Playing Politics With Iraq

Playing Politics With Iraq

June 23, 2006

For the past two weeks, both the House and Senate have been engaged in the "first extended debate on whether the time had come to end that war." The House voted for a sham resolution linking Iraq to the "war on terror" while opposing a timetable. Yesterday, the Senate gave an "endorsement to President Bush's Iraq policy," and voted down two amendments calling for redeployment of our troops out of Iraq. Instead of focusing on coming up with a real plan for Iraq, conservatives in Congress choose to play politics with the war — attempting to politicize national security. The biggest losers in that game are our men and women in uniform and the American people.

• Conservatives are waging a political war over Iraq. The right wing's recent focus on Iraq is no accident; it is part of a larger political strategy to paint progressives as weak on national security. Despite ongoing violence in Iraq and an American public that is fed up with the war's direction, conservatives "have concluded that the war is a clear winner." Karl Rove has his "reinvigorated hand in the strategy," which will "play out over the summer and into the fall." At least Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) tried to add a semblance of seriousness to the Senate debate, arguing that it "should be taken more seriously than to simply retreat into focus-group tested buzz words and phrases like 'cut and run,' catchy political slogans that debase the seriousness of war."
  
  
• While conservatives played politics, progressives offered real alternatives to the president’s plan of “stay the course.” Last November, the Senate overwhelmingly voted to declare 2006 "a period of significant transition." Two proposals introduced in the Senate this week sought to define what this means. While there are some differences between the two plans, "the basic thrust is the same—calling for a phased redeployment of U.S. forces to begin in 2006, coupled with increased efforts to set Iraq’s political transition and reconstruction back on track." The proposals indicate a "progressive unity" position that redeployment must begin this year.
  
  
• Iraqis and Americans alike support setting a timeline for redeployment U.S. troops. In his argument against redeployment, Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN) stated that, "The Iraqi people want and need us to help them." That may be true, but they also want us to eventually leave their country. According to a World Public Opinion poll, 70 percent of Iraqis favor setting a timeline for the redeployment of U.S. forces. A recent Pew poll showed that the majority of Americans favored a timeline for redeployment. The Iraqi prime minister, the Iraqi president and the Iraqi vice president all have called for withdrawal to begin soon, and Iraqi National Security Adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie joined them this week. Former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said in a recent interview with The Australian that he "believed the Iraqis would soon ask the US to leave their country," and he personally "hoped there could be a draw-down of US and other coalition troops in Iraq in the next 12 to 18 months."