To follow on Jonathan's earlier post about Republicans on the war, here's a good article on how the Republicans are feeling pressure to end the war and abandon Bush.
A diverse collection of House Republicans has formed an ad hoc group to negotiate with the White House on a compromise Iraq spending bill, Politico's Ryan Grim reports. The group plans to hold talks with National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, who has been working behind the scenes to cement opposition among Republicans to the spending bill that would require U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq at some point.The group includes five Republicans, diverse in geography and ideology: Reps. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, Charles Boustany of Louisiana, Jeff Fortenberry of Nebraska, Mac Thornberry of Texas and Wayne Gilchrest of Maryland. Of the five, only Gilchrest broke with his party to support a timeline for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq.
Now, Gilchrest says the group will encourage the White House to compromise on negotiations with Syria and Iran and on setting a date for withdrawal from Iraq.
Bob Geiger has a very important post on the framing of the Iraq war debate. Bush wants to have the debate over funding, but the reality is that there is no fight over money because nearly every member of Congress voted to provide money for the military. There is only a fight about whether to end the war or to keep it going. Bush is putting pressure on his party to stay the course, and on the media to put up stories about defunding and disunity. Apparently the White House is asking reporters why they aren't covering splits among Democrats more aggressively. Bush has held six press conferences discussing funding for the war, and the whole money for the troops meme is heavily pushed by the entire right-wing edifice.
The reason is that, veto or no veto, there is no support for this war and the public supports efforts to end it. The Iraq Accountability Act was the single most important vote since the original authorization to use force, and it was a vote to end the war. If Democrats can keep putting pressure on Bush to end the war, Republicans are going to crack and abandon him. They are already having semi-public talks, leaked to the press, about how they want Bush to accept a timeline. He won't, of course, which will put Republicans into a very severe box. They can end the war, or they can leave office in 2008 as another wave washes over them.
So remember, people hate Bush and they hate this war. They support efforts to end the war, and that's what legal withdrawal timelines do. None of this has anything to do with funding, and it's time to get disciplined on that fundamental point.
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