code Pink organization harangues terribly wounded soldiers as they come and go from the very gates of Walter Reed Army Hospital,
In an era where the Democrat Congress seems hell bent to side with our terrorist enemies,
It is great to have a Congressman who will wrap himself in the flag and publicly recite the values that have made America great.
He must be complimented for his action and encouraged to enter the capital and daily endure the stench rising from the liberal side of the aisle."
Thank you for letting me know this - I really do appreciate it. Well, let me make a correction then:
Congressmen who willfully take action during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs, and should be arrested, exiled or hanged." --
Anonymous and Ping-Pong
I should have checked the quote. I have a tendency to accept things at face value. I attribute honesty to others when perhaps I shouldn't. Thank you again.
They have no clue - just that they need political capitol, something they always will lack.
Thanks LVD.
I agreed with almost everything that Rep. Kingston had to say on Hardball, with one notable exception: I am one of those National Guardsmen that has been extended here in theater, and I can tell you honestly that it is NOT just "fresh troops" that are tasked in this surge. We have been on the ground here for about a year now, and we would dearly like to go home. The surge has extended us for about 4+ months. Add that to the 6+ month trainup (which was also time spent away from our loved ones) and it totals approximately 23 months of time spent away from our families and our civilian careers. None of our active duty counterparts have shouldered this much time away from their families including the 172nd Striker Brigade, who were extended last summer.
Now...this doesn't mean that we do not support our commander in chief. Far from it, we will charlie mike(continue mission) because that's what good soldiers do. And every last one of us here are part of a voulnteer service, so it is not like someone forced us to be here. However, I hope that our senior leaders in Washington recognize the sacrifice my national guardsmen and women have made in this fight. When all is said and done, the 1/34th BCT will have been the longest deployed unit in the Iraq War since the invasion in 2003.
Having said that, please understand: I share Rep. Kingston's feelings about a democratic majority in congress that cannot seem to generate any valid or helpful ideas of their own. They ran on a wholesale platform of criticism about how the republican controlled government has been committed to the wrong course of action in the war, but they have offered no valid or constructive options of their own. They need to stand up and be responsible to the people who voted them into office and start generating helpful and useful legislation that will outline a clear course of action in the future. Continuing to play defense and try to limit the options of the CinC is not constructive, it is just another tired reiteration of the political blame game.
And the MSM is so busy reporting on Anna Nicole that they will conveniently put this little, insigificant story below the cut line and it will be buried.
Brilliant plan, in a Dick Morris sort-of way, devious, evil, but brilliant!
New tires and a paint job is just not going to do it.
I remember that day. I had the honor of being one of the veterans who stood beside her on stage the day she originally said it.
She really never needed to apologize, since the media never broadcast or quoted her original statement. It was the truth of those words, Lincoln's or not, that terrified the media that day.
Whether Lincoln said it or not, and it can't be proven either way, his actions as President bear out his belief in those words, with only the possible exception of the hanging part.
Obama is part of the plan. Hillary is the convient distraction for them to push a guy like Obama.
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