Democrats Back Date for Start of Iraq Pullout

[kskiska]

Source: NYT

April 24, 2007

WASHINGTON, April 23 — Congressional Democrats agreed Monday to ignore President Bush’s veto threat and send him a $124 billion war spending bill that orders the administration to begin pulling troops out of Iraq by Oct. 1.

“On Iraq, the American people want a new direction, and we are providing it,” said Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington, a leader of the Congressional negotiators who came to terms on the legislation that has become a test of wills between Mr. Bush and the Democratic majority on Capitol Hill.

The House and Senate are to vote on the agreement and send it to the White House by the end of the week, and Democrats expressed confidence that they could secure narrow approval. But even as they ironed out differences between House and Senate approaches to Iraq policy and cut some spending that has drawn Republican scorn, Democrats acknowledged that the bill would be rejected by the president.

Mr. Bush made it clear again on Monday that he would use the second veto of his tenure to kill the legislation, which would set a goal of having most American combat forces out of Iraq within six months of Oct. 1.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/24/washington/24cong.html?_r=1&hp&oref=login

[Kagemusha]

1. What's this? An outbreak of spine? Is this to be believed?

It sounds too good to be true. Sounds like the message got through that Bush is vetoing it anyway, damnit, so stop being babies. At least for the bill you KNOW will be vetoed.

Which makes sense but who here considered it likely to actually happen?...

[Danieljay]

2. Don't worry. They will cave and give Bush the money anyway. n/t

[msongs]

3. if bush vetos it, do NOT send a new version. just let it be nt

[Old and In the Way]

4. The 1st vote was the hardest vote.

They found out that the American people are backing their legislation. It must have been a quite a moment when they voted to do the right thing....and the American people didn't threaten to string them up. Hopefully, this will embolden them to resist capitulation. If they do fold, Republicans won't reward them with respect for their bi-partisan support...no, they'll assail them for being the gutless flip-floppers as they've done continuously in the past. You can only lose if you lose your will to do the right thing.

[Triana]

5. LET HIM veto it - if he wants to veto funding for the troops...

...let him!

[IndianaGreen]

6. By October 1 it should be clear to everyone that the surge failed

and that there is nothing else to do but to get the hell out.

[Rageneau]

7. A crack in the wall of appeasement?

[keopeli]

8. Way to go, Patty Murray!

She's our best Senator. I will be writing to encourage her NOT to back down, but to let Bush take the fall he has coming.

[Vidar]

9. For once they uphold the will of the people.

[rodeodance]

10. but says oct 1 dedline is 'quicker"------hoping to sell to ardent war critics:

While the legislation incorporates the troop readiness standards of the House, it sets the full withdrawal of forces as a goal more in line with the Senate bill, considering that the House had earlier required that most forces be out by fall 2008. But the Oct. 1 deadline for beginning a withdrawal is quicker than any envisioned by the House and could help sell the plan to ardent war critics.

In a tough attack on Mr. Bush in which he accused the president of being in denial on conditions in Iraq, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, said the legislation would provide “a way forward,” combining the withdrawal timetable with benchmarks to measure the progress of the Iraqi government.

“No more will Congress turn a blind eye to the Bush administration’s incompetence and dishonesty,” Mr. Reid said in a speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center here.

Republicans accused Democrats of overstepping their constitutional authority and micromanaging the war. And they noted that the legislation would require a pullout whether or not the Iraqis were making progress in stabilizing their country.