It's time for the Democrats to take the lead on an issue that continues to tear down our ability to support them.
From the Las Vegas Sun:
Potential Democratic presidential candidates who voted to give President Bush the authority to use force in Iraq could face a political problem - they supported a war that their party's rank-and-file now strongly view as a mistake.
More:
Their pro-war votes - cast three years ago - could haunt them as they seek early support among die-hard Democrats and gauge whether to launch formal candidacies for the party's 2008 presidential nomination.
"For a lot of activists, this could be a threshold issue. They may be looking for somebody without any taint for prior support for the war," said John J. Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in California.
Sens. Evan Bayh of Indiana, Joseph Biden of Delaware, Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, John Kerry of Massachusetts and former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina are mulling over running for the Democratic nomination. All voted in October 2002 for a resolution authorizing the president to use force in Iraq.
They no doubt will be forced to explain their positions - both then and now - and in doing so could open themselves to attack from candidates who didn't support the resolution or didn't have to cast the politically tricky vote.
The only other oft-mentioned potential Democratic presidential candidate in the Senate - Russell Feingold, D-Wis. - voted against the resolution. Other possible hopefuls, such as Govs. Mark Warner of Virginia, Bill Richardson of New Mexico and Tom Vilsack of Iowa, weren't in Congress.
The Democrats should take the lead now on condemning a White House that's facing a public that's turning increasingly sour on many fronts, including the progress in the war.
- "Activist" is not a dirty word. It's "activists" that donate money, work the polls, and go door to door asking people to get out and vote.
- Reasonable explanations for voting in support of JR114 abound:
A) They were misled when the OSP and WHIG stovepiped the data.
B) They were giving Bush a "big stick" that no one believed he was stupid enough to use without good reason.
C) No one could have foreseen the complete lack of planning beyond "Mishun Akkomplissed", parades, and
some grand square in Baghdad that is named after President Bush.
Of course, we'll have to offer alternatives that will make sense to Americans. The biggest move to be made is the admission that we need the support of the UN and the Muslim world if we're ever going to bring this shameful waste of life to an end. (And if there's actually a Democrat with balls...a pipe dream, I know...they'll offer to turn Bush over to the world court.)