The bill to set withdrawal timetables from Iraq has passed, on its way now to the President’s desk–where it will be vetoed. Democrats will work on this issue from now on, presumably with an eye toward using it as a campaign issue to gain more seats and hopefully hand the White House to a Democrat. All well and good. Bush has made a hash of this war.
What does disturb me is the trend toward thinking that cutting funding for the war is a useful tool. Congress can’t order Bush to pull out, but it does control the purse, and as such it can–presumably–make it impossible for the President to conduct the war. But we all, if we’re honest, know very well that that’s not how it will play out.
I am apalled at this war, but let me be clear–had Bush contented himself with going into Afghanistan and dealing with that, I would have backed him. Perhaps he or his cronies would have made a hash of that, too, but I saw Afghanistan as a legitimate enterprise. The Taliban were harboring Osama bin Laden, and the Taliban itself made its political feelings toward us very clear. Also, Afghanistan is right next to Pakistan, which is and has been a seed bed of problems for some time. Pakistan was a source for nuclear technology to rogue states, it has a big problem with extremists, and the Taliban launched their invasion of Afghanistan from there and use it to hide. Pakistan is potentially a lot of trouble. So I had no real problem with going into Afghanistan.
I always thought the Iraq move was stupid and unnecessary.
But.
There is and never has been neat ways to disentangle from messes and what I dislike about the Democrat’s threat to cut funding for the war is that it uses the troops on the ground as a political football. Bush is already doing that. For the Democrats to join the game is one of the reasons I tend to curse both parties.
If the expectation is that when the money dries up, the troops will come home, then we all have to realize that Republicans and Democrats are engaging in a game of political chicken. Who will flinch first. Because as long as Bush is in charge, they won’t come home. They’ll simply be tasked to do the job with less. Or he’ll find the money somewhere else. (Anyone remember Reagan?) But it will not be the neat, tidy quid pro quo the Democrats expect everyone to believe it will be. And the ones who will pay for this game of chicken will be the soldiers.
The way to get out of Iraq, the best way possible, is to wait for a new administration, preferably Democrat, and then do it by open and uncompetitive means. It will take longer. But if the Democrats push this money thing in order to make Bush look worse than he does, then they will be no better than him, using the troops to make political points. Perhaps their strategy will be viable–more and bloodier casualties will wash over the Republicans and sweep some more of them out of office–but it the same kind of callous politicking we’ve been accusing the Republicans of all along.
And by the way, McCain and others are correct about setting timetables. The insurgents will just hunker down and wait. The big losers then will be the Iraqis who really are trying to make their country work. That may not be an argument for us to stay, but it is a consequence that has sound historical precedent–Vietnam and Cambodia to name two.
I think we’ve hashed up Iraq. I say we because of the nature of our electorate, so whether as individuals we support this war or not, it remains a We issue. Staying may not help. Leaving will only help us. Had there been a plan before the invasion or any semblence of responsible oversite during, we might have actually succeeded in something. So I’m for gettng out. But I believe everyone ought to know what that means and I resent the Democrats–who I voted for in the last election–playing politics with the very troops they claim to be supporting.
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