SubscribeHouse Passes Yet Another Iraq Surrender Bill
From the DNC’s Associated Press:
House passes $50B Iraq withdrawal bill
By ANNE FLAHERTY, Associated Press Writer Thu Nov 15
WASHINGTON - House Democrats pushed through a $50 billion bill for the Iraq war Wednesday night that would require President Bush to start bringing troops home in coming weeks with a goal of ending combat by December 2008.
The legislation, passed 218-203, was largely a symbolic jab at Bush, who already has begun reducing force levels but opposes a congressionally mandated timetable on the war. And while the measure was unlikely to pass in the Senate — let alone overcome a presidential veto — Democrats said they wanted voters to know they weren’t giving up.
“The fact is, we can no longer sustain the military deployment in Iraq,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. “Staying there in the manner that we are there is no longer an option.”
The White House pledged to veto the bill, and Republicans said they would back the president.
“These votes, like the dozens of previous failed votes, put the interests of radical interest groups ahead of the needs of our military and their mission,” an administration statement said.
The bill represents about a quarter of the $196 billion Bush requested for combat operations in the 2008 budget year, which began Oct 1.
It would compel an unspecified number of troops to leave Iraq within 30 days, a requirement Bush is already on track to meet as he begins in coming weeks to reverse the 30,000 troop buildup he ordered earlier this year. It also sets a goal of ending combat by Dec. 15, 2008, and states that money included in the bill should be used to redeploy troops and “not to extend or prolong the war.”
The measure also would set government-wide standards on interrogation, effectively barring the CIA from using such harsh techniques as waterboarding, which simulates drowning…
The bill’s prospects brightened somewhat after three leading anti-war Democrats announced they would support it. California Reps. Lynn Woolsey, Barbara Lee and Maxine Waters said they had agreed to swing behind it because the bill explicitly states the money should be used to bring troops home…
Fifteen Democrats broke ranks and joined 188 Republicans in opposing the measure. Four Republicans joined 214 Democrats in supporting it…
In another provision that drew White House opposition, the House bill would require that all government interrogators rely on the Army Field Manual. The manual is based on Geneva Convention standards and was updated in 2006 to specifically prohibit the military from using aggressive interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding.
The White House said in its statement that the Geneva Conventions shouldn’t apply to “captured terrorists who openly flout that law.”
The bill also would require the president to certify to Congress 15 days in advance that a unit being sent into combat is “fully mission capable,” although Bush could waive that requirement if necessary.
It looks like this sentence got garbled:
Democrats said they wanted voters to know they weren’t giving up…
Clearly the Democrats want the voters and terrorists to know that they have in fact given up, and that they are also trying to make Bush and our military give up.
Too bad they can’t.
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10 Responses to “House Passes Yet Another Iraq Surrender Bill”
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November 15th, 2007 at 11:52 am
“…The measure also would set government-wide standards on interrogation, effectively barring the CIA from using such harsh techniques as waterboarding, which simulates drowning…”
Never have a bigger bunch of idiots been assembled in one place. In fact, if stupidity had critical mass, DC would have blown itself to pieces long ago. I feel like I’ve been shackled to a hurtling death machine.
November 15th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
Amen, WB.
Luhve that photo, SG.
November 15th, 2007 at 12:57 pm
Actually, Helena, that photo was taken whilst they were celebrating the introduction of Rangel’s “Mother Of All Tax Increases.”
But it’s close enough for government workers. And it certainly captures the sentiment.
November 15th, 2007 at 1:05 pm
Congress has no War Powers other than to fund or not fund War. The rest is an attempt to cut and run, create defeat (actually snatch defeat from the jaws of victory) and an un-Constitutional attempt to wrest War Powers from the President.
In addition they are wasting tax payers time and money - without accomplishing a damn thing.
If healthcare, soc sec, education, poverty, glowball warning et al - are so damn important - why aren’t they working on those instead of putting forth voted down (ok - 2 got through the House) and vetoed symbolic bills?
Talk about government corruption, a lack of ethics in government, a non-partisan cooperative government and a utter and complete waste of tax payer money.
Term Limits - it will go a long way toward stopping these leeches on the American taxpayers.
November 15th, 2007 at 6:42 pm
YOU JUST CAN’T MAKE THIS STUFF UP.
I HAVEN’T BEEN TO WASHINGTON IN A COUPLE YEARS, BUT CAN SOMEONE CHECK OUT IF THOSE SHORT LITTLE SCHOOL BUSES DROP TAKES THESE GUYS TO CONGRESS CAUSE I THINK MAYBE OUR RULING CLASS ARE A BUNCH OF RETARDS (NO OFFENSE TO RETARDS).
November 15th, 2007 at 11:28 pm
RB: No, they don’t take the “short bus” to work in the mornings….but they do take the underground special tram to work.
Same difference.
I lost respect for those elected officials in DC many, many years ago…but they’ve really made me nauseous these past 6 years. Retards, indeed. They are beyond retarded….way beyond that.
November 16th, 2007 at 1:03 am
Help me my head is exploding !!!
I really hate that history recycles stuff but –
Withdrawal from Vietnam (a still contested fight turning our way) was not catastrophic to our national security because the N. Vietnamese had neither intention nor ability to exploit our pull-out by pursuing us to our mainland. The consequences were paid by the peoples we left behind and by the US military and its service members and families.
Recent developments prior to and including the surge show our military service members have turned the corner in Iraq. But they are faced with having the carpet pulled from under their feet (knife in the back, betrayed, call it what you want) by the unrelenting political battle from within their own government to leave the fight before it is through. Leave defeated without having been defeated! The shockwaves from this patricidal political decision could make Vietnam or the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan look insignificant. Again the people in the region would pay.
And there the recycle/repeat probably ends. Like the old service adage says: the enemy has a vote. This enemy (AQ, Iran and allies) has the intention, ability and prior success in pursuing and attacking us on our own soil. All the Homeland security measures we have take so far are not going to stop them. The Europeans will really feel the full effect as they could become the next principle “theatre” for the Jihad to focus on.
And since I’m ranting -Would someone find some gonads up at the top and call out Pelosi, Reid and the rest of the Neville Chamberlain wannabes – in front of the entire nation- and make them explain why our enemies are going to stop fighting because we start turning tail? And precisely how are these strategic policy geniuses going to take responsibility for failure of this policy should this not in fact “end the war”??? Ok, now I’m delirious.
Still, someone needs to get them on the record in a very public statement on those points because right now Iraq is our best hope to stop the advance of this wave of Jihad. We fail or cut and run and it will not just be the US military paying for the failure, but Americans for generations will curse and wonder what twisted delusional political leaders believed that this Islamo fascism was rational, reasonable and wants peace?
Ask a liberal just how he would react if a real WMD attack occurred here and he/she lost children, parents, relatives or friends – after we “ended the war” – you get a blank look and then some agitprop bs. They get hostile to me for proposing such a situation, not toward the (not so) hypothetical attackers (proof that Darwin still needed more work on that whole survival of the fittest thing). They need an introductory screening of Beheadings 101. How quickly they have forgotten Nicholas Berg or Dan Pearl?
I don’t believe the fanatics or the mullahs can take us out – but they can and will, given half a chance take us down – to a level that makes it all the easier for other, bigger, ambitious entities to nail us.
Iraq is 1389 (first battle of Kosovo) not 1683(battle of Vienna). The point is to stop the wave at the beginning not at the zenith. It can get a lot more painful from here if we “end the war”. Jihads are measured in decades and centuries.
Ok –my head is still attached to body for now – but regrettably I am currently stuck here near the epicenter of this lunacy – the SF Bay area (Wally World).
So my head is exploding.
November 16th, 2007 at 1:13 am
Selfish, self serving, don’t give a damn about us…. that is the majority of all politicians. Some, I believe, actually go in with a good value system and want to make positive changes, but it becomes such a hassle for them that they start slipping towards the dark side. Anyone ever heard of a senator or a congressman, or other politician who leaves office poor? Maybe, just maybe, one of the ones who get caught in criminal activity, but then, I even doubt that. I’m sure they’ve got money squirreled away somewhere.
I realize that in order to run for office, you also have to have money. Maybe it’s just a vicious circle.
On values: I once worked for a DA Civilian, retired LTC, artillery. A contractor came in to give him a presentation on some product they had they wanted us to procure as a training device. Good device, but not our decision to purchase or not. When my boss explained this to him the guy puts a briefcase on the table and pushes it across to my boss saying “Take this, maybe this will change your mind”. By boss was about 5′8″ and couldn’t have weighed more than 140 lbs, and was pushing 60 years old, but he dragged the dude out of the chair and out the door.
Is it a sign of old age when I keep posting old memories?
November 16th, 2007 at 1:37 am
“It looks like this sentence got garbled: Democrats said they wanted voters to know they weren’t giving up…”
Replace “voter” with “Terrorist” and thats the message Democrats want to send out, just they can’t say it publicly because that would be their chances in 08 going up in flames.
Hang in there AQI, Pelosi and Reid know you’re catching it from the US Military, but they’re doing their best to shaft them and give you victory, if it hadn’t been for that damn surge…
November 16th, 2007 at 12:35 pm
PJ O’Rourke once said that in America we had a place where we could put such people in a place where they couldn’t hurt anything of real importance - he called it Washington.
But we weren’t in a war & the fight of our lives.
Maybe in a thousand years, this class will be those trogs in HG Wells Time Machine. When ever the whistle blows, we send them a couple sacrifices.
Hey, wait a minute, that’s already happening, except the whistle is CSpan.