Pelosi and Reid Aren't Gonna Wait For September

Why wait for another pack of lies?

Dems to confront Bush again on Iraq pullout

Pelosi, Reid say House and Senate will vote in July --
won't wait for report on surge

Edward Epstein, Chronicle Washington Bureau
Saturday, June 30, 2007

Washington -- Speaker Nancy Pelosi threw down a new gauntlet Friday before President Bush and Republicans in Congress, saying the House will vote in July on legislation to withdraw almost all American troops from Iraq by April.

In the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said there also will be votes on the future course of the Iraq war next month, although he said he is consulting with other top Democrats on exactly what the legislation might entail.

The statements by Congress' top two Democrats mean that the renewed confrontation with Bush over Iraq won't wait until September, when the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Baghdad, are scheduled to issue a report on how the surge of American troops has worked to quell sectarian violence in the Iraqi capital and other cities.

Pelosi and Reid, talking to reporters in the Capitol as Congress left town for its weeklong July Fourth break, made it clear that they want to pressure Republican members on their continued support for the war. They think a major break in GOP support for Bush is possible, after statements this week by senior Republican Sens. Richard Lugar of Indiana and George Voinovich of Ohio, who said Bush's strategy isn't working and called on him to start withdrawing the 160,000 U.S. forces in Iraq.

"We will put everyone on record,'' Pelosi said. "We're encouraged by the public demand for this. Hopefully, it will be heard by the president and the Republicans in Congress. I see some signs that that is happening."

The Democratic leaders recognize their July efforts could end the same way as last spring's showdown with the president over a withdrawal plan for the war, now in its fifth year at a cost of more than 3,500 American lives and an estimated $500 billion.

Bush vetoed the withdrawal plan, and Republicans stood solidly behind him in the narrowly divided Congress, blocking the needed two-thirds margin in both houses to override a veto.
Democrats eventually passed, and Bush signed, a bill providing about $96 billion to pay for the Iraq war through the end of the federal fiscal year on Sept. 30 -- with no provision to withdraw troops.

Criticism from their own base rained down on the Democratic leaders for giving in, but Pelosi and Reid say they will try again and again, hoping for Republican defections or the election next year of an anti-war Democratic president and Democratic Congress.

"The American public is sending the message to their representatives that we need to change direction in Iraq,'' Pelosi's top deputy, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said. "The American public sees the current direction is not working.''

The Democrats admit that public frustration with the continuing war in Iraq has hurt their popularity after six months in control of Congress, especially after they campaigned on a platform that promised a new direction in Iraq policy.

The new withdrawal legislation in the House would require a troop pullout beginning within 120 days of enactment and completed by April, Hoyer said. It may be a stand-alone bill, meaning it could be considered separately from military appropriations legislation. Democrats also may offer other proposals seeking to wind down U.S. involvement.

The only troops that would be allowed to stay in Iraq would be those needed to directly combat al Qaeda, train Iraqi forces and protect the U.S. Embassy complex in Baghdad.

The Senate's vehicle for any proposals will be the fiscal 2008 military authorization bill, which Reid said Friday will be taken up when the Senate returns July 9.

"We're hoping Republicans will want to join us,'' said Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, who heads the Democrats' 2008 campaign effort to keep their newly won House majority.

Some Republican leaders, even after the statements by Lugar and Voinovich, are appealing to Congress to give the surge strategy more time.

"I've believed all spring and I continue to believe that we ought to allow General Petraeus the opportunity to succeed,'' House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said this week. "Now, he has a plan in place. He's had his full reinforcement of troops only about two or three weeks.''
Boehner added, "At the end of the day, making sure that we have a secure Iraq is in the best interest of all Americans, and for that matter, the rest of the world, because losing in Iraq will allow al Qaeda and their like-minded souls around the country to expand, to increase their ranks.''

His deputy, House Minority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., said he doesn't see a major fissure in House GOP ranks, at least not yet.

"I believe our members will largely reserve their decision on what needs to happen in Iraq until September. I believe that's a reasonable position to take,'' Blunt said.

E-mail Edward Epstein at eepstein@sfchronicle.com.
This article appeared on page A - 8 of the San Francisco Chronicle

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