Democrats and Failing Iraq

Incredible. You'd think that Biden and his ilk would be more intelligent than to start yelping for bugging out of Iraq, but no, they've decided that they do indeed want to run away. And have lots of investigations on the way. And this is better than how Bush as been handling it, how?

After years of playing a marginal role in the Iraq war, congressional Democrats plan to move quickly next month to assert more control and undercut any White House effort to increase troop levels.

As President Bush prepares to outline his plan for Iraq in a major speech in the next few weeks, Democratic leaders will counter with weeks of oversight hearings, summoning military officers, administration officials and foreign policy experts to Capitol Hill.

The Democratic plans put Congress on a collision course with Bush over the direction of the nearly 4-year-old war. And they signal a new phase in a war that had been directed almost exclusively by the White House with little dissent from the GOP-controlled Capitol.

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), the incoming chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said Tuesday that he intended to call key administration officials, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, to testify at as many as a dozen hearings.

At the same time, the chairmen of both chambers' armed services committees and of the House International Relations Committee also plan to hold hearings.

"I hope the president and his people will listen," Biden said.

Marginal role? Hmm. Last I checked the war-time powers in Article II have those powers controlled by the President. I guess I need to check that again.

Biden, the Vietnam war era senator is just the person to start the cowards run. I'm sure he and Murtha can do their best to ensure that by running away now we will completely fail to form some peaceful solution in Iraq. At least Bush has been trying to succeed, while these jerks are striding to lose, again.

Democrats won control of Congress in an election that turned on voters' unhappiness with the war. But Democrats have struggled for years to articulate an alternative to the Bush administration's policies.

As recently as last year, when Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.) called for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, many in the party agonized over whether that position would permanently tar Democrats as weak. But as discontent with the war has grown, sapping Bush's popularity, Democratic lawmakers have become increasingly outspoken.

And senior party leaders now appear to be uniting behind the call for a phased withdrawal of U.S. forces, a position that was bolstered by the release this month of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group's report.

The report did not set a specific timetable for withdrawing troops but did suggest numerous changes in the administration's policies, including more diplomatic engagement with Iraq's neighbors, another prescription embraced by congressional Democrats.

Got to love how the Dems want the runaway portion of the ISG and appear to be ignoring the possibility of an increase in troops to separate the parties and get them under control.

Rather than talk of reducing the number of U.S. soldiers in Iraq, the White House has focused in the weeks since the release of the Iraq Study Group report on a temporary increase in troops that proponents say will help control the growing sectarian violence.

Senior congressional Democrats, including Biden, have attacked that plan, arguing that beginning a phased withdrawal is the best way to force Iraqis to take responsibility for halting the violence between Sunnis and Shiites.

As he outlined his scheduled hearings in a Tuesday conference call with the media, Biden expressed hope that by airing more viewpoints on Iraq, congressional leaders, particularly Republicans, could persuade the president to reconsider the idea of deploying more soldiers.

This is exactly the time when the President needs to start taking the offensive with informing the public. The Iraq war, and troop increases are very unpopular by all recent polls, and that is a problem that isn't going to get any better if the President just hides away and doesn't push doing the right thing. One thing the Dems have is a lot of shrill voices that get lots of air time. His message is quite simple, fail now and there will be hell to pay. There are several things that could and probably will result. The "Civil War" in Iraq will likely actually become a full fledged civil war which will attract the Islamic radicals to both sides destabilizing the region extremely. The result will be increased oil prices which will cool the world economy and our economy greatly. The terrorists, which for the most part have to stay well hidden in Iraq will be able to move openly and train openly, and then attack the west openly.

But I'm sure those issues will only get better if Biden and the other dolts in his mold get to have committee hearings on it.

Biden said he planned to call retired diplomats, military officers and academics, in addition to Rice, before his committee. He said he was unsure whether he would summon former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

On the House side, Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Burlingame) is planning to call the lead authors of the Iraq Study Group report — former Secretary of State James A. Baker III and former Rep. Lee H. Hamilton (D-Ind.) — to appear before his International Relations Committee.

And House Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) last week promised a series of oversight hearings aimed at uncovering and correcting abuses in the war effort.

"Asking the tough questions — 'Why did this happen? Why did you make a decision to do this or that?' — that does influence behavior," Skelton said.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) has said he plans several January hearings.

The flood of congressional hearings next month will probably shed unfavorable light on the way the Bush administration has prosecuted the war in Iraq.

These pathetic asses are going to do their best to ensure failure. And with that failure will come the increase in threats to the US in many theaters. But the Dems will have won their political war to their political benefit, to our security failure. Can anyone honestly argue that this is going to have even moderately good results?

"We should not exaggerate the ability of the United States Foreign Relations Committee or the Congress to get a president to act in a manner in which the Congress thinks is more rational or more appropriate," Biden said Tuesday. "There's nothing the United States Congress can do by a piece of legislation to alter the conduct of a war that a president decides to pursue.

"This is President Bush's war," he said.

There is the crux of the issue. This isn't "President Bush's War." It is in fact all of ours. It doesn't matter if you don't like how we got into the war, the point frankly is completely irrelevant. We are in this conflict and we must conclude it in a manner that will ensure some certainty of stability in the region. Biden's declaration misses the point that if we fail we all get damaged, and by pointing fingers and blaming Bush, Biden is just playing politics in its most worthless manner. Yep, he looks good, but we all suffer.

God I hate politicians.