Tsar George says that the Congress is trying to micromanage the war on terror when it wants to put time limits or conditions on funding. HE is the commander-in-chief and, consequently, the only one who can lead the fight. There is a definite conflict.
Since last November, every time that George has asked for money for Iraq, aka the war on terror, the Democrats have put up a fight only to back down with the rhetoric that George and the Republicans use accusing them of being un-American, putting the troops in harms way, or supporting terrorist.
There has also been quite a number of Dems who just seem to agree with whatever George wants. [I live in the IL-3 Congressional district and Lipinski is known as a bushdog when he really a lapdog] These Democrats have forsaken the principle's of the party platform and forgotten the process of government set out in the Constitution.
Now, Senator Reid has made one statement and suggested one move that would severely cramp Tsar George's style.
First, via Huffpost:
Democrats who lead Congress likened President George W. Bush on Thursday to a bully on Iraq war policy and vowed to spend no more on combat without a deadline for bringing U.S. troops home.
"He damn sure is not entitled to having this money given to him just with a blank check," Sen. Harry Reid, the Democrats' Senate leader, told reporters.
"Americans need someone fighting for them taking on this bully we have in the White House," he said.
Reid and other Democrats, who hold slim majorities in both houses of Congress, accused Bush of wanting a free-flow of hundreds of billions of dollars for the Iraq war, all the while being tight-fisted on the home front.
"Every dollar we spend in Iraq comes at the expense of people in America," Reid said
They've even gone ahead and said that the Pentagon can use some of the $450 billion it just gave them. Of course, the tsar and Pentagon says there isn't that kind of money and needs supplemental funding specifically for Iraq.
Along these lines, the Republicans have attacked a report released yesterday that the actual cost of the war is about $1.5 trillion dollars when the hidden costs are included with the most important being the rising cost of oil. By the time the current bills are paid on the war it could total $3,500,000,000,000.00 by 2017, if there are no more charges made. That is $3.5 trillion!
Of course, the House did just pass a $50 billion Iraq bill and Bush says he's going to veto it. Good! Let him veto it. Let them pass it again. Let him veto it again. If he's playing the game, play the game better.
The second thing that Senator Reid has hinted at is putting an end to recess appointments that Tsar George is good at doing. When the Senate does not approve an appointee, he has merely waited until a recess making the appointment that he wanted anyway. [He took a different stance with Mukasey, saying he wouldn't appoint a AG at all if he didn't get what he wanted. It would have been interesting if it happened. After all having no AG was better that Gonzales. The bushdogs gave him what he wanted though.]
From Rawstory:
A plan engineered by "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to eliminate all extended recesses except for the traditional August break during the 110th Congress may have an added benefit for Democrats," Roll Call reports.
"It could be a back-door way of preventing President Bush from unilaterally installing controversial nominees in key executive and judicial branch posts through recess appointments, a favorite tool of the president over the past six years," John Stanton writes.
Now this would be interesting. It might just force the Tsar to negotiate with Congress, as the process of our government intends, or he would have to fill vacancies from within the existing department as an acting status until he's gone.
But here is the real dilemma - are the Democrats going to find the cajones to stand up this time and will they keep to them once they find them? It's a big question.
if they really want to win the 2008 election, they better...
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