Republicans Call Dems' Bluff

In a brilliant stroke of genius last night, the Republicans in Congress called for a vote on the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq. (Good post: A Spine is Detected). This forced the Democrats to basically 'put up or shut up' over the war in Iraq. We listened to the whole thing on C-SPAN Satellite Radio as we were driving up to Minneapolis.

The Democrats have been calling George W. Bush, the President of the United States and Commander-in-Chief a liar for the past several weeks. So, it is hard to understand their frenzy last night when the following occurred...

Members were heatedly debating a procedural rule concerning the Hunter resolution when Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Ohio) was recognized at 5:20 p.m. Schmidt won a special election in August, defeating Iraq war veteran Paul Hackett, and is so new to Congress that some colleagues do not know her name.

She told colleagues that "a few minutes ago I received a call from Colonel Danny Bubp," an Ohio legislator and Marine Corps Reserve officer. "He asked me to send Congress a message: Stay the course. He also asked me to send Congressman Murtha a message: that cowards cut and run, Marines never do."

Dozens of Democrats erupted at once, pointing angrily at Schmidt and shouting repeatedly, "Take her words down" -- the House term for retracting a statement. For a moment Schmidt tried to keep speaking, but the uproar continued and several GOP colleagues surrounded her as she sat down, looking slightly dazed. Presiding officer Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) gaveled in vain for order as Democrats continued shouting for Schmidt to take back her words. Rep. Martin T. Meehan (D-Mass.) yelled "You guys are pathetic!" from the far end of the Democratic section to the GOP side.

Just as matters seemed to calm a bit, Rep. Harold E. Ford Jr. (D-Tenn.) suddenly charged across the aisle to the GOP seats, jabbing his finger furiously at a small group of GOP members and shouting, "Say Murtha's name!" Rep. David R. Obey (D-Wis.), who had led the chants for striking Schmidt's comments, gently guided Ford by the arm back to the minority party's side.

At 5:31, when order was finally restored, Schmidt rose again and said softly, "My words were not directed at any member of the House." She asked that they "be withdrawn" from the record.

It was a very bad idea to have her words withdrawn from the record, because this gives license to the Dems and the media to reconstruct what she actually said. Watch for them to spin this as an 'attack' on Murtha.

Whoa. No sooner had I typed these words than I saw this great post at The California Conservative.

She didn't attack Murtha. She said that she got a call from a fellow legislator who asked her to remind Murtha that cowards cut and run. Since Murtha is suggesting that we cut and run, I guess the shoe fits. While he is (was?) a war hero and deserves our gratitude for serving his country bravely, this does not exempt him from criticism when he makes a cowardly suggestion. (And apparently doesn't keep him from making a cowardly suggestion).

But you had to hear the rest of the debate that evening (and this probably won't be reported in any major media outlet). Murtha used his time at the end of the debate to tell story after story of individual families and soldiers dealing with the tragedy of injury and loss of life.

Now, the American people place a high value on individual lives, unlike the terrorists. No one wants to lose our young men and women (or older ones, for that matter) in a conflict in a distant part of the world that few of us will ever see and most of us will never understand.

That is why the terrorists blow up innocent men, women and children. That is why they kidnap and behead unarmed contractors and drag burned bodies through the streets. To weaken our resolve and cause us to give up. So, by playing up the very same thing that the terrorists have identified as our weakness, isn't Murthau playing right into their hands?

Anway, after hours of bloviating, fist waving and foaming-at-the-mouth, in the end, the vote came down to 403 to 3. So, the 'heroic' Dems after arguing for weeks that...

*We should not be in Iraq.
*Bush deliberately misled the country to war.
*The Iraqi people don't want us there.
*We are making terrorism worse.
*We are causing the rest of the world to hate us.

...voted that *gulp* we should, "stay the course". Kind of makes your head spin, doesn't it?

It will be fascinating to see how the Democrats try to resuscitate the 'let's withdraw from Iraq' mantra after all of the them voted against it.