An AP report on a Iraq proposal spearheaded by Sen. Byrd:

Senate Democrats have drafted a $121.5 billion war spending bill that would direct President Bush to begin bringing home troops from Iraq with the goal of ending U.S. combat missions there in just over a year.

But unlike that resolution, Democrats think the spending legislation has a much better chance of passing. Sen. Ben Nelson, a Democrat who voted against last week's resolution, has agreed to support the spending legislation because it includes a provision he wants outlining benchmarks for the Iraqi government.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., released details to panel members Wednesday in anticipation of a committee vote on the bill on Thursday.

(Emphasis supplied.) The key point for me is whether the funding is to the date certain Byrd specifies March 31, 2008. If it is, I think it likely that I could strongly support such a measure. I'll remind those who have not understood my views on the flip.

As usual, I speak for me only

Last week I asked for the following -- Out of Iraq Blogger Caucus or Idiot Liberals of the World Unite! The response has been overwhelming . . . Ok, actually, a few bloggers do agree with me. They are, along with other organizations:Peace Action; United for Peace; Military Families Speak Out; Insitritute for Public Accuracy; Code Pink; Democracy Rising; True Majority; Labor Against the War; PDA;Drawing the Line; Take It Personally; edger; Just A Bump in the Beltway; afterdowningstreet.org; democrats.com; NION; downwithtyranny; My Left Wing; propaganda press, as well as some FPers at daily kos, and the previously mentioned corrente and Gun Toting Liberal. I am sure there are others. I just do not know who they are.

Via Democrats.com:

Call your members of Congress now toll free at 800-828-0498, 800-459-1887 or 800-614-2803.

Progressives are saps. Blue Dogs know how to fight better. Case in point:

The Blue Dogs get an Iraq funding bill tailored for them and one of their leaders says:

Tanner, the Blue Dog representative on the chief deputy whip's team, had been undecided until yesterday morning. Now that he is on board, he hastened to add that he is not about to start leaning on his Blue Dog colleagues. "I don't ask people to vote on the leadership's behalf, particularly on a vote like this," he said.

A progressive, who got figuratively spat on by the Dem leadership, says:

Schakowsky, like Waters, is one of nine chief deputy whips, and her early statements of opposition had stunned leaders. She pledged yesterday to press liberal members of the House Out of Iraq Caucus and Progressive Caucus to fall into line.

As always, I speak only for me

In an e-mail to its members (except me, I got neither the one to vote on the House bill, or this latest), Move On says:

Some of you have asked whether we support the Lee Amendment, a proposal that would accelerate the end of the war. Of course we do—we'd love for the proposal to bring our troops home sooner, and MoveOn members are pretty clear on that point. We've been fighting for as strong a bill as possible. Right now, the Lee Amendment is not being offered, but if it comes up, we'll definitely encourage Congress to vote for it.

If you support funding the war through September 2008 (which mean funding it past that because only a fool thinks the Congress will cut off funding 2 months befoe an election) you do NOT support the Lee Amendment. This is just nonsense from Move On. The Lee Amendment would be moot if the House funding bill becomes law. Let's hope it does not so Move On can ACTUALLY support the Lee Amendment.

Previously, I noted that the rationale behind the House bill seems to me to be Ending the Iraq Debacle . . . After the 2008 Election. I think this post, along with Move On's ironic ad evidence my point:

In a recent vote, the Republican members of the House Appropriations Committee unanimously opposed requiring that the troops sent to Iraq be properly prepared for their mission and protected with armor. Again.

But does the House proposal "require[] that the troops sent to Iraq be properly prepared . . ."? Uh no, as the SAME blogger aptly pointed out:

At the moment, it appears that the political calculus hinges on what happens with those "teeth." That is, the leadership's math goes like this: they figure they get and keep more Blue Dog votes by removing the ability to enforce the benchmarks than they lose from the Progressive Caucus, who think the president can't be trusted and will game the benchmarks and continue to humiliate and embarrass Congressional Democrats. So as things stand now, the language is out, because by the leadership's count, there were more Blue Dogs at least implicitly threatening to vote against a bill that included it than there were Progressive Caucus members threatening to vote against a bill that excluded it.

The enforcement language is out says this blogger. But we can STILL beat up on Republicans. Dems will end the Iraq Debacle, we are told, but AFTER the 2008 elections.

As usual, I speak for me only

Let me first be clear on this - John Murtha is NOT the problem with the House Dems. But his post at Huffington Post is not favorable for the proposed House supplemental funding bill. I think it is actually an indictment:

. . . We must insist that before we send our battle weary warriors back into intense combat, we give them the time they need to rest and reconstitute and the time they deserve to spend with family and loved ones.

During this year, the Bush Administration has requested $1 trillion for the Department of Defense. $9 billion a month is being expended for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan . . . Over 3,200 of our sons and daughters have lost their lives in Iraq and close to 25,000 have been wounded, to include thousands of traumatic brain injuries and hundreds of limb amputations.

. . . Meanwhile in Iraq the situation remains dire. Benchmarks established by this Administration are elusive and routinely ignored.

. . . After four years of incompetence and mismanagement, this Administration must come to the realization that Iraq's civil war can only be solved by the Iraqi people and that stability in Iraq can only be accomplished when U.S. and coalition forces end the occupation and redeploy.

Hard then to justify the House bill's funding of the Iraq Debacle through September 2008 in the face of that Representative Murtha. As you say, Bush routinely ignores benchmarks. He'll certainly ignore the House's.

And if you want to picket, you want to protest, you want to disrupt my life - better my life [in my spacious DC office] is disrupted than the lives of these men and women in uniform [fighting and dying in Iraq].

-Senator Barbara Mikulski (thanks Barb)

Booman is misled by the repeating of false GOP talking points from Senator Mikulski on the Iraq defunding debate and now uses the Beltway position to articulate his views. I stand with Russ Feingold:

Keeping our brave troops in Iraq indefinitely is having a devastating impact on our national security and military readiness.

That's why I have consistently advocated that we set a timetable to redeploy our troops from Iraq. But the president refuses to set a timetable, even though the American people soundly rejected his Iraq policy in November. Instead, the president has announced he wants to send approximately 20,000 more troops.

. . . We can't afford to wait any longer. Congress must use its main power - the power of the purse - to put an end to our involvement in the war in Iraq. . . . As the president made clear Wednesday night, he has no intention of redeploying our troops from Iraq. Congress cannot continue to accept this.

. . . Some [like Dem Sen. Mikulski and Booman] will claim that cutting off funding for the war would endanger our brave troops on the ground. Not true. The safety of our service men and women in Iraq is paramount, and we can and should end funding for the war without putting our troops in further danger.

Congress will continue to give our troops the resources and support they need, but by, for example, specifying a time after which funding for the war would end, it can give the president the time needed to redeploy troops safely from Iraq.

I speak only for me of course

From Greg Sargent:

MoveOn's Washington director, Tom Matzzie just confirmed to me that despite earlier concerns that the House Dem leadership's Iraq plan wasn't tough enough, the organization yesterday started polling its members and has decided to back the legislation . . . "We asked all 3.2 million of our members to weigh in, and 80 percent back the plan," Matzzie says, adding that he didn't have exact numbers on how many members had voted. "Our view is, this is a choice between Republicans who want endless war and Democrats who want a safe, responsible end to the war."

Well, this is just stuff and nonsense. The House bill will not end the war in September 2008 as proclaimed. That simply is false. What it does do is fund the war until that date when the Congress will vote more money, as any sane person realizes they will, 2 months before an election.

The Taliban has taken credit for the suicide bombing next to a motorcade of U.S. Embassy officials in Kabul.

Joe Mellott, a US embassy spokesman, told the AP news agency that several American embassy officials were wounded in the incident, one seriously. He confirmed that Ronald Neumann, the US Ambassador, was not in the convoy.

Local police later confirmed that a 15-year-old passerby had died in the blast, while several civilians were injured.

In a typically very good post, Atrios reminds us of the years of pronouncements from the Wise Men on Iraq:

. . . [T]he Very Serious People in Washington, as represented by Fred Hiatt, are still all for sending other people off to die to find the pony they know is there. The editorial the Post had out yesterday will be recycled for next year's anniversary, with little changed.

And on and on.

...A year ago, David Ignatius told us in the Post:

[. . .] [T]his is the way this war is supposed to be going. It's a few years late, but the new U.S. strategy is moving in the right direction.

. . . Jim Hoagland told us:

[. . .] U.S. troops will be moving out of Iraq's streets and then out of Iraq's cities by the end of this year as part of a coordinated drawing down and concentration of all foreign forces. . . . This is what Bush calls Iraqis standing up to allow Americans to stand down.

But I have a nit to pick with Atrios and the Netroots generally. Which I will do on the other side.

Four years ago, on March 19, 2003, the United States launched it war against Iraq. In his announcement speech, Bush said,

We are going to apply decisive force. "We are going to carry on our work of peace."

On March 21, mass protests occurred in the U.S. In San Francisco, 1,350 people were arrested.

We're still there, fighting a civil war. More than 3,000 of our troops have died.

Something is very wrong with this picture, and I say it's President Bush.

I always suspected this was the real strategy behind the House Dems' Iraq proposal. But Matt Stoller makes it explicit:

My strategic end goal is to end the war. To do that involves a process of showing that the Democratic caucus is unified behind putting restrictions on Bush and his ability to fight the war, and then using that pressure to remove Republicans (and wayward Democrats) from office in 2008.

All the blather about communications strategies and making the war illegal, etc. was just so much talk. But at least Stoller is now forthright about it. Read what a DemHillStaffer writes on the other side.