Dems Surrender Again
But in a good way.
WASHINGTON, May 22 — Congressional Democrats relented today on their insistence that a war spending measure sought by President Bush also set a date for withdrawing troops from Iraq. The decision to back down, described by senior lawmakers and aides, was a wrenching reversal for some Democrats, who saw their election triumph as a call to force an end to the war. A Democratic effort to include timelines prompted Mr. Bush’s veto of the original bill last month, producing a political impasse.
“We don’t have a veto-proof Congress,” said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader.
[...]
The concession to the president was proving so difficult for the Democratic leadership that by this afternoon, the lawmakers had not yet publicly acknowledged that the timelines would disappear. House Democrats were preparing to advance two separate measures, to enable antiwar lawmakers to support popular domestic spending but not the money for the war. House Democrats were to review the proposal later this evening, but lawmakers were already predicting that many would not support the war spending.
Well, they finally did something right. They were playing politics with our military's lives. Their little game already set things back in Iraq. The military had to pull troops off training the Iraqi police and military in order to conserve money. Then in a few months those same surrender-monkey Democrats will be boasting about how the Iraqi forces had met training guidelines.
