WASHINGTON – In a debate that echoed the divisive rhetoric of the Vietnam era, Senate Republicans stood behind their weakened president on the Iraq war Thursday and killed two Democratic troop-withdrawal amendments while accusing their supporters of favoring a policy of “retreat” and “cut and run.”
With the midterm congressional elections a little more than four months away, GOP senators found comfort in stressing unity and staying the course over a bloody conflict that has undermined President Bush’s popularity and called into question Republican control over Congress.
From Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., to John McCain, R-Ariz., presidential hopefuls in the chamber marched to the microphone to spell out their positions on the war, and the Senate floor took on the air of a national political debate over the No. 1 issue facing Americans.
If nothing else, the debate clarified the issues and the political, military and economic stakes involved in a conflict now in its fourth year. The November election could be decisive in determining the war’s future course.
Democrats battled their own divisions as they sought to challenge Bush and Republicans on the war and win political points in the process, although these divisions are likely to be exploited by Republicans as the political campaign heats up. Even Illinois’ two Democratic senators, Dick Durbin and Barack Obama, did not see eye to eye on pulling out troops.
First, the Senate voted 86-13 against an amendment by Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Russ Feingold, D-Wis., both possible presidential contenders in 2008. It would have required that U.S. troops be withdrawn from Iraq by July 1, 2007, although some forces could remain longer for training purposes or if American lives are in danger. Durbin voted for and Obama voted against this plan.
Both Obama and Durbin, as well as most Democrats, supported an amendment by Sens. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and Jack Reed, D-R.I., calling on the president to submit a timetable for withdrawing troops by the end of this year. The Levin-Reed plan, which was non-binding, was rejected on a 60-39 vote, as six Democrats voted with the GOP. Sen. Lincoln Chafee, R-R.I., voted with the Democrats.
One notable Democratic opponent of troop withdrawals, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., sounded like many Republicans.
That was when he said the amendments would encourage terrorists, undermine the fledgling Iraqi government and possibly create conditions for a civil war.
The Senate majority leader, Republican Bill Frist of Tennessee, said Democrats favored “plans for surrender and cut and run. … Withdrawal is not an option. Surrender is not a solution.” In a CNN interview, Vice President Dick Cheney made the same points, saying, “The worst possible thing we could do now is what the Democrats are suggesting.”
Cheney added: “And no matter how you carve it, you can call it anything you want, but basically it is packing it in, going home, persuading and convincing and validating the theory that the Americans don’t have the stomach for this fight.”
The vice president and GOP senators cited recent successes in the formation of a new government in Iraq, the beefing up of Iraqi forces and the killing of al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
But Democrats criticized what they called the “open-ended” commitment in Iraq. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the situation in Iraq is growing worse, not better, and favored the phased withdrawal advocated by the Levin-Reed amendment. Reid, however, called it a “redeployment” rather than a pullout, which some Republicans ridiculed as soft-pedaling the Democratic approach.
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If troops leave Iraq, Reid said, they could be redeployed to handle other crises, such as in Afghanistan. He said the best way of supporting U.S. troops, as favored by the GOP, is to bring them home. And, he said, Democrats are more united than they appear. “Every Democrat agrees that the direction of the war in Iraq must change, and change now,” he said.
Clinton supported the Levin-Reed plan urging Bush to propose a timetable, which emerged as the party’s consensus position on the war for now, even though some members opposed it. Obama said he preferred the amendment over the Kerry-Feingold plan because it would leave some flexibility to keep U.S. forces in Iraq longer if that would help achieve stability.
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AP-NY-06-22-06 1928EDT
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