Homeland Security

Vice-President Dick Cheney took the unusual step Tuesday of blasting Senate Majority Leader during a visit to Capitol Hill. The veep usually says nothing on these visits. But he broke custom this time, he says, because he believes Reid was so seriously out of line in suggesting publicly last week that the Iraq war is already "lost." What do you think? Scroll down to our Quick Poll! and tell us whether you approve or disapprove of what Reid said.

Attack. Attack. Attack. Is that really all the Bush team knows how to do? Yes, it has won them two elections but it doesn’t help a great deal when it comes to governing.

Take the latest effort at going nuclear over Harry Reid, a usual target. OK, I grant you that “the war is lost” makes a nice sound bite to eviscerate. No one likes to hear that anything is lost — your wallet, your umbrella, your pet — let alone a war. The trouble is that Harry Reid became so furious at George Bush and his my-way or the highway approach to this war that he let it fly. The surge is not working, he said — hard to argue with that after the last several weeks.

But Bush and his attack dogs have it all wrong. This is precisely about supporting the troops……as the bumper sticker says: SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, BRING THEM HOME. Reid and other Democrats have given the president everything he has asked for and then some, as Budowsky writes. It really is time to set limits, to avoid making the same mistakes as we did in Vietnam, when over half those 58,000 who died were killed after the war was "lost."

Bush can only attack Reid to try and boost his own sad policy, not try and come up with a political solution that works, and works fast.

We create more insurgents each day than we kill. We now have polls in Iraq that show over 80% of Iraqis want us out. We are losing more precious young men and women, both Americans and Iraqis, every day. We are spending hundreds of billions of dollars on a lost cause, weakening our military beyond what is imaginable, and destroying the country in order to save it.

Democrats in Congress are proposing benchmarks for the Iraqis to meet, setting exit strategies, calling for dialogue, as did the bi-partisan Iraq Study Group. The Bush doctrine is more of the same. My guess is that Secretary Gates may return from his trip to Iraq and report privately to the president what members of Congress have found (Republicans and Democrats) — the country is falling apart and our presence is hurting not helping. That would be the honest assessment and, how ironic, not far from what Reid declared in his own impolitic way.

After he has spent more than five years meticulously building a second presidential campaign, this one meant to carry him over the finish line, it's hard to believe Sen. John McCain's candidacy has stumbled so badly. With money drying up and poll numbers falling, McCain has found ever since the midterm elections of 2006 that his support for the Iraq war is a ball and chain following him wherever he goes. As he drags it around it drags him down but doesn't seem to hold back Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney, both of whom supported the recent troop increase right along with McCain.

On Sunday, McCain began a public-relations offensive he hopes will help redefine him as the right leader on the country's most difficult issue. With a Washington Post editorial, a "60 Minutes" interview and an upcoming speech at the Virginia Military Institute, McCain is making his case for finishing the job in Iraq. Though he has campaigned in primary states, McCain has not had much national visibility in recent months, and during this time polls have indicated a majority has begun to support a withdrawal from Iraq. McCain knows he is pushing a political boulder up the side of a mountain. He is asking voters not to agree with him but to trust his position and his leadership. With some luck and skill his new strategy just may help him. Read more...

Now Mitt Romney lies about hunting.

The former Massachusetts governor said he had been a hunter for just about all his life. Almost immediately his staff reminded him he had only been hunting twice. Presumably Mr. Romney forgot about all the times he never hunted.

Meanwhile, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is now engaged in intensive preparation for his congressional testimony. Will he accuse his former chief of staff of lying? Or will he admit that he lied himself when he said he was not involved in the U.S. attorney firings?

Of course, Scooter Libby was convicted of lying, to the applause of the neoconservative community, which calls for pardon because, for them, putting one's hand on the Bible with an oath to God Almighty and lying is really OK, thank you.

After many tall tales about Iraq WMDs, a little perjury between friends is no big deal. Read more...

A smart press strategy by Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) crack staff has muffled the potential political explosion of his announced support of an amendment to cut off funding for the troops as they fight in Iraq. But this story is not going away. In fact, Reid’s announcement is not merely a political tactic to get President Bush to the negotiating table. It is philosophical dogma to the hard left of the Democratic Party.

Democratic leftists want us to leave Iraq now. They wanted us to leave Vietnam, too, and guess what happened there. A communist takeover of Saigon, massacres, genocide and a crisis of confidence in the United States that led to a weakening of American influence from Iran to South America to Africa. Read more...

Having just returned from a brief vacation, where I looked back at Washington from the Left Coast, I saw little blurbs of gossip and information that from far away reveal the big picture.

Here are the bits that came through the news:

1. Tony Snow, the best thing that has happened to this White House in four years, has cancer again, and it may have spread to his liver. This is bad and very sad news for all who know Tony personally and for this White House team that needs his leadership.


2. The Iranians' seizure of 15 British marines is needlessly provocative and possibly much more significant geopolitically than has been acknowledged by the White House thus far.


3. The Democrats are having a field day beating up the executive branch, especially the Justice Department, and the Attorney General has done a fairly lousy job explaining himself. Getting thrown under the bus by his ex-chief of staff yesterday was not helpful.


4. The Democrats finally won a short-term victory on the war supplemental. They got their votes, and some Republicans’, and now they have a bill that will surely be vetoed by the President. It is too early to tell who won this battle, and only God knows how much pork has yet to be added to get the conference report to final passage.


5. So here is the Big Picture. Washington is screwing around, playing political games here at home, while the Iranians are licking their chops and hoping that we leave Iraq so that they can finally dominate once and for all their neighbor and long-time adversary. The Iranians are so confident that they can win the endgame that they are playing a risky game of hardball by seizing those British Marines and then parading them on television. They are calculating that we have a weak hand because of our political shenanigans, and that we won’t do what it takes to win this game in the long run. I hope they are wrong, but given the realities of the situation today, they may be right.

Wouldn't it be amazing if the first woman Speaker redefines national politics and regains the high ground for Democrats on national defense and national security?

The truth is, the Speaker comes from a family of old-fashioned values and traditional standards and views America as a larger family and shared community.

The Speaker is a woman of faith, a grandma, mother, daughter, and wife. In her world, all Americans are security moms and security dads; all Americans are military moms and military dads.

For military families, it's a family affair. The Speaker's daughter Christine Pelosi is a strong advocate for vets and troops in her own right, and initiated a major program for vets through the Democratic National Committee.

If the Speaker leads an unprecedented battle for better treatment of our troops and vets she will transform American politics and can seize the high ground on national security for many years to come. Read more...

Hillary makes one dizzy trying to follow all of her flips and flops over Iraq.

She said, upon her return from Iraq this winter, that she was not going to vote for a cutoff of funding for the war ...

... But now she is backing a House bill to cut off funding for the war if troops are not out by September '08.

She said, at the same time, that she opposed a deadline for withdrawal ...

... But the House bill proposes just such a deadline.

She said, last week in a New York Times interview, that she would keep troops in Iraq for intelligence, training, and logistical support, air support, interdiction of Iranian infiltration, and pursuit of al Qaeda ...

... But the House bill just specifies intelligence, training, and air support, not the other missions.

Talk about having your cake and eating it too.

Sen. Chuck Hagel's (R-Neb.) comments on ABC that he is working towards a proposal and alliance with Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.) offer the possibility of a major game-changer for Iraq policy and the U.S. Senate. This is exactly what the doctor ordered.

Hagel and Webb are highly respected war heroes and legislators and among the most cogent critics of the Bush policy. They both have a major streak of independence, a fierce patriotism born of service, deep knowledge of military and world affairs and a desire to dramatically change a disastrously failed policy.

The only thing as bad as the Senate failing to honor its constitutional role for oversight and war powers would be an endless series of party-line votes without any prospect of policy change. Read more...

Sure, House passage of a time line for withdrawal from Iraq is a huge victory for Democrats with their angry, anti-war base. But a new direction in our war in Iraq it is not. What happens next in the Senate is anyone's guess — the place is the original Mickey Mouse Club where "anything can happen and it usually does." Even if the time line somehow passes there it still faces the promised veto from President Bush.

Republicans say they too are accomplishing their short term goals, buying time as they join Bush in waiting out the surge. Months from now, new pressure will build on both parties. Some Republicans will likely have to retreat from their steadfast support of the war if the surge is not successful. Democrats will be asked for bolder action still by their base, and along the way there will be political tricks up GOP sleeves. One possible example is a Republican amendment to the Defense Appropriations bill when it hits the floor this summer to cuts all funds for the war.

But Democrats can feel good this week. Finally they have bought themselves some breathing room with their supporters, and House Speaker Nancy avoided what would have been an embarrassing defeat.