Thursday, May 17, 2007
The Democrats oppose military planning?
Power Line makes a rather good point:
One of the Democrats' frequent talking points about Iraq is that the administration failed to plan the mission there adequately. It is ironic, then, that nearly all of the Democrats in the House of Representatives have voted to bar the administration from planning for the contingency of hostilities with Iran.
The bill in question is really quite astonishing:
An amendment to the defense authorization bill, introduced by Rep. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.), a member of the armed services panel, failed Wednesday night by a vote of 216-202 with six Republicans voting in favor of the amendment together with 196 Democrats.
Andrews’ amendment, which had strong support from House Armed Services Committee chairman Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), would have prevented funds authorized in the bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from being used to plan a contingency operation in Iran.
So, 84% of the Democrats in the House of Representatives (and, I'm sad to say, almost 10% of Republicans) voted to ban the United States government from planning a military action against Iran. This is unwise to the point of recklessness. First, there are all kinds of circumstances under which we might have to retaliate against Iran. If we cannot plan an attack on Iran, how can we plan a retaliation? We have plans to invade or retaliate against some huge percentage of the countries on the planet, but 84% of the Democrats want to ban even contingency planning for a conflict with Iran.
Worse, the supporters of this bill -- who generally complain that the Bush administration has not followed the recommendation of the Iraq Study Group to "negotiate" with Iran -- would make it impossible to, er, negotiate with Iran. Why would Iran, a country that has endured thirty years of economic deprivation in the cause of its foreign policy, concede anything material in any negotiation with the United States if it knows that the consequences of building an atomic bomb, declaring unending war against Israel, and running proxy wars in Iraq and Lebanon were... nothing? Had this bill passed it would have destroyed the one method for confronting Iran that even most Democrats purport to support.
The Democrats had better hope that the voters really have decided that there are no meaningful foreign threats. Otherwise, they will be in real trouble in 2008.
CWCID: Glenn Reynolds.
6 Comments:
By 
, at
Thu May 17, 11:24:00 PM:
It doesn't matter. Bush's plan to import 20 million new Democratic voters from Mexico makes anything moot.
Welcome to the border-less United States, home of free welfare to the world. Heck Iranians could walk over the border and become citizens.
By 
Unknown, at
Thu May 17, 11:45:00 PM:
A classic example of the most childish of behavior: "If we can't think about it, it can't happen--and so we will be safe." Just because Iran's mullahs what to "wipe out" Israel doesn't mean they want to harm us, right?
And yet there is a 50/50 chance that our country will be lead by these childlike fools after 2008. Until the next, and assuredly much more horrible, 9/11.
By Gordon Smith, at
Fri May 18, 08:00:00 AM:
I think the premise quoted from Powerwank is ridiculous.
Bush planned to go to war with Iraq since before 9/11 and his planning was woefully inadequate, inflexible, and incompetent.
You don't think the DoD is drawing up plans for Iran contingencies? Nonsense.
This is a silly post along the lines of "Dems will leave our troops without bullets or food!"
Stop that.
By Tom the Redhunter, at
Fri May 18, 08:37:00 AM:
"Screwy" is an appropriate moniker for you, considering your comment.
Try making sense next time.
By Dawnfire82, at
Fri May 18, 10:25:00 AM:
"You don't think the DoD is drawing up plans for Iran contingencies? Nonsense.""
Of course I do. But had this passed, they would have stopped.
And 84% of the Democrats voted for it.
It doesn't take a genius to make the link.
By Gordon Smith, at
Fri May 18, 01:43:00 PM:
Wrong.
The bill would have prevented monies designated for Iraq and Afghanistand from going towards Iran contingency planning.
There's quite a few more hundreds of billions of dollars for feeding the contigency planners and moving them along. Let's just hope they're not the same guys who planned the Iraq invasion.
