Yesterday, I singled out House Appropriations Chairman David Obey as having a special obligation to defend the mandatory redeployment timelines in the House version of the "Iraq Accountability Act."
I felt that this special responsibility fell on Obey as a result of his stormy confrontation with anti-war protesters. Not necessarily because of the alleged "insults" which he hurled at them -- after all, there is some dispute about their methods and intentions, not to mention the very understandable stress under which Obey surely found himself at the time. Rather, I felt this responsibility arose from the posture Obey took in shutting down the protesters' angle of questioning -- that is, his insistence that only he knew how it really worked, and anybody who advocated a different approach was fooling themselves.
While it's undoubtedly true that Obey knows much, much more about the legislative process than just about anyone on the planet, it's also my considered opinion that his angle in that debate cut off a number of very valid points that he simply didn't want to consider, even if only to illustrate their inferiority to his plan. That was a great disservice to the public debate over ending the occupation of Iraq, and it was delivered -- quite deliberately, I believe -- in a way that was calculated to make it seem that the only "politically sophisticated" view of the options was Obey's. And I don't think that's true.
But that's not actually what I've sat down at the keyboard to say today. What I came to say is this: I was wrong to single out Obey at the time I chose to single him out, because the decision to abandon those timelines and substitute non-binding "advisory" language apparently had already been made by the House leadership.
Next week, the House and Senate will reconcile the competing pieces of legislation they passed last month and send a new bill to the White House. House Democratic leaders have convened meetings throughout the week with their members, urging them to accept a compromise calling for a goal, as the Senate has done, not a mandatory deadline.
Recall, both from the infamous video and from yesterday's discussion, that Obey had emphatically stated:
The liberal groups are jumping around without knowing what the hell is in the bill! You don't have to cut off funds for an activity that no longer is legal!
Well, now we're getting an idea of what's in the bill after all, and what Obey said was in it ain't in it anymore.
So the tactics have shifted:
"The president is going to veto it anyway, so what difference does it make?" said Representative James P. Moran, Democrat of Virginia. "This bill is a shell of itself. It’s not worth fighting over."
"The president is going to veto it anyway, so what difference does it make?" A good question. Of course, the same question could be asked of Senate Democrats who refuse to go along with the binding timeline language. Why not go along? The president is going to veto it anyway, so what difference does it make?
And yet, no one asks that question of conservative Democrats. Only of progressives. What difference do your principles make? The president says they don't matter, and the Congressional leadership concurs.
So the plan now is, Democrats offer the president full funding for the troops, a billion more for veterans' health care, in exchange for "advisory" language on redeployment as a "goal," plus the ability to waive requirements that troops sent to Iraq be fully trained and armored.
What difference does it make? The president is going to veto it anyway.
Well, he damned well better, at this point. Though frankly, I can't see why he would. Can you?
As Obey told his questioners:
The language we have in the resolution ends the authority for the war. It makes it illegal to proceed with the war.
And now it doesn't. Which, by the way, is what his questioners believed would be the end result of the bill when all was said and done. It's hard to argue that they were wrong. This bill will not make it illegal to proceed with the war.
So why would Bush veto it?
Well, what difference does it make? "It's not worth fighting over."
God help us if George Bush should suddenly agree.
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