Democrats to concentrate on 9/11 commission bill, will get to Iraq later.

Democratic leaders backed away from aggressive plans to limit President Bush's war authority, the latest sign of divisions within their ranks over how to proceed.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Monday he wanted to delay votes on a measure that would repeal the 2002 war authorization and narrow the mission in Iraq.

Senior Democrats who drafted the proposal, including Sens. Joseph Biden of Delaware and Carl Levin of Michigan, had sought swift action on it as early as this week, when the Senate takes up a measure to enact the recommendations of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission.

Reid, who will huddle with Democrats Tuesday to discuss whether to postpone the Iraq debate, cited pressure from victims' families for quick action on the Sept. 11 bill as the reason for doing so.

"Iraq is going to be there - it's just a question of when we get back to it," Reid said, predicting it would be "days, not weeks" before the Senate returned to the issue. The war reauthorization legislation also appears to lack the 60 votes it would need to pass the Senate.

"As a coach, one of the things I tell my players is to "put up or shut up," meaning that they can talk all they want about how good they are, but until they perform then it's all just words.

I feel the same way for the Democratic leadership in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. How long have we heard them make the cry "Bush lied, people died" or "This war is about oil"?

Well Mrs. Pelosi and Mrs. Clinton, and your fellow congressmen and senators, it's now time to "put up or shut up." Enough of these nonbinding resolutions.

They made the claim that this past election was about Iraq. If they and all the others who voted yes on the nonbinding resolution are so against the war, then, by all means, they should cut the funding.

They and their fellow representatives control the purse strings, so what's stopping them? If you firmly believe what they say, then they should "man up," as my players say, and prove that they are not just talk."