Thursday
Newspapers, networks, and blogs have created lists of all the Iraq bills and resolutions on the table; by most counts, there are five. Tom Andrews, the former Maine congressman who is now the national director of Win Without War, has spent the week lobbying Congress in person and on television to come up with a way to block the surge. “People did not vote for a Democratic Congress so they could pass words and phrases that are not binding,” Andrews says.
How does the attitude on the Hill compare to the attitude when Win Without War launched, when Democrats were meekly approving the original Iraq War resolution?
“It’s night and day. In 2002 there was a general view that a vote to support the president was the safe vote. People remembered the first Gulf War; they thought that worked out okay. Democrats were concerned about looking soft on defense, and they said ‘let’s shore up our credibility by voting for this war.’”
But are the Democrats actually committed to stopping the surge or ending the war?
“One of the ways we will get an indication of that is Congress’s attitude on Iran.”
At 11 a.m., a broad group of Democratic and Republican House members were debating that precise question. Walter Jones is holding court in the press room where the Out of Iraq Caucus presented its bill on Wednesday, and he shares the microphone with Democrats from Massachusetts to Hawaii and Republicans from Maryland’s Wayne Gilchrest to Texas’s Ron Paul. Jones and his allies are introducing a binding resolution that would force President Bush to ask Congress for authorization of any military attack on Iran.
“I want to recognize Walter Jones as the conscience of this Congress,” Hawaii Democrat Neil Abercrombie says. “If anyone represents what it means to represent the people of your district, it is Walter Jones.”
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Jordan Shoes|8.12.11 @ 10:43PM|#
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دليل|10.7.11 @ 8:29AM|#
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