After the Veto Posted by Ilan Goldenberg

So what do Democrats do after the Veto?  Matt Yglesias suggests passing a bill without the withdrawal language but only for the next three months and then bringing up the debate again.  I generally agree.  It keeps the debate front and center, and as things get worse (And I’m pretty sure they will) you chip away and build more support for a supplemental with an exit strategy included.

My only problem is that three months is too short.  These supplemental debates are exhausting and all consuming.  Congress has a lot of other things to worry about and Iraq is already crowding out pretty much everything else.  Not to mention the fact that the country would get pretty sick of having these debates every three months only to have them end in veto and deadlock.  Every six months might be better.

Comments

[Bob Narus]

Great idea, except that, as of 10/1/07, there aren't supposed to be any more war supplementals. The whole thing is supposed to be rolled into the FY 2008 defense budget. Are we going to fund the entire Pentagon with a series of short-term continuing resolutions? Seems to me this game is going to get a lot more complicated.

[Greg Sanders]

Bob Narus:
They're no longer planning to use supplementals as the main vehicle for war funding. However, that doesn't mean there won't be any more supplementals. Unless they over-budget substantially unpleasant surprises will probably come along to demand more resources.

However, I think these supplementals will likely be in the low tens of billions rather than the fifty to a hundred fifty billion dollar range. So as you say the dynamic will still change.

[Dan Kervick]

Hmmm ... Maybe the Democrats really are the party of appeasement.

At some point, you need to make a stand, and it will never be easier to challenge Bush than it is right now. Deferring the fight to another time will not gain support, but lose it, because moderates and fence-sitters will only lose heart and decide congressional attempts to constrain presidential action are futile, given the lack of will to fight the executive's veto power. Also, as the end of the Bush term in office draws nearer, legislators will find less and less incentive to challenge presidential authority, and start looking toward 2009 to solve the problem.

Call for a veto override, and send the party troops out to fight for it. If in the end the votes aren't there, then at least the Republicans who oppose it will have to put themselves on record in supporting White House obstructionism over a blll that has majority popular support.

[Don Bacon]

The Democrats are voting for continued funding of the wars over Republican objections to micro-managing and pork. After the veto the Dems will have to pass continuing resolutions to fund the wars which will require the continuing silencing of the anti-Iraq-war Dem progressives. In the meantime our increasingly brutal occupation of Iraq is pushing Iraq further into disaster and possible US military defeat, and is even drawing the ire of former US/Bush ally and chief US oil provider Saudi Arabia.

The Dem bills, besides requiring an oil law (yipee) and local elections (hah), allow a continuing, endless presence of US troops for "engaging in targeted special actions limited in duration and scope to killing or capturing members of al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations with global reach, and training members of the Iraqi Security Forces" which is pretty much what our government geniuses say the US is doing now. Iraq is the central front of the 'War on Terror' to prevent the establishment of a caliphate extending from Indonesia to Spain, don't you know. Osama bin-Laden says it so we must listen and accept what he says. At least there's someone supposedly believable in the world today.

Come on, nobody really believes that the US forces will leave Iraq and all its oil sans (1) a military defeat or (2) a widespread soldier revolt such as the one that effectively ended the Vietnam fiasco. The pols certainly won't do it. The US continues to have forces in Germany, Japan and Korea after more than fifty years, and US forces would still be in Vietnam if the GIs hadn't refused to go on missions and killed their superiors.

Of course the Dem bills call for "redeployment" but the bills don't say to where. The Dems say Afghanistan, that historical sinkhole of death for occupying armies. Oh joy.

I would like to hear a statement from the Dems as to why they are continuing to fund the Iraq war. What is the noble cause? Is it to defend a fundamentalist Islamic state allied with US arch-enemy Iran? To prevent a world-wide caliphate as that odd couple Bush and bin Laden say? Or what? I think they owe the American people an answer.

[cheap Final Fantasy XI Gold]

FF11 is very famous now. My friends like to play it and buy FFXI Gil. If you have money to buy FFXI gold, you will find it is very useful. Earning Final Fantasy XI gold is not so hard. Try your best and then you can get it. I buy FFXI Gil, just because I like it.

[Watch Accessories replica watches]

we don't think it is reasonable to spend hundreds thousands dollars to buy a decorating watch. you can use those money to invest in other industry which will return you good profit.
here you just need to spend 100-200 dollars to buy a replica rolex watches.
Watch Accessories replica watches are made by the rating 1:1 according to the original watches, and you can't distinguish the original and the fake watches when you look at the surface of the watches.

[cheap silkroad gold]

most of the time he will win the silk road gold back.

[rf gold]

I hope i can get rf online gold in low price.
i buy rf money for you.

[Runes of Magic Gold]

Once I played Rom Gold, I did not know how to get strong, someone told me that you must have Rom Gold. He gave me some Runes of Magic Gold.

[cabal online alz]

As expected in my next, the agent makes a great deal of determination in the cabal online alz. So I bought more and morecabal alz.

[requiem gold]

Do you like playing the game where you need to use requiem gold, when you do not have requiem lant,

[requiem gold]

Do you like playing the game where you need to use requiem gold, when you do not have requiem lant,

[molded rubber products]

plastic parts made by injection molding
printing in China
construction scaffolding

[cheap coach handbags]

Thank you for your sharing! I like i very much!

[Liushuanglin198606]

On my Egypt Air flight yesterday to Cairo, I witnessed one of the more intriguing in-flight exchanges that I can remember. A bearded, well-dressed man sitting a few seats behind me began shouting at the flight attendant. He was complaining that the in-flight movie was inappropriate. What are these “offensive images?ugg boots clearance” he asked. These included a 15-minute stretch of the movie where at least one woman at any given time was wearing a bikini. In a couple of scenes at a club, members of opposite sexes were dancing in close proximity while, it appeared, consuming alcoholic beverages. “Are we really all Westernized now?” the man behind me asked, as if posing a question to those of us in the back of the plane.

The man’s arguments were rather interesting. He pointed out that if you took a poll of the passengers,ugg boots outlet most would agree the film was morally offensive. He asked the attendant, “if we ask the passengers what they think and they agree with me, then what will you do?” The attendant responded, “we don’t take public opinion (ra’i al ‘am) on the airplane.” The man was right: most passengers, and most Egyptians – the vast majority of whom don’t drink, go to clubs, or wear bikinis – would object to the film’s content. But at what point do they have the right to restrict minority expressions of unfaithfulness?

It was an odd, amusing exchange that justified the otherwise unpleasant experience of flying on EgyptAir.ugg boots clearance But it was a reminder of the fundamental lack of consensus in the Arab world over the boundaries and limits of the state. There are two groups – Islamists and secular elites – with worldviews which couldn’t be more different. They live parallel lives in parallel worlds, with parallel institutions. They rarely intersect.ugg boots clearance One group believes it has both history and the Egyptian people on its side. The other side, considerably smaller in number, likely has neither. It does, however, have the power.

This stalemate has paralyzed the Arab world for decades now.ugg boots outlet

Sunday’s elections will be just another version of this.ugg boots clearance The main players are the Muslim Brotherhood – populist, religious, and righteous – and the regime coalition which, with its president soon to pass, finds itself in an uncertain place. Both sides are strong in different ways – and weak in others. Neither seems to have anything resembling a coherent strategy for dealing with the impending transition that is soon to come.

ugg boots clearance

[Egitim]

thanks for sharing Sohbet many people are pay more attention to one's wearing than before, especially a watch. Chat .
Perhaps when you went to some place far away Chat you must borrow it from friends Sohbet you can get everything you want in this game
Chat money to invest in other industry which will return you good profit. Sohbet when you look at the surface of the watches
Egitim from the city you live in and thought you knew nobody there exsohbet

[Adriannedgn796]

Are there really good conquerors and bad conquerors, in which school are those things learned english, german , italian­, spanish, france, because at my school they learned me that conquerors are always bad ones...LOOK MAN I DONT CARE ABOUT ΜΥ GREEK MOMUMENTS...You already have ruined pathenon and learn a thing turks didnt ruined parthenon english and Lord Elgin did.However Italy,France,Spain etc.. kept Europe.

[Cheap Ravens Jersey]

we don't think it is reasonable to spend hundreds thousands dollars to buy a decorating watch. you can use those money to invest in other industry which will return you good profit.

[Mark Sanchez Jersey Authentic]

'Boys aim for three straight. Bengals, Ravens battle. Week 11 previewJock to Doc take: Freeman practiced fully Wednesday and Thursday after struggling with a thumb injury. He'll be on the field Sunday in Green Bay, but one can't help but think this injury may be a factor in his mediocre play this season.