Harry Reid announced that he’ll allow a vote this week on the Feingold-Reid amendment, which would cut off funding for the war by March 31, 2008:
This is a big deal for war opponents — it’s the first vote in the Senate on a measure of this kind. “This is a vote that folks have been clamoring for for some time now,” enthuses a staffer who works for a Senator favoring the approach.
As McQ points out, “this is the only constitutional way the Congress has of actually stopping the war”.
But Liberal heavyweight blogger Atrios points out the exact reason that it will fail:
I imagine there’s a pretty close correlation between those who regularly prattle on about Democrats needing to stand for things and show strong leadership, yadda yadda, and those who aren’t too thrilled that they’ll have to actually take a stand.
Yep.
When it actually comes down to standing up and being held accountable for what they believe in, the Democrats will fold. Again.
How pathetic is the Democrats conviction in the amendment? That they won’t even let it stand on it’s own as a bill. Instead, Harry Reid has attached it to the Water Resources Development Act Reauthorization.
I wish I were making that up. But I’m not.
As Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) weighs in:
“We should have a straight up or down vote on Feingold-Reid – not as an amendment to a water bill or any other bill.
This is the most important Senate debate since the original vote to authorize the war. This simply cannot be the occasion for hiding behind procedural tactics.
Ok. So at least there’s one Democrat with some semblance of honesty and integrity.
Harry Reid has attached it to the Water Resources Development Act Reauthorization.
That is strictly for “plausible deniability”. If, in a future campaign, an opponent accuses them of either voting for or against defunding the war, they can claim that they were actually casting their vote based upon the Water bill, it really wasn’t about that silly amendment that was sure to be vetoed by the President anyway.
This is a win-win for the Democrats. The ones from the most Moon-batty districts can vote for the measure. The ones from more moderate districts that don’t support outright surrender can vote against it. Even if it passes the House and Senate (which it won’t, but even if, by some fluke, it did) Bush would veto it so, no harm no foul as far as the Dems are concerned. Not only that, but their signaling that we as a nation don’t have the backbone to see this through strengthens the resolve of our enemies and keeps them fighting which gives the Dems further fodder for decrying “Bush’s war”.
They simply cannot lose in this game.