Well now. From NRO’s Rich Lowry, an examination of reality-based nuance:
A Hill source forwards along these quotes:
Sen Harry Reid (D-NV) :
“…I don’t think anyone can find a war that this country was engaged in where the funds were cut off. No one is talking about cutting off the funds.”
Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) :
“I do not support cutting funding for American troops.”
Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) :
“We’re not going to cut off funding to the troops … no one wants to do that.”
Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) :
“I don’t know of any senator who would cut off funds for troops in the field.”
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) :
“I don’t think we should be pulling back any funds.”
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA):
“Yes, the congress could cut off the funds. But the congress will not do that because our men and women are in harm’s way.”
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) :
“U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson ( D-FL ) today made clear his intention to oppose measures he sees as possibly undermining U.S. troops, like cutting funds… […] Nelson said today he’ll oppose efforts to cut off funding.”
Predicted “progressive” responses, listed in no particular order:
1) I question the timing
2) Those quotes are clearly taken out of context
3) What, a serious thinker isn’t allowed to change his or her mind when the situation warrants it?
4) Bush lied, yada yada. So why can’t our guys? I mean, at least when they do it, it’s to save lives—not to kill upwards of 700 million orphans just because you want your daddy to love you / like oil / hate Al Gore (source: Lancet)
5) Dick Cheney shot a dude in the face. In the freaking face, man! And you’re worried about this?
6) So what? It’s politics. You think Republicans don’t flip flop all the time? Bush said he wasn’t for nation building. Remember that? You neofascist warmongering chickenhawk? ANSWER ME!
7) Look! Puppies!
8) I don’t know what you’re talking about. I can’t read “neocon.”
Add your own. I’m tired.
(h/t Instapundit)
9. They were EATING people in the Superdome!!!
10. Anna Nicole….DNA….$500 million….
11. I’m am offended by your swift-boating smears of my inconvenient truth about my tortured political posturings.
12. Look at the grouse!
9. Hey we’re liars. That’s what we do. Quit tryin’ to make a mountain out of a molehill already.
10. The truth and the Democratic party have been estranged for years now. I guess I don’t understand your credulous response.
TW: simple69 Get the fuck out of here!!!
Democratic opposition to the Iraq War is in its Last Throes!
Isn’t that true? Once Bush secures funding for the surge won’t it be pretty clearly the case that the question of the Iraq war would most judiciously be decided in the ‘08 election?
The early signs of surge success HAS placed Democrats in a panicky Last Throes mode, as these quotes demonstrate.
That was then. when the insurgency was in its “last throes.” Things change.
alf- I don’t understand. Did those people not say those things?
Yes or no?
As a side note, why not just introduce a line item into the bill to fund the troops that authorizes a payment of 50M directly to Feinstein’s husband.?
Just pay the man.
Knock off the charade.
tw: still43…… I wish
Are you saying Hillary is a Republican, alfi?
If Bush hadn’t been selected Resident 5-4, none of those quotes would have been spoken and no explanations would have been necessary.
Okinawa is nice this time of year.
You left out the most popular lefty response of them all: Fuck Bush!
I remember when Carl Levin was a respected Senator from Michigan.
Now he’s just another hack, putting politics above all.
We will be greeted as facilitators?
They will not cut off funds, they will reprogram the funds to higher priority national defense spinach and Harry Reid real estate needs. And for emergencies William Jefferson will be holding a lot of ready “cold cash”. And the troops will not run out of bullets, the will be “return fire challenged”. And they will not run out of food “they will be placed on strict diets to improve their health”.
Gotta learn to talk like a leftie, if you want to get ahead.
Hah – you called it Jeff…
Number 6?
(responding to Lady Sara at 1:02am)
We olde timey conservatives are already winners, Lew.
In a few weeks, we will be treated to the sight of some Pentagon welfare queen going before Congress to say that $600,000,000,000 a year just ain’t enough to station a few thousand troops in Baghdad for a few months.
When the giggling stops, Congress just might shut down the whole pork trough.
Well, more a combo of 6 and 8.
There isn’t a hundred GI’s in Iraq that wouldn’t rather die fighting than to suffer the ‘democrat’ cut and run defeat (we) Vietnam Vets have suffered. I only hope that if the democrats succeed in their surrender plans the GI’s that they betray turn into revenge seaking mad men upon their return and start hunting democrat politicians and they’re families like the coyotes they are. Season open year round. The courts can sentence you to death but most will die of old age (thanks to the democrats).
25. But, we didn’t know it would be sooooo expensive and that Nevada real estate doesn’t pay for itself you know. Wait, wait, I mean, at first.
How can this post be titled “The Kerry Effect” without:
“I actually voted for the $87 billion, before I voted against it.â€Â
Are you saying 600,000,000,000 ain’t a few thousand, alfi?
Are you questioning my patriotism? Well let me tell you sir, emphatically, that I, nor any Democratic senator, congressman, state legislator or voter would ever even CONSIDER holding any funds to support our troops’ lavish luxuries or the death camps they facilitate (that regularly torture children).
Did I mention they torture children?
“We,” it says. It is to laff.
But don’t you dare suggest that this particular “olde timey conservative” doesn’t support the troops.
13. Egad! Swiftboats have been sighted on the Potomac. And they’re bearing quotes! This has to be some kinda war crime!!
Q: Since Kerry once served on a swiftboat, and he presented largely false evidence in public testimony in the early 1970’s (for political gain and to smear others), shouldn’t he be considered to be the first ‘swiftboater’?
A. Surely the honour is too great?
14. Yeah, yeah, whatever. Where’s my district’s/state’s pork?
A blast from the past as Action Chimp© reaches back to his monkeyboy days and vomits the “military is just like welfare” carp.
Remember with “a”, it’s all about the money.
14. “Look, I’ve got like 78 gorgeous scarves in my rataan scarf basket that I haven’t used in about 40 years. And I’m not talking about cheap Jaqueline Smith Collection scarves either. Some of these are probably worth some money. My hair just doesn’t hold up like it did in the 60’s either.”
15. That was before Al won an oscar. We either fund global warming type stuff, or our troops. How many troops could get us a shot at Hollywood starlets? Duh! We have priorities to consider here!
16. No worries. Once the troops are defunded, then they qualify for the second of the two Americas, and Edwards has a plan for that.
Hmmm… declares himself an “old time conservative”, mouths Democrat talking points, hates brown people…
ALPHIE’S A KLANSMAN!!!
TW: youre42. Wow, it’s stopped reading minds and it’s started getting nasty. I’m not that old!
Uh, Klansperson, Robert.
……..and if you don’t like it, take it up with your ombudsindividual.
17. Look! Karl Rove! Frog march!
18. How can you warmongerers want our troops there when you nuke the entire Middle east?
19. MANBEARPIG!!!
20. You can’t hug people with
nuclearconventional arms.I remember when Carl Levin was a respected Senator from Michigan.
Now he’s just another hack, putting politics above all.
But, let’s be honest – he’s been a hack for a while now.
Well, I think there are in fact some reasonable counterarguments to the proposal that Democrats are trying to withhold funding. Some of those are expressed here, by the way. I’ll condense them:
There’s some of that that I agree with. Not all of it, but some. I think the inclusion of a timeline is defensible grounds for a veto, and also that the inclusion of a timeline is a legitimate thing for Congress to request, even if I don’t agree with it. I don’t think, though, that pointing the finger at the other fellows because they don’t happen to agree with you is going to accomplish much. It’s certainly not going to do any persuading.
I just cut and pasted the list over at AmericaBlog. See how crazy they go…
Slarti- the question is really once Bush vetoes this funding bill, will the Dems defund the war. I agree that the Dems aren’t withholding funding now, and I’m not sure who thinks that.
I’d differ with you on the assertion that the inclusion of a timeline is legitimate. I’m sorry for repeating reasons that have been used before, but these consist of the institutional, the practical, and the hypocritical.
Institutional: The Executive Branch has the authority to commit troops. The legislative branch has the authority to authorize disbursement of funds, to inquire, debate and investigate. Placing a timelimit, which is what this is, does not, I feel, belong within the realm of the legislative branch.
Practical: Military historians, terrorism experts and policy makers do not support announcing when one side will capitulate, or what their weaknesses are.
hypocritical. We have troops deployed elsewhere, and these are not operating under a ticking clock, nor are the advocates of timelimits setting limits for those deployments.
The third reason can be seen as being partisan. The first two, I would submit, are anything but.
Some of the arguements that you cited do have merit. But the question remains whether any or all of them meet the necessary and sufficient conditions for justifying what is in this current funding bill? If not, then these are merely attempts to avoid responsibility for the intent and scope of the bill.
Please note that I’m presenting this as debate, not condemnation.
BJTex:
Sometimes it’s all about the money. But sometimes, as when he claimed that training was a waste of money, it’s just plain ignorance.
Actually, I take that back. W/ alphie it’s <i>always</ib> a matter of just plain ignorance.
Dang. Long response lost when my word-submission failed. Short version:
Maybee: agreed, but the cart is getting in front of the horse in this case.
Blue Hen: I think we’re mostly in agreement, but I think it’s useful to keep in mind that what Congress can do and what they should do and what they must do are usually mutually disjoint, and also disjoint from what they eventually do.
LO:
Ignorance is always the first order of business with The Action Chimp©. His love of monetary comparisons goes back to his previous incarnation as monkeyboy when he refered to the military as “just another form of welfare” and made the remark that the money that we spent in iraq could have “saved 100,000 children in Africa from deadly diarrhea.”
He/she is a 60’s style hippy liberal trying (badly) to masquerade as some kind of “conservative” who believes in spending money more wisely, Inevitably it involves spending money on port security, health care and starving children around the world. As I have previously written, “a” really expouses the “If the Air Force Had To Hold a Bake Sale” bumper sticker mentality.
But first, of course, there is surpassing ignorance and the desire to write the most outragious things to poke the ‘Thugs. He/she probably pulled the wings off of flies when they were a child.
This is true enough. But my last point still stands. Unless the arguements being advanced meet the necessary and sufficient conditions to warrant their actions, then the rationale for Congress funding bill is indeed wrong. And I’ve seen nothing that refutes what I referred to as the practical arguement against a timelimit. And whether they are wrong or right, responsibility for their bill rests upon them, not the President.
The most striking aspect of the argument defending timelimits is that it’s very similar to the one regarding advertising. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent annually on advertising.An entire industry is devoted to this. Oddly, whenever the assertion is made that advertising has a negative effect, defenders claim that negative influence is unlikely. This is also true of the entertainment industry. The implication is made that only a positive influence, if any, is possible.
How likely is it that a timelimit will have a beneficial effect or influence on Iraqis to ‘get their act together’, but exert no negative influence by feeding the hopes or aiding the long range planing of terrorists?
That’s at best poor logic. At worst, it’s an attempt at providing cover for one’s actions.
Do you mean wrong or illegal? I don’t think Congress cares a lot for what we consider to be right and wrong, and not much more for what’s legal.
I’d also tend to think that Congress isn’t obliged to rubberstamp war funding. If they were, why have them be involved at all?
21. Frogmarch, Impeach, EXECUTE!!!!
Not necessarily in that order.
I agree that right/wrong and legality are largely exclusive, especially where the Congress is concerned. I would note that I had acknowledged that Congress has its role, and is not confined to rubberstamping anything. I’m questioning the insertion of the time limit. I’m not questioning it’s technical legality. It’s also legal to characterize it as stupid, counterproductive, and a craven attempt to undermine the war while shifting blame to another. If they want the troops withdrawn, regardless of the facts, then they should do so.
22. Look! MORGAN FAIRCHILD!!
(”…whom I’ve slept with.”)
Hey! That’s my wife you’re talkin’ about!
Oh Yeah?
Well I’ve moved on to..to..
Carmen Electra…yeah..that’s the ticket….
I thought it was FinAYgin.
At least, it was until recently97.