Strategic Drift

Today's Sacramento Bee has an op-ed piece wrtten by John Podesta, Lawrence J. Korb and Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress Action Fund which points out the failure of the Democratic led 110th Congress to meaningfully confront the White House on the issue of the Iraq War.

With apparent disregard for the opinion of the American people, the debate over whether the large U.S. military presence in Iraq threatens our national security has been put on hold. Both political parties seem resigned to allowing the Bush administration to run out the clock on its Iraq strategy and bequeath this quagmire to the next president. ...

Strategic drift is being aided by many in the legislative and executive branches (in both political parties), most of the foreign policy elite and several policy research institutions. Conservatives continue to align themselves with Bush's Iraq strategy; some have offered muted criticisms of the implementation and handling of the war, but there has been no call to change direction.

Progressives must be careful not to repeat the mistakes made in 2002 and 2004, when they failed to offer a clear challenge or choice on Iraq. Splitting the difference and hedging on positions helped get America into this quagmire. But during the Democratic presidential debate in Philadelphia last month, Iran, not Iraq, was at the forefront. Iraq is the issue of greatest concern to voters.

Progressive candidates should be offering clarity on Iraq and pushing for a real change in course. [Emphasis added]

Yesterday, the Senate failed to pass a bill that would have tied funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to timed withdrawals of US troops in Iraq. Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader, now indicates that any bill to fund the wars will have to come up next year, thereby forcing the Pentagon to pay those bills out of its enormous Defense Department budget rather than through the special appropriations bills Congress has so willingly gone along with. While that looks like a reasonable tactic to force the issue in the face of not having enough votes to do more, Mr. Reid has made such promises before on this issues, yet he has caved each and every time to give President Bush what he wants, even though it is abundantly clear that the American public wants this war ended.

Why the constant capitulation?

Probably the most important reason is that the Democrats are still allowing the Republicans frame the issues. For some reason, the war in Iraq is still being talked about in terms of "national security." If we don't "win" the terrorists will have won. If we pull out precipitously, the terrorists will follow us home and strike again. We won't be safe. In the real world, terrorists are gaining sympathy across the Middle East because we illegally invaded and continue to occupy Iraq. Our remaining is what fuels that fire. Yet few Democrats either in Congress or on the campaign trail bother to debunk the GOP argument lest he or she be accused being (gasp!) soft on security. There is, after all, an election coming up in less than a year.

And that leads right into the second reason, the election. The last election showed just how deeply disgusted the American people are with the war and all of its ramifications. Polls today show that little has changed in that regard except that the disgust is deepening. Are Democrats paying attention to these polls? No, instead, they are listening to the Sunday Morning bobble heads and the blast fax talking-points emerging from the White House. If it isn't happening inside the Beltway, then it apparently isn't happening. Period.

As a result, it looks like we're going to have another year of "strategic drift" when it comes to Iraq and what it is doing to our security, our economy, our standing in the world. More people will die, but somebody will win an election.

Shameful.