Very good point.

Does Feingold's framework actually force Bush to order the troops home, or are we just assuming he would?  

that was dishonest?

You claim that Dodd, and Dodd alone among candidates, doesn't want to wait till 2009 to change strategies.

What's your proof for this claim?

Why would you give less weight to Edwards based on this? Are you saying that he doesn't mean what he say or are you making another statement? I am seeking understand this point.

That may in fact be the greatest power congress has.

Be that as it may - defunding does not force Bush to order the troops home.  Why is it that nobody will address this point head on?  

With all due respect BTD, that's a bit of a dismissive answer, and assumptive as well.

I am extremly familiar with Reid-Feingold.  Did I misrepresent any facts?  

Though, to your last point, I think that the new campaign against the Blue Dogs might well be productive, if it actually goes anywhere. The failings on the spring supplemental battle are noted, however.

"Dodd wants to act now."

Richardson wanted to act yesterday.

Dodd has become active on Iraq as the year has gone by.  But don't in your praise of Dodd use that as a basis to criticize Richardson in an under handed way. Richardson has been leading on Iraq - just watch the last debate in Iowa.

Here is what Richardson said on Iraq last February.  He called for deauthorization of the war and removal of all troops from Iraq by the end of the year.  What was

The war in Iraq is not the disease. Iraq is a symptom. The disease is arrogance.

The next president, must be able to repair the damage that's been done to our country's reputation over the last six years. It's why experience in foreign affairs has never been more important.

But whatever you may think of a preemptive war grounded in the choice  reasoning, the clouded reasoning of a vengeful administration and a  
misled Congress, the reality is we've done in Iraq what we said we  would do.

We've rid the world of a brutal dictator. We've brought about free  and fair elections three times over.

The Iraqis now have a constitution, over 200,000 armed soldiers. They  have huge oil revenue.

It's time for our troops to leave with honor.

When it comes to this president, when it comes to this president, I  don't know how someone can be so blind to the hurt and anguish in  this country and so deaf to the will of the people.

This is not presidential greatness. This is a great tragedy. America  is better than this.

A struggle for human rights is worthy of military intervention. A true threat to our country's security is worthy of  war. But a struggle between a country's warring factions where both sides hate the United States is not worthy of one more lost American life.

. . .

You know, as someone who served in the Congress for 14 years, I know  the power they hold, should they choose to wield it. The Congress  
passed a resolution authorizing war. They need to pass another one  that overturns that authorization and brings our troops home by the  
end of this calendar year.

And you would think -- that when the Congress realized they were lied to, they would have done something about it. Well, they still can.

Once our troops are heading out, America still has a responsibility.  We still have a role to play. We have a moral responsibility to bring  
the Sunni and Shia together in a national reconciliation conference.

And we have a strategic interest in organizing a regional conference with all of Iraq's neighbors, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, NATO, but also include Syria and Iran to help stabilize Iraq.

But, more than anything else, America has a moral obligation to those Americans who have laid down their lives. A Native American kid in New Mexico perished 10 days ago, the first Pueblo Native American to die.

Some say we can't let their sacrifices be in vain, but you'll never convince me that those slain patriots would have wanted a single additional life to be lost just to validate their own sacrifice.

Instead, the moral obligation is to honor their service by bringing  their mission to a close, by ending the bloodshed and finally letting  
the Iraqi people to set their own course.

http://www.richardsonforpresident.com/ne wsroom/speeches?id=0002

Have you not read what Richardson proposed in terms of the voting on the authorization again?

Hardly - it voices like Richardson that are putting pressure on Congress to act.  

This nitpicking. I make plenty of blog posts that focus on "now". You obviously had no clue that Richardson had a focus for "now" too. I was blogging about what the candidates had presented about doing after they were president. You are trying to create a rift where there is not one, and are looking silly in the process.

Yea, you apparently missed the emphasis that Richardson has placed on de-authorizing the vote now too. Or the emphasis I have put on setting a deadline, de-authorizing the vote, cutting off the funding.

The post I made was not the only focus there is.

But how can we know what public pressue can be brought to force if the Democrats kept challenging him over and over again rather than capitulating as they have done on so many fronts? I think, and I can't speak for BTD, the flaw with your argument at least to me is that the Democrats haven't done ALL they can do. They propose things, and then try to pass them, and when that fails, they capitulate. FISA being just the latest in my mind. Where is the use of public perception like the GOP has done in the past? Where's the attempt bully Bush a bit on these issues?

is pretending deauthorization is a PRACTICAL response NOW for ending the Iraq Debadcle. I made a theoretical legal argument for why Congress can deathorize the war

here:

Would a repeal of the Iraq War Authorization be subject to Presidential veto? I believe it would not be. The argument that it would be would be based on Article 1, Section 7, of the Constitution:

Every Order, Resolution, or Vote to which the Concurrence of the Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary (except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to the President of the United States; and before the Same shall take Effect, shall be approved by him, or being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and House of Representatives, according to the Rules and Limitations prescribed in the Case of a Bill.

Admittedly, the text seems clear. Every "Vote" shall be presented to the President. The problem is the statements of the Founders. For example, James Madison:

"[I]t is necessary to adhere to the "fundamental doctrine of the Constitution that the power to declare war is fully and exclusively vested in the legislature."

And Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist 69:

"It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first General and admiral of the Confederacy; while that of the British king extends to the declaring of war and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies -- all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature."

To provide the President the power to veto a Congressional decision to <span class="caps"><span class="caps">END </span></span>a war would run contrary to what Madison and Hamilton were preaching - that a President can not maintain a state of war.  This is an occasion, in my opinion, where the plain meaning clearly runs contrary to the original understanding of the Constitution.

All that said, it seems clear to me that what Kennedy is proposing, supported legally here in Marty Lederman's unfair attack on Joe Biden, is <span class="caps"><span class="caps">NOT </span></span>consistent with  the Constitution. Lederman wrote:

"Is it really imaginable that any reasonable constitution-writers -- let alone our own Framers, suspicious as they were of unchecked executive military power -- would disable the legislature from correcting the Executive's mistake under such circumstances [such as the Iraq Debacle]?"  

The answer is no. But the Framers, in my opinion, envisioned the Congress using its power to declare and end wars, not attempt to micromanage a war. Federalist 74:

THE President of the United States is to be "commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States <span class="caps"><span class="caps">WHEN CALLED INTO THE ACTUAL SERVICE </span></span>of the United States." . . . Of all the cares or concerns of government, the direction of war most peculiarly demands those qualities which distinguish the exercise of power by a single hand. The direction of war implies the direction of the common strength; and the power of directing and employing the common strength, forms a usual and essential part in the definition of the executive authority."

The bottom line is clear. <span class="caps"><span class="caps">WHETHER </span></span>the United States enters war or <span class="caps"><span class="caps">CONTINUES </span></span>at war is the exclusive decision of the Congress. Bt the <span class="caps"><span class="caps">CONDUCT </span></span>of that specific war, subject to Congress power of military rulemaking (on torture, the <span class="caps"><span class="caps">UCMJ, </span></span>the Geneva Conventions, etc.), belongs exclusively to the President.

The Congress' power here seems clear to me. IT can <span class="caps"><span class="caps">END </span></span>the Iraq war. But it can not dictate how it is conducted on military questions. That power belongs to the President.

But theoretical legal arguments do NOTHING to actally end the war. The Spending Power is NOT theoretical. The Spending Power is accepted by ALL, including Bush, Cheney, Yoo, et al. as the effective means by which the Congress can end the war.

I do not qestion that you support NOT funding. I DO question that Richardson has made a realistic pitch or push to do anything NOW about Iraq. His promise and focus is all about 2009.

What is Richardson's focus? "Residual troops." That has nothing to do with the NOW.

And that is the point of my post.

One CAN and will play ot - the NOT funding or FUNDING issue is now front and center.

Deathorization will not be even discssed.