Can The Congress End The War By Not Funding It?

By Big Tent Democrat, Section War In Iraq
Posted on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 09:34:08 AM EST
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The conservative Republican site Red State says:

Indeed, it has been conceded from the outset that Congress has the power to bring the war to an end by stopping all funding. And if [NYTimes Editorial writer] Adam Cohen had been paying attention, he might have noticed that ever since the beginning of the 110th Congress, Republicans--including those found in the Bush Administration--have been daring Democrats to bring an end to the war by stopping all funding if they believe so strongly that the war and America's continued presence in Iraq is a mistake.

President Bush has said the same thing. John Yoo says the same thing. Bruce Fein says the same thing. This appears to be a settled question in the political debate.

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Can The Congress End The War By Not Funding It? | 29 comments (29 topical)

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I snagged most of this from (5.00 / 1) (#1)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 09:40:23 AM EST

Kos' groundhog day post today, the rest from the yahoo news link.

BAGHDAD - A revised U.S. military plan envisions establishing security at the local level in Baghdad and elsewhere in Iraq by summer 2008, leading one year later to security conditions nationwide that Iraqi forces are capable of sustaining, U.S. officials said Tuesday.
Known as the Joint Campaign Plan, developed in tandem by Gen. David Petraeus and his political counterpart in Baghdad, Ambassador Ryan Crocker, it reflects a timetable starkly at odds with the push by many in Congress to wind down U.S. involvement in a matter of months.

I can't remember what we called this plan last year, do you?

Oh Yeah, How could I forget (5.00 / 1) (#2)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 09:47:16 AM EST

Published: June 25, 2006 per Michael Gordon New York Times

WASHINGTON The top American commander in Iraq has drafted a plan that projects sharp reductions in the United States military presence there by the end of 2007, with the first cuts coming this September, American officials say.
According to a classified briefing at the Pentagon this week by the commander, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the number of American combat brigades in Iraq is projected to decrease to 5 or 6 from the current level of 14 by December 2007.
Under the plan, the first reductions would involve two combat brigades that would rotate out of Iraq in September without being replaced. Military officials do not typically characterize reductions by total troop numbers, but rather by brigades. Combat brigades, which generally have about 3,500 troops, do not make up the bulk of the 127,000-member American force in Iraq, and other kinds of units would not be pulled out as quickly.

It was THE plan.


And cows fly (5.00 / 2) (#5)
by koshembos on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 12:07:26 PM EST

If the military is incompetent enough to believe that they can do it, then they can refight Vietnam and win it. Once at it, they can also declare the earth flat, abortion technically impossible and, of course, Bush the best president ever.

How many insurgencies do we need to watch for this bunch of political generals to learn that defeating insurgencies is impossible.


: Sadly it doesn't matter what the military (5.00 / 1) (#7)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 12:18:14 PM EST

believes that counts, only the commanders. About 60 to 70% of soldiers polled want out of Iraq too but it isn't their say.

As I've always said (5.00 / 1) (#3)
by Dadler on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 11:33:27 AM EST

The Democrats are simply afraid. Afraid of suffering the slings and arrows. Afraid of taking the heat. Afraid of genuinely leading. Afraid of the reality that they entirely lack imagination, thus rendering them incapable of responding passionately and effectively to Republican smears and lies and illogic.

Cowards.

I agree (none / 0) (#4)
by Slado on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 11:38:25 AM EST

The democrats are double bad in my book.

The call the war lost, a war crime, a mistake, blah blah blah but they in action are as unlikely to stop it as the republicans that are still behind it.

I can only believe that they are either wimps or actually don't care about the war just the ability to use it as a talking point.


I'm an idependent now and I say (5.00 / 3) (#6)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 12:15:46 PM EST

The military objective in Iraq has been attained and time for the military to come home. The war was a crime that will never find justice because BushCo manipulated a very emotional America after 9/11 into it. The Iraq War is hands down the largest military foreign policy fiasco America has ever produced and the sooner we move to producing something else the better.


Really? (none / 0) (#10)
by Slado on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 01:49:02 PM EST

You don't think Vietnam was a bigger fiasco?

You don't think allowing the Japanese to bomb Pearl Harbor was a bigger fiasco?

You don't think the North's strategy with Lee before Gettysburg and then Lee's decisions to charge at Gettysburg where bigger fiasco's then Iraq in terms of wasted lives?

This is no where close to our militaries biggest fiasco.


No I don't think Vietnam was (5.00 / 1) (#14)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 04:19:46 PM EST

a bigger military foreign policy fiasco, we still thought we could spread democracy and it took Vietnam to teach America that democracy cannot be delivered via an M-16. We paid dearly though and should have. That is what makes Iraq so HORRIBLE! How is the bombing of Pearl Harbor a bigger military foreign policy fiasco even remotely? As for the North and South fighting......that war is still going on as far as I know down here. And I said military foreign policy fiasco.


Let's have some (none / 0) (#15)
by Slado on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 05:30:22 PM EST

perspective.

Our loss in Vietnam nutured our influence around the world, let Jimmy Carter get elected which allowed several foreign policies fiasco's and 58,000 men where killed.

Iraq is one month of Vietnam.

It's not pretty but calling it something it's not makes you look silly IMHO.


: Since Hindsight is 20/20 (5.00 / 1) (#16)
by squeaky on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 05:33:37 PM EST

and

Iraq is one month of Vietnam.
It is clearly time to leave. Good argument. Learn from our past mistakes.

: Sometimes I can't believe the (5.00 / 1) (#21)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:00:02 PM EST

B.S. that people claim they tell and sell themselves. Since violating people so willfully and malignantly equals good and positive things has anybody with any sort of psych degree suggested you are a serial anything?

No, Slado (none / 0) (#28)
by Dadler on Wed Jul 25, 2007 at 11:22:27 AM EST

In this day and age -- with the lessons we SHOULD have learned, with the imagination we SHOULD have developed through those historical lessons -- that this murderous fiasco happened at all makes in the worst and the most inexcusable. WWII would've happened, Pearl Harbor or No. The Civil War would've happened, Lee's strategy at Gettysburg or no. Iraq would not have occurred were it not for OUR immoral and just plain old f*cking stupid decision to invade. We were on the side of right in WWII. The North was on the side of right (albeit in the context of the mid 19th century) in the Civil War. We long ago proved ourselves on the side of wrong in Iraq. Needless violence and war profiteering. These are what we sided with in Iraq. Period. We can yap about lofty goals, but we never had any plan or real intent to bring those goals to fruition. In the context of early 21st century history, our debacle in Iraq is unrivaled.


If you can't see... (none / 0) (#29)
by Dadler on Wed Jul 25, 2007 at 11:35:17 AM EST

...the Republican Party as the bully it is, with the Democratic Party as the bullied, then I can't help you. The dynamic between the parties has been a constant for more than half a century.

The Democratic Party still has not developed the institutional gonads necessary to do to today's warmongers what Army counsel Joeseph Welch did to Sen. Joe McCarthy in 1954.

"Have you no sense of decency, sir?"


Or.... (none / 0) (#19)
by kdog on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 08:54:10 PM EST

they have just been plain old fashioned bought, and play the opposition in an attempt to get the big seat and a bigger slice.


Add.... (5.00 / 2) (#20)
by kdog on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 08:57:27 PM EST

or it's just a strange coincidence that the guys who pledge to bring the troops home tomorrow and re-think foreign policy (Kucinich, Gravel, Paul) are the ones with no money.


I think it is something more (none / 0) (#22)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:17:18 PM EST

I truly think there is more to the mystery, for some reason such men and women who tell so much truth all at once are perceived as weak by the tribe. I would argue that they aren't, that they are far stronger than the rest of us to pack around so much readily available truth. The human tribe seems to have a hard time digesting so much truth though all at once unless Hitler is invading all the countries around you and bombing you.


Freedom's (5.00 / 1) (#23)
by Edger on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:25:20 PM EST

just another word for nothing left to lose?


Amen (none / 0) (#24)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:29:50 PM EST

Freedom to know the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help you God ;)


And have (5.00 / 1) (#25)
by Edger on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:35:31 PM EST

no obligations to people who benefit by you not being truthful.

IOW, people who sell their souls usually get paid with something equally worthless....


I think they do too Edger (5.00 / 1) (#26)
by Militarytracy on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:45:11 PM EST

They come with the game though, that I don't know what to do with and it must be part of the lessons we are to learn or there wouldn't be so damned many of them ;) I willfully submit to a new way dealing with them via BTD, they are vessels, I have a wheel and throw pots sometimes and I think about it that way......figure out to make them into what we need, use that. They use us, we use them, same as it ever was. It seems to serve me better at this place I'm in, usually much saner now ;)


: All we can do is try our best I guess. (5.00 / 1) (#27)
by Edger on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 10:49:00 PM EST

Probably bound to get trapped occasionally... so we learn what the traps are?

Hah! (none / 0) (#8)
by chemoelectric on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 12:43:03 PM EST

Read late entry of Glenn Greenwald's blog.

Now see from this why one should not cite John Yoo as evidence of 'settled political debate', unless wanting to portray desperation. If someone brings up that Yoo has said something, the correct response is 'What John Yoo says is garbage and I would never cite it to defend my point'.

The same thing goes (to a lesser degree) for George W. Bush, who told citizens explicitly that he wasn't allowed to spy on them without a warrant, so they shouldn't worry.

: Interestingly (5.00 / 3) (#9)
by Big Tent Democrat on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 01:18:23 PM EST

your comment is obtuse. As in EVEN the recidivistly intellectually dishonest John Yooo said about THIS war, and THIS President and THIS Congress that the Congress can defund the war.
You really are bad at this.

They can. (none / 0) (#11)
by Edger on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 02:07:32 PM EST

And they probably would. If they saw any political cost to not ending it.

So far they don't.

That was quite evident during last (5.00 / 1) (#12)
by oculus on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 02:23:28 PM EST

night's debate, exceed as to Kucinich and Dodd.


Dodd too, yes. (none / 0) (#13)
by Edger on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 02:37:47 PM EST

My bad. I forgot to mention him yesterday, when I said that my own opinion is that Dennis Kucinich and Armando Llorens are the two people I know of who make the most sense re Iraq.

Dodd too.

Add you and me and MT and Squeaky and Dadler and a few others here and there are probably at least 10 maybe 20 of us.

We'll get this done yet. We've got them outnumbered. They haven't got a chance. ;-)


The other candidates didn't look or sound (none / 0) (#17)
by oculus on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 06:52:21 PM EST

the least bit worried about what we think. Hope they will respond to mcjoan at YearlyKos though.


: Maybe that will start to change (none / 0) (#18)
by Edger on Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 07:22:13 PM EST

when they realize that they will be asking for votes next year from people whose sons or daughters or wives or husbands or neighbors will die in Iraq over the next 14 months who will respond with questions like:
"You had the power to do it. Why didn't you end the occupation of Iraq last year?"