The continuous whine that "we don't have the votes" is also part of the big lie.

If the Democrats stand up NOW and announce that they will no longer fund the occupation and that there will be no more emergency supplementals introduced when the current one runs out, the situation will become one of NO votes needed to NOT pass a bill. The ball will be in Bush's court.

The Democrats have absolute power in this debate. What good is it and why should voters let them retain it next year if they are too weak kneed to use it to end the Debacle? If they will not, then by default they proclaim their complicity with Bush.

The argument that 'defunding endangers the troops' is utter bullsh*t and is completely and irrefutably debunked. Let the rethugs try to accuse Democrats of it. Democrats will win that political argument, but ONLY if they have the cohones to do what they know is the right thing.

As John Freelund wrote on May 27 at TPMCafe:

Pin Bush and Gates Down

At the next presidential press conference, I'd suggest question 1-5 be the following:

"Are you Mr. President, and Mr. Secretary, prepared to leave troops in Iraq without adequate supplies?"

Watch them squirm, watch them dance. They will not be able to say "yes." This is what the media and the Democrats should have been asking, over and over again, to frame this debate properly.

If the Democrats don't want to do the right thing... it becomes obvious that they want to continue the occupation.

One explanation for the weakness of the U.S. peace movement, often expressed by cynics about human nature, is that demagogues spouting patriotic propaganda easily hoodwink people.
...
Another explanation, expressed by Green Party supporters and assorted leftists, is that the Democratic Party is a sort of reactionary vampire that schemes, successfully, to drain the blood of the peace movement and other progressive forces. First it seduces them, and then it abandons them--or so the argument goes.

But this explanation begs the issue. After all, if the peace movement were strong enough, would the Democratic Party dare to abandon it?

An overwhelming majority of the American public wants the war in Iraq ended and the troops brought home now. If anyone believed the Democrats in Congress were going to end the fiasco without massive pressure from the peace movement, that illusion just flew out the window with the Democrats acquiescing in funding the war without even any deadlines for withdrawal. Whether one thinks of it as making more Democratic lawmakers afraid to anger the peace movement, or showing sympathetic Democrats that the peace movement can cover their backs when Republicans try to pin the disaster on any who vote to cut off funding, is of little practical importance. The overwhelming antiwar sentiment that already exists must be mobilized.

It has to be in the fall of 2007 because spring 2008 is too late. First, most Americans understand that every month that passes is more American and Iraqi lives lost for absolutely nothing. Second, the Democrats in Congress will face important choices in September, so that is when the pressure needs to be applied. And third, by spring 2008 too many supporters and activists in the peace movement will be drawn into primary campaigns. Unless we have made ourselves vocal and visible as an oppositional movement, the pressure to subordinate peace politics to the strategies of the candidates will be overwhelming.

How do they avoid a similar showdown such as they had with Bush this past go-round, wherein Bush successfully vetoed any partial funding?

It so happens that I believe the riskier political play for Democrats is NOT ending the war. But even if it did have negative electoral consequences, it would be worth it to end the war. For the good of the country.

The Iraqis Have A Word: "Sahel"

PERHAPS no fact is more revealing about Iraq's history than this: The Iraqis have a word that means to utterly defeat and humiliate someone by dragging his corpse through the streets.

The word is "sahel," and it helps explain much of what I have seen in three and a half years of covering the war.
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Listen to Iraqis engaged in the fight, and you realize they are far from exhausted by the war. Many say this is only the beginning.
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"No country in the world is fighting such terrorism," said Adel Abdul Mehdi, an Iraqi vice president and leader in the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, a powerful Shiite party, on the day he made his pilgrimage. "Every time we give more martyrs, we are more determined. This is a big battle, there is no such battle in the world."

The Shiites have waited centuries for their moment on the throne, and the war is something they are willing to tolerate as the price for taking power, said the Iraqi leader who had invited me to dinner in the Green Zone. "The Shia say this is not exceptional for them, this is normal," he said.

As for the last vote IMO if funding would have required two more votes I think both Clinton and Obama would have voted yes as their record shows they are willing to do so. That they had the luxury of voting last and making sure they were not hurting anyone they were able to vote no.

If anyone here thinks if the last bill would have passed it would have cut-off funds they are not paying attention - the bill would have been vetoed. And as Biden said after Bush vetoed it all that would have happened is that the funding would have came a few weeks later. And then as Biden explained that would have meant among other things that the building of the special armored Humvees would have been delayed which very likely would have cost some more lives by lack of their presence. That was part of his reasoning. Funding to provide armored vehicles is hardly Orwellian.

But the bottom line is their votes are votes for the continuation of Bush's Iraq Debacle.

That's one way to look at it. But  Biden, Webb and Tester's way is the right way to look at it. They are simply not going to deny money that is needed by the troops to protect themselves while they are still in Iraq. As I said here before Webb is the former Secretary Of The Navy. He understands better than any of us what the money means and why it is needed. If he says that the troops need it to protect themselves then they need it to protect themselves. End of story.

To keep fighting as they all are to stop this war while still keeping the best interests of the troops in the field at heart as long as they are there is responsible especially given that they would eventually have to be funded anyway. There is no need to hold up important items like armored Humvees just to try to make a point again.

One way or another this war will be ended as we know know it.

As Howard Dean said:

But there is one way to truly ensure we end this war.

Elect a Democratic president in 2008

And yes if you listen to the available audio he did put emphasis on the "truly" word.

Somewhere between that solution and political suicide there is the Veto Proof Majority to set a timeline. Which according to George Will's recent conversation with Repub Gordon Smith is a real possibility. According to Smith in Will's column:

Smith says, "a high expectation that we" -- Republican senators -- "will be able to vote for something different in September." And: "I can," he says, "think of a dozen Republican senators who will be with me in September."