Democrats are
understandably exhilarated by their decisive takeover of the House on
Tuesday. But once the champagne bubbles go flat, they are going to
find that their ability to carry out their most prominent campaign
promise is limited.
The president was quick
to acknowledge the obvious message the Republican defeat carried by
firing Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Wednesday. No one can
deny that this election was a referendum on the administration’s
conduct of the war in Iraq, and in particular, the president’s
refusal to set a date certain for the withdrawal of U.S. troops.
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But incoming Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and likely Armed
Services Committee chairman Ike Skelton are going to find it easier
said than done to simply set a date for the “phased withdrawal”
of U.S. troops to begin, as they promised American voters.
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First, the obvious. The House of Representatives has the power of the
purse, but not the power to command. They cannot order the president
or the Secretary of Defense to withdraw U.S. troops or even set a
date for that withdrawal to begin. All they can do, should
negotiations with the White House break down, is to cut off funds for
the war.
¬Ý
It’s not hard to imagine how Republicans will respond should
Nancy Pelosi and the Democrat leadership chose to go down that road.
Rush Limbaugh will have a field day. Democrats have abandoned our
troops in combat, left them without bullets or billets? Not even
Chris Matthews or Dan Rather could spin Pelosi a way out of that
political minefield.
¬Ý
So, now that the hype of the election campaign is behind us, what
will the Dems do?
¬Ý
We know that Bush has already been meeting with Pelosi quietly in the
White House. This president is someone who has shown he cares little
about personal popularity or public
perception,
as my colleague at Newsmax Ron Kessler
remarked recently.
¬Ý
But he cares deeply about doing what he believes is right, and that
is leading our nation in a just, global war against the forces of
darkness that attacked us on September 11, after five earlier attacks
by al-Qaeda and its allies that went unanswered during the Clinton
administration
¬Ý
Bush has shown he can quickly back down from what he previously
painted as an absolute position of principle, if he become convinced
he has no other choice. (One example: after saying he thought
campaign finance reform was unconstitutional as passed by Congress,
he signed the McCain-Feingold bill into law).
¬Ý
In the coming weeks and months, we are going to hear new weasel-terms
coming out of the White House to describe what Pelosi and the
Democrat leadership have called “phased withdrawal” from
Iraq. The fig leaf for this policy strip tease will be provided by
the bipartisan Iraq Policy Group, headed by former Secretary of State
James Baker and former Congressman and 9/11 Commission member, Lee
Hamilton.
¬Ý
Prospective Senate Majority leader Harry Reid has caught the tune. On
Wednesday, he called for an “Iraq Summit” to draft a
bi-partisan “new direction” for the Iraq war.
¬Ý
Before all the clothes come off, the Pentagon will have to work
overtime to train Iraqi security forces so they have the numbers (if
not the determination) to carry out most security tasks by
themselves.
¬Ý
But even the most partisan Democrats (at least, those who have
retained their faculties) understand that the United States cannot
simply pull out of Iraq tomorrow. To do so would have the effect of
turning over the country to our enemies: al-Qaeda, Iran, Syria, and
the remnants of Saddam’s regime.
¬Ý
So there is the first constraint. Democrats will simply be unable to
deliver on the main campaign promise, because 1) they do not have the
power to pull U.S. troops out of Iraq, and 2) because any effort to
defund the U.S. war effort would be political suicide.
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Call it a Wake up Call.
¬Ý
Former McCain advisor Marshall Wittmann, who is now an advisor to the
Democratic Leadership Council and runs the
“Bull
Moose” blogspot, believes
the Democrats are slowly recognizing these realities. He argues that
one key was the re-election of Joe Lieberman to the United States
Senate as an Independent.
¬Ý
Lieberman’s victory was a “massive repudiation” of
the party’s dominant left wing, that should “send a
powerful message to the '08 wannabees that winning the affections of
the nutroots and the activists does not translate into victory in the
general election - even in a state as blue as Connecticut,”
Wittmann said.
¬Ý
The real limiting factor on the new Democratic Party majority,
however, will not be the White House, its own left-wing, or the Iraqi
government of Prime Minister al-Malaki.
¬Ý
It will be Iran, and Iran’s allies in Europe and the United
Nations.
¬Ý
We cannot defeat the insurgency in Iraq and bring U.S. troops home
without defeating the regime in Iran, because Iran has been funding,
training, and supplying the weapons to the Iraqi insurgents.
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And we cannot defeat the Tehran regime without a comprehensive policy
to do so - which neither the White House, the Pentagon, nor
Congressional Democrats have been willing to craft.
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That is the real challenge facing us in the coming weeks and
months.
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The questions I have as I look forward are these:
•
Will
Nancy Pelosi chose to commit political suicide and cut off funds to
U.S. troops in Iraq? (I doubt it.)
•
Will
incoming Secretary of Defense Robert Gates seek an accommodation with
Iran and Syria to cut off their support for the insurgents? (I fear,
yes.)
Pelosi will be limited in her options by political realities. But Bob
Gates, as Secretary of Defense nominated by the president with the
blessing of the new Democrat majority, will not. He will be able to
carry out the dramatic shift in policies the Democrats and their
allies in the Brent Scowcroft wing of the Republican Party have been
clamoring for, behind the fig leaf of bipartisanship.
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I have a great deal of respect for Bob Gates. Not only is he
personally brilliant; he understands the way government works and
specifically, how to cut through huge bureaucracies to accomplish his
goals.
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And that is precisely my fear.
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The last thing we need to do is turn Iraq over to financial,
military, and intelligence controllers sitting in Tehran, as the
price of bringing the troops back home.
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But that a deal I believe Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are prepared to
make, as long as the proposal comes from Republicans or from a
bipartisan commission that gives them political cover.
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Kenneth R. Timmerman is
the author of Countdown to Crisis: the Coming Nuclear Showdown
with Iran (Crown Forum, New York), and Executive Director of the
Foundation for
Democracy in Iran.