7 GOP Senators Quickly Shift Stand On Iraq Debate (UPDATED)
This is a development that was seemingly easy enough to predict;
Senate Republicans who earlier this week helped block deliberations on a resolution opposing President Bush’s new troop deployments in Iraq changed course yesterday and vowed to use every tactic at their disposal to ensure a full and open debate.In a letter distributed yesterday evening to Senate leaders, John W. Warner (Va.), Chuck Hagel (Neb.) and five other GOP supporters of the resolution threatened to attach their measure to any bill sent to the floor in the coming weeks. Noting that the war is the “most pressing issue of our time,” the senators declared: “We will explore all of our options under the Senate procedures and practices to ensure a full and open debate.”
If you were a fly on the wall in these Senator’s offices, you’d probably learn that they faced a firestorm of criticism from anti-war voters back home. Many of these Senators are up for re-election in 2008. They had perhaps lost some Republican support due to their war stance, but they had probably gained some independent and Democratic support in their own states as well.
News media coverage of the debate thwarted by the GOP Senate leadership was not kind to the Republican party. Most news stories talked about the GOP putting a lid on debate over the issues polls show is the number one issue most Americans are now concerned about. And so you had this:
The letter began circulating yesterday evening after it became apparent the Senate was deadlocked over the war resolution and Reid was prepared to move on to other matters. McConnell and many in his party have aggressively defended their decision to block the bipartisan resolution as an issue of fairness because Democrats would not agree to GOP procedural demands.But some Republicans were uneasy about appearing to have stymied the debate. The letter appeared so suddenly that although it was addressed to Reid, the Democratic leader had not seen his copy before Warner read the text on the Senate floor.
“Monday’s procedural vote should not be interpreted as any lessening of our resolve to go forward advocating the concepts” of their resolution, the letter said. “The current stalemate is unacceptable to us and to the people of this country.”
Meanwhile, a top military official undermined one of the key talking points being used to try and squelch a resolution:
“There’s no doubt in my mind that the dialogue here in Washington strengthens our democracy. Period,” Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, testified before the House Armed Services Committee. He added that potential enemies may take some comfort from the rancor but said they “don’t have a clue how democracy works.”
But is it too little too late? And the Democrats would probably have more to gain politically if they just let the resolution from being block.
em>Prediction: from the standpoint of voters who opposes the war, the damage has been done to these 7 Senators who will likely face stiff re-election fights if Iraq is not resolved by 2008.
And although the administration seems to have dodged a bullet on a nonbinding Senate revolution, it still could be faced with one in the House:
But with the Senate at a standstill, House leaders are considering a straightforward resolution that opposes the troop increase, without the multiple provisions that complicated Warner’s text. Senior House Democrats predicted their measure will attract overwhelming party support and possibly as many as 30 GOP votes.
If that happens, it would put additional pressures on Senate Republicans.
But is that what happened? Steve Clemons writes that his sources tell him that the 7 Senators were horrified over a “nasty” partisan tug-of-war over the debate issue waged by the two parties’ Senate leadership:
I was as confused as anyone by the votes cast by Warner, Snowe and Hagel who were real stakeholders in the resolution that was being fought over. But it is now clear that in the eyes of these Senators, the Republican Party leadership and the majority Democrats chose to slug each other silly in ways that preempted any ability to secure the votes needed to assure debate. In that circumstance, the Senators who have signed the letter below decided to vote against the resolution in that climate.Essentially, these seven Senators have said to their own Republican leadership and the Democrats to “shape up” or a “pox on both your houses.”
I think it’s a brave move — and explains a lot.
The problem: the average voter — particularly those who have questions about or do not support the war — won’t look at it that way. The voters (including those in those Senators’ states) may view it as an indication that the Senators’ anti-war rhetoric was just that and not distinguish their stance from that of the White House’s or the GOP leadership’s.
15 Responses to “7 GOP Senators Quickly Shift Stand On Iraq Debate (UPDATED)”
[...] Joe Gandelman sounds like he’s on a witchhunt: [...]
People like myself who are deeply engaged in and concerned about the conduct of the war are horrified at the “show” that the party leaderships put on over the non-binding resolution on Monday, but we should not be surprised.
The Inside the Beltway air that these people breathe is a political nitrous oxide and it makes them “silly” in untimely and utterly inappropriate ways.
While I generally hold Steve Clemons thoughtful comments and his insider informations in high esteem, here you’re right, Joe! Good job in pointing this out.
Both sides are stalling because this way they can posture as though their side wants to debate but the other side is obstructing the discussion. Politically that is what the party leaders want because they can portray to their constituents that they “tried” while also delaying so that they don’t have to be on record with an actual position on opposing the surge (only a few GOP senators would benefit from such a position) or from actually saying that they’d cut off funding (only a few Democratic senators would benefit from taking that position). So, both Reid and McConnell found it was in their party’s best interest to stall, and the seven senators who wrote the letter are calling BS on them.
CS is mostly correct. McConnell did not want a resolution criticizing the surge to pass the Senate, Reid did not want the Gregg amendment which says no funds will be cut off for the troops in the field to pass the Senate. So we ended up with no debate. Saying they tried will not be enough for angry anti-war constituents who will not accept that there wasn’t even a debate on the floor on these resolutions. The 7 GOP Senators who are vulnerable in ’08 are aware of this.
Hallelujah, Kim, we found something we agree on! LOL
“Reid did not want the Gregg amendment which says no funds will be cut off for the troops in the field to pass the Senate.”
Imho this isn’t Reid’s motive. The Gregg amendment is almost unacceptable for Dem seantors, because it would limit their chances to nfluence Bush’s decions. It’s very improbable it would have got a majority, not to speak of 60 votes. News reporting about 70 possible votes is just hot air, republican spin, there’s nothing that would support this guess.
No, I don’t think this explanation is fitting. Imho Reid wasn’t very much interested in compromise because the price was to high (McConnel deliberately made it so), and because he knew that the filibuster would hgive only a short timed propaganda victory for the WH, but a solid advantage for Dems in 2008. The seven Senators, who come out of the closet now and voice their concerns, simply show they are totally aware they pay a high price for the WH orchestration of this kabuki theatre and try to limit its negative impact.
“No, I don’t think this explanation is fitting.”
Strike this sentence, it’s just another evidence of my lousy skills as my own editor…
“Hallelujah, Kim, we found something we agree on!”
Congratulations!
At least I’m still here so to provide a diferent view. Not that we run out of comments we can disagree on!
ggg
Gray- CS and I have only agreed about 2 or 3 times since we’ve been commenting here- usually we are diametrically opposed,, lol.
I’m not criticizing Reid- I thought it was the only thing he could have done. If that amendment had been put to a vote, a lot of Democrats would have felt pressured to vote for it,imo, because they do not want to go into ’08 looking like they only back the troops with words, but not with action.
Lessons learned from Vietnam. Once the Dems defunded that war, all were tarred with the “McGovern peacenik” brush, even though in all likeliehood the money would have only been spent on a lost cause. I did feel that we should have done a lot more to help the South Vietnamese escape Ho Chi Minh’s genocide, though.
There was plenty of debate. There were just no votes. Every media person, blogger, and other pundit who claims that the Republicans, by voting against cloture (which is, by definition, an end to debate), were instead cutting off debate is grossly misleading their readers. Most are being hypocritical, as any number of solid bloggers have pointed out, because they called Republican efforts to overcome Democratic filibusters efforts to “stifle” debate by invoking cloture.
Cloture is ending debate, whether done by Democrats or by Republicans. In this case, Republicans voted against cloture, and therefore in favor of more debate. They wanted to discuss other resolutions. The Democrats did not want to discuss or even get close to voting on any of the other resolutions, so they tried to forestall that debate by invoking cloture, which would have allowed them to hurry up and vote on their preferred solution without having to actually debate any of the Republican proposals.
What utter, rank hypocrisy, by so many.
Thanks, PatMHV, for explaining it much better than I could. And as you point out, most of the bloggers who portrayed this in a misleading way must know exactly what they were doing because they understood it perfectly when the GOP was in the majority.
My take. I think Warner, Hagel, and the “gang of 7″ sincerely wanted to get to a 60 plurality on a resolution. Even if they all voted for cloture, they did not have enough Republicans. So they backed off when asked, played ball to get a few more votes and put it on the leaders plate to get it done. Essentially saying – “we’ll stay in line for this vote, on the expectation that you are going to work it out.” The leadership let them down, they are pissed, and there is no tether anymore. They are “open loop” from this point and no longer manageable by the leadership of either party. Should be fun to watch.
The most interesting bit was the exchange between Lieberman, Hagel and Warner on Monday about “non-binding resolutions”. My YouTube take on it here. Warning – Rated M for Mature Language
What we have here is the beginning of the new NEOLIBERAL movement……lol. I can see it now.
Republicans aligning themselves with democrats and forming a new political thinking. Just like Democrats aligned themselves with Ronald Reagan and formed the New NEOCONSERVATIVE movement.
Its fascinating to watch this transformation taking place.
And I have noticed over the last 12 years of so a politcal shift that has to be a bit distressing to liberals and conservatives alike
Democrats are tending toward Fiscal responsibility. (Balanced budgets, smaller government) because it seems to be what the people want. While the Republicans under the NeoConservative movement are trending toward bigger government, more social programs(prescription drugs for seniors)and less fiscal responsibility.
Its trully amazing to watch this transformation and I’ve often wondered if Im the only one seeing it.