RUSH: All right, let’s talk about the Democrats and the war in Iraq. The Associated Press: ‘The closest thing Congress has to a peace movement – 71 liberals who want to yank Iraq funding and bring troops home swiftly – faces a dilemma: The lawmakers can back a Democratic plan they think is too weak, or they can block it and risk an embarrassing defeat for their cause. It falls to one of their strongest allies, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. – whose San Francisco district is passionately against the war – to persuade them to accept a less aggressive stance. Pelosi is working feverishly,’ not only to avoid Code Pink protesters, but also ‘to scrounge together enough Democratic votes to pass a war-spending measure that would force the withdrawal of combat troops from Iraq by 2008. Leaders circulated a draft Monday, and the House is set to weigh in on it as early as next week.’
The next story with this: ‘Democrats Abandon War Authority Provision — Top House Democrats retreated Monday from an attempt to limit President Bush’s authority for taking military action against Iran as the leadership concentrated on a looming confrontation with the White House over the Iraq war.’ Now, do you know what this means? It’s not so easy in the driver’s seat, is it, Democrats? It’s much more fun being the grumpy old know-it-alls in the back seat, ‘Are we there yet? Are we there yet?’ You didn’t have the guts to put it in the bill, did you, that the president can’t go into Iran? You didn’t have the guts, did you? You don’t want the responsibility, do you? No, you just want to be a bunch of back-benchers even when you’re in the majority, bellyaching and moaning and whining and accusing everything that happens in Washington of being a conspiratorial crime.
So let’s see if I understand this. The Democrats are essentially saying that President Bush should agree to the Pelosi Surrender Plan because it helps her bring together the various factions in her caucus. That’s what the Drive-Bys are saying. So hard on Ms. Pelosi. She’s got such a tough job, balancing all these different factions in her caucus. Fine. Let the president bail her out. Let the president agree to her surrender plan so that she can keep her caucus united! The language was worked out so as to bring on board her libs and her so-called moderates. Whether or not it does that is another issue, though. These far leftists want to cut off funding, but that doesn’t have a prayer, so she hopes a certain deadline would bring ’em along — a deadline that is also meaningless, a deadline to get the troops out. Even the media is laughing about this. I want to take you to an audio sound bite from Sunday on CNN’s Late Edition, with John Roberts filling in for Wolf Blitzer. His guests are Lindsey Graham and Senator Joe Biden, and they play a videotape for these guests to comment on from last Thursday when Pelosi and David Obey of Wisconsin went out there and announced this brilliant plan. I want you to listen to the whole bite.
ROBERTS: When these resolutions were unveiled later in the week, they were convoluted, to say the least. Take a quick listen to some of this press conference.
OBEY: Must be out of a combat role by October — I mean by August of — of 19 — or — 19 — 2007.
PELOSI: 2008. If they meet —
OBEY: I’m sorry. That’s right.
PELOSI: If they haven’t made any progress by July, we begin the 180 days. If they haven’t — if they haven’t made — if the president cannot demonstrate progress by July, we begin the 180 days.
UNKNOWN REPORTER: Is it July 1st or 31st?
PELOSI: Is it July 1st or 31st? July 1st.
ROBERTS: Joe Biden, how do you pass or enforce something you can’t even explain?
RUSH: That was the CNN anchor who will normally do his best to make these people look like wizards. He was himself forced into laughter asking Joe Biden, putting Biden on the spot, ‘How do you pass or enforce something you can’t even explain?’ This was an absolute joke. Now, the point about all this is that you have to understand this is not about the war. It’s not about winning the war. (It’s about losing it, but it’s not even about that). It’s about purely partisan political calculations for 2008. That’s what your Democrat majority is involved in here, in regards the national security of the United States. It’s not about the national security of the United States. It’s about the perpetual power and security of the Democrat Party.
The liberals have been trying to sell this and build up their own competence. They’re out there saying, ‘Bush didn’t finish the job at Tora Bora.’ Nobody’s ever asked this question: ‘What do you mean finish the job?’ Would liberals have even started the job at Tora Bora? Well, I ask because they didn’t start it in 1993 when the World Trade Center first blew up and they didn’t do anything in ’94 or ’95 or ’96 or ’97 or ’98 or ’99 when there were terrorist attacks against Americans all over the world. What makes you think they would have started in 2002 or ’03 or ’04 or ’05 or ’06? Where is the history that Democrats are going to ‘take the fight to terrorists’? Bush didn’t finish the job at Tora Bora? Here’s why liberals can’t conduct a war. First, they insist on giving six months advance notice the war is going to start. Now they want to give six months advance notice the war is going to end.