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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lazarus_Long who wrote (20231)	6/1/2007 1:16:38 AM
From: Peter Dierks	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 71588

I am aware of no candidate that I would not vote for over Hillary. I would dismiss myself from the ICU to vote against her.

To: Lazarus_Long who wrote (20231)	6/1/2007 1:20:10 AM
From: Peter Dierks	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

The end of Hillary as security hawk. Saturday, May 26, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT This week's vote in Congress to fund the Iraq war without timetables or withdrawal dates is being portrayed as a "defeat" for Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats. No doubt it is in the short-term and partisan Beltway frame of reference, but in the larger sense it is a victory for American interests and the Framers of our Constitutional order. Hamilton and Madison knew what they were doing when they gave the bulk of the war powers to the President, and it's hard to imagine a more telling vindication of their wisdom than this year's Iraq debate. Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Harry Reid claim to oppose the war and want it to end, yet they refused to use their power of the purse to end it. Instead, they tried every legislative gimmick imaginable to hamstring President Bush's war strategy without actually having to take responsibility for cutting off funds. They tried mandatory deadlines and "benchmarks," a do-over of the October 2002 war resolution that most of them voted for, a "slow-bleed" gradual reduction in war funds, and stuffing the bill with $17 billion in domestic spending to attract antiwar Members. Four months and a Presidential veto later, they abandoned everything except the $17 billion in pork. As the Democratic Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, David Obey, put it this week, "There has never been a chance of snowball in hell that Congress would cut off funding to the troops in the field." So all of the Iraq maneuvering was merely for show to appease the antiwar left that elected Democrats. Ms. Pelosi couldn't even deliver a majority of her own Members for the war spending bill, and she voted "no" herself. Thus she can claim to oppose the war but also sleep easily knowing that others voted to fund it. The troops will be funded because 194 Republicans joined 86 Democrats to support it. Two Republicans and 140 Democrats opposed it. At least Majority Leader Reid voted for the bill, which passed 80-14 in the Senate. To his credit, so did Joe Biden. But the main story in that body was the "no" votes by Presidential candidates Chris Dodd, Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The vote won them praise from the likes of MoveOn.org, which threatened not to support anyone who voted for the bill. "Senators Obama, Clinton and Dodd stood up and did the right thing--voting down the President's war policy," said Eli Pariser, MoveOn's executive director. "They're showing real leadership toward ending the war, and MoveOn's members are grateful. This bold stand . . . won't soon be forgotten." We hope he's right about that last part. Here are three politicians bidding to be Commander in Chief, and they vote to undermine U.S. troops in the middle of a difficult mission, albeit knowing like Ms. Pelosi that their vote won't determine policy. Mr. Dodd and Mrs. Clinton both voted for the Iraq War resolution in October 2002, which means that they were for the war when it was popular but are against it now that public opinion has changed. The vote marks the end of Mrs. Clinton's post-9/11 positioning as a national security hawk. Her 2002 speech supporting war in Iraq was among the most forceful in the Senate, and for a while she admirably stuck with that conviction. But as the antiwar furies have built in her party, she has bent with them and now says and does whatever it takes to deny Mr. Obama or John Edwards any running room to her left. Perhaps this will win her the Democratic nomination, but it will complicate her Presidency if she ever does make it to the Oval Office. The Iranians, among others, will have seen that she can be turned when the going gets tough. Which brings us back to the current President. Whatever his mistakes as a war leader, Mr. Bush at least hasn't betrayed our allies or troops in the field for the sake of reviving his poll numbers. He was also right to defend the war powers of the Presidency against Congressional micromanagement. His obligation now is to do whatever it takes to succeed in Iraq so that the men and women fighting this war will not sacrifice in vain. opinionjournal.com