Democrats Aim to Reframe Iraq Debate
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN
New York Times
WASHINGTON, Sept. 4 — As Congress reopened for business on Tuesday, the Democratic leadership promised to force a change in President Bush’s war strategy, and lawmakers maneuvered to frame the debate over Iraq ahead of reports next week by Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker.
“Many of my Republican friends have long held September as the month for the policy change in Iraq,” Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic majority leader, said in his opening speech on the Senate floor. “It’s September.”
“The calendar hasn’t changed,” he said. “It’s time to make a decision. We can’t continue the way we are.”
Mr. Reid’s speech, which included sharp criticism of President Bush, reflected an aggressive effort by the Democrats to shape the discourse over the war before General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker testify.
Aides said Senator Reid was trying to signal a new willingness to compromise across party lines when he called on Republicans to join in finding a way “to responsibly end this war.” Such a deal would almost certainly require Mr. Reid to drop his demand for a fixed deadline for withdrawal, which brought the Senate to an impasse on the war in July.
In a hearing later in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, war critics seized on a new report by the Government Accountability Office showing virtually no political progress by the Iraqi government as the latest evidence that the president’s military strategy was failing.
(Continued here.)
New York Times
WASHINGTON, Sept. 4 — As Congress reopened for business on Tuesday, the Democratic leadership promised to force a change in President Bush’s war strategy, and lawmakers maneuvered to frame the debate over Iraq ahead of reports next week by Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker.
“Many of my Republican friends have long held September as the month for the policy change in Iraq,” Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic majority leader, said in his opening speech on the Senate floor. “It’s September.”
“The calendar hasn’t changed,” he said. “It’s time to make a decision. We can’t continue the way we are.”
Mr. Reid’s speech, which included sharp criticism of President Bush, reflected an aggressive effort by the Democrats to shape the discourse over the war before General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker testify.
Aides said Senator Reid was trying to signal a new willingness to compromise across party lines when he called on Republicans to join in finding a way “to responsibly end this war.” Such a deal would almost certainly require Mr. Reid to drop his demand for a fixed deadline for withdrawal, which brought the Senate to an impasse on the war in July.
In a hearing later in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, war critics seized on a new report by the Government Accountability Office showing virtually no political progress by the Iraqi government as the latest evidence that the president’s military strategy was failing.
(Continued here.)
Powered by Blogger
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home