Yet another Republican bigwig has broken with President George Bush over his Iraq war policy:
Sen. Pete Domenici (N.M.), a 36-year Republican veteran of the Senate, abandoned President
Bush’s Iraq war policy today by publicly endorsing legislation designed to withdraw nearly all U.S. troops from Iraq by March 2008.
Domenici, a member of the defense appropriations subcommittee, is the fourth senior Senate Republican to sharply criticize Bush’s war strategy in the past two weeks. He announced during a press conference in Albuquerque that he was co-sponsoring legislation that would embrace the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, which called for a major redeployment that would leave only a limited number of troops in Iraq to focus on counter-terror operations and securing the border
“I have carefully studied the Iraq situation, and believe we cannot continue asking our troops to sacrifice indefinitely while the Iraqi government is not making measurable progress to move its country forward,” Domenici said. “I do not support an immediate withdrawal from Iraq or a reduction in funding for our troops. But I do support a new strategy that will move our troops out of combat operations and on the path to coming home.”
Domenici’s defection is the latest from a growing number of senior Senate Republicans who have decided to oppose the White House’s preferred plan of waiting for a mid-September progress report on the effectiveness of Bush’s “surge” plan of boosting the U.S. deployment in Iraq this year by tens of thousands of troops.
But the Republicans in general are in a dilemma when it comes to GWB. Those who are breaking with him are in effect saying they’re breaking with him but they’ll work with and trust Bush to eventually change course.
Yet, there is little indication that this President will change course — no matter what opinion polls, Republicans, former members of the first George Bush’s administration or even members of the military want. Bush’s whole modus operandi — evident in the Scooter Libby affair — is to make a decision and do it his way. Even if he has stated the opposite earlier, when he makes a decision it’s what he wants to do and consensus, other political parties and political polls don’t make any difference to him.
So the outlook is for the Republican Party to continue to be dragged down by the war in Iraq, unless there is some history-making, authentic (versus spin) turnaround in the war’s progress. Those who wait for Bush to dramatically change course and work with them may have a long wait (unless Dick Cheney decides to change course).
The only viable outcome? If enough Republicans, motivated by genuine doubts plus perhaps political self-preservation, join with Congressional Democrats to use whatever legislative tools they can to force a change in policy. But so far the Democrats don’t have the majority or political muscle (and some say the political will) to do that.
The realistic outcome is that by the fall Bush has fewer Republicans supporting his policy and his poll numbers stay in the basement or go sub-basement. But there’s no indication Bush or his administration would care about Congressional or public sentiment even then.
Only one opinion counts — and he won’t be gone until 2009.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.