The Date Stays In!

It looks like the Iraq supplemental will pass the Senate with strings attached, laying the groundwork for a furious spinning battle once Bush vetoes the supplemental. It's interesting that as best I can tell both parties think the veto battle will help them. Brian Beutler helps explain what happens legislatively after a veto.

Let me just say that while I think the legislative tactics in play here are clearly very important to the future of the country, political gamesmanship of this kind isn't something I feel I can make especially enlightened judgments about so I may write less about this question than its objective importance in some sense merits.

UPDATE: Santamonicamr notes in comments that this appears to have been the long-awaited moment when Chuck Hagel stops complaining and actually does something -- breaking with the GOP and voting the right way on the amendment.

3/27/07 6:38PM del.icio.us this incoming links

Comments

Why do people automatically assume that Chimpy McFlightsuit will veto this? Do you forget Chimpy's love of the signing statement? He'll take too big of a PR hit if he vetoes this. He'll use a signing statement to neutralize the withdrawal date. That's my guess.

Posted by: This Machine Kills Fascists on March 27, 2007 06:48 PM

Whether Chimpy McFlightsuit chooses to have The Big Showdown over the veto or over a signing statement that's effectively a veto, kind of seems neither here nor there. He will refuse the withdrawl date. Then the ball is truly in the Congressional court, no?

Posted by: Jojo O'Banabinns on March 27, 2007 07:08 PM

If he signs it with an indication that he won't "faithfully execute" the law he's signing, Congress might just have to take him to court.

Posted by: dj moonbat on March 27, 2007 07:16 PM

I don't get it. For months the Democrats demanded Bush change course in Iraq. He finally does and the Dems' response is to set a date to pull-out regardless of whether the new course yields benefits or not. This begs a couple of questions that perhaps others on here would be willing to answer:

1) Petraeus said he'd know if his new strategy would be working by late summer. Why not wait until then to decide about deadlines for withdrawal? Or, if Dems are certain the new strategy won't work, why not start the withdrawal now?

2) Why not withdraw from Afghanistan too? The same arguments against doing so (would leave a vacuum that terrorists could fill) would seem to apply in Iraq, and Iraq would seem to be a more strategically important country.

Posted by: Fred on March 27, 2007 07:29 PM

Fred, you're right: you don't get it.

as for matthew's posting, the "furious" spinning battle has several constituent elements, and one of them is the battle going on within the republican party. it is certainly not within me to understand the ins and outs of republican party politics, but on the face of it, it appears that republican senators are finally realizing that their interests and bush's interests do not have 1-1 congruence....

Posted by: howard on March 27, 2007 07:36 PM

Before the President has a chance to veto, will the date in the bill survive a conference committee?

Posted by: qwertyuiop on March 27, 2007 08:02 PM

Matt, for a long time you have (justifiably) criticized Hagel for talking a lot but not, you know, actually *doing* anything.

Will his vote today qualify as "doing something"?

I say "yes." If he votes with his party, the measure fails.

Posted by: santamonicamr on March 27, 2007 08:15 PM

If Bush signs the bill, and then refuses to comply, don't take him to court, impeach him; I might not think that withdrawl from Iraq is a good idea, but it is unambiguously within Congress's authority to order it. The power to declare war and the power to undeclare it are two sides of the same coin.

Posted by: Brett Bellmore on March 27, 2007 08:17 PM

The bill hasn't passed yet. The question today was when it actually comes to a vote, would the bill include a non-binding withdrawal date?

Posted by: Dave in the Corn on March 27, 2007 08:38 PM

A pity the question wasn't whether it would contain $20 billion in pork. That point seems to have been settled in the affirmative, without any real debate.

Posted by: Brett Bellmore on March 27, 2007 08:51 PM

A pity the question wasn't whether it would contain $20 billion in pork.

Yes, for the first time in many years an appropriation actually contains pork! I guess when Republicans add their earmarks that is not really pork.

I strongly suspect that the American public is going to get much more benefit out ot the $20b in "pork" than we do from the trillion or two we wind up spending on Iraq.

Posted by: k on March 27, 2007 11:09 PM

I wonder if Hagel's vote was a twofer--if it gave Nelson cover enough to shift his vote, too.

Posted by: Calculator on March 28, 2007 12:19 AM

The assholes screaming about pork never mention war profiteering, I wonder why?

Posted by: merlallen on March 28, 2007 03:26 AM

Well, excuse me for hoping that Democrats might keep one of the campaign promises they made that I actually liked, and which they'd at least started out with a good show of hewing to. I suppose it was pretty stupid to expect them to keep this one; After all, it's not as though Republicans spending like drunken sailors had anything to do with their gaining the majority.

Posted by: Brett Bellmore on March 28, 2007 05:59 AM

Brett,

The Washington Post had an editorial about this with a great headline: "Retreat and Butter".

Posted by: Fred on March 28, 2007 08:10 AM

Good comment.Thanks admin.

Posted by: youtube on November 16, 2007 05:27 PM

Thanks
Best regards
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