Since I went off on Gravel folks for his "fair tax" plan, here's for supporters of IWR "yea" folks

A "yea" vote on IWR, even in 2002 when most people thought Saddam had WMD (unless they read the UN documents thoroughly and/or listened to Scott Ritter) is still a wrongheaded, nakedly political, vote.

Before I begin let's be clear that not all "nays" came from the best place. A good example is the lionization of Bob Graham for his negative vote. Let's not forget his "nay" vote came with the caveat: "The reason is that this resolution is too timid." His statements justifying his vote, if you've read them, indicate the resolution didn't go far enough. Thanks Bob.

Next, no one should be written off exclusively for this vote. The politicians involved were rightly afraid that a vote against would be politically dangerous -in the 2002 climate-. Of course afterwards, that which seemed brave but politically suicidal became both brave and extremely wise. Also, there was little evidence that Bush would completely blow off any and all diplomatic solutions, especially based on his comments in the 2000 debates. Trusting Bush to that extent however should remain a black mark on any politician's record. It shouldn't totally debase all else in a politician's career, however.

Now for the problems of the IWR. No president should be trusted with such open-ended power, and Congress has to be weaned off ceding its Consitutional responsibilities to the Executive Branch. The authorization was not limited to Iraq, nor was it limited to the enforcement of existing UN resolutions. This sort of open-ended authorization is incredibly dangerous. The Biden/Lugar bill at least would have remitted most of the open-endedness of the bill, so support for that is good to note.

Second, the president made a propagandistic, emotional, but necessarily fact-starved case for war, especially considering this was a preemptive war. Not quite being convinced by that shaky case was a sign of intelligence, caution, and the general ability to remain unswayed by some very strong political winds. "But Bush needed the threat of force to compel Saddam to cooperate!" Fine. In that case Congress should itself have legislated itself the right to decide whether or not Saddam was being cooperative pursuant to its constitutional duties rather than having a single man and his administration fulfill that role. While Biden-Lugar had some fig-leaf accountability requirements (various reports required to Congress, etc.), it was not particularly good in this area either.

Make sense? So support those candidates all you wish, but let's not try to justify a very wrongheaded "yea" on the IWR. Don't totally write those people off, either, though. It's not wholly a black and white issue.

"also, there was little evidence that Bush would completely blow off any and all diplomatic solutions"

I believe that completely ignores the reality of that time. EVERYONE knew that Bush couldn't wait to get his war going. EVERYONE. He had a couple hundred thousand troops in the area, bribed a few countries to be a 'coalition partner', including many who refused to be named publicly, tried desperately to get the UN to sanction it and when they wouldn't pulled a temper tantrum and did it anyway.

Anyone who thinks Bush wasn't determined to invade Iraq when the IWR vote took place was asleep.

Such as this from September of that year:

Bush was saying he had no intention of going to war at that time, that the IWR was not a vote for war. It is clear that he was lying now that we have the DSM, the conversion of funds from Afghanistan to Iraq, and Tommy Franks' orders to create a war plan that included a quiet build-up, which was actually being implemented while Bush was saying the stuff below. It's impossible to make the case to impeach the man on war lies while also saying Congress knew everything Bush did, because if that's true, there were no lies and no impeachment. I believe the Bushies lied and that some people didn't believe the lies, which is an entirely different thing than "knowing" the truth.



Sept 7, 2002

Its my honor to welcome the Prime Minister back to Camp David. I look forward to spending a good three hours talking to our friend about how to keep the peace.


Sept 10, 2002

"I'll make the case of how I think we ought to proceed, on how we work together to keep the peace."


Sept 19, 2002

"I am sending suggested language for a resolution. I want -- I've asked for Congress' support to enable the administration to keep the peace...If you want to keep the peace, you've got to have the authorization to use force. But it's -- this will be -- this is a chance for Congress to indicate support. It's a chance for Congress to say, we support the administration's ability to keep the peace. That's what this is all about."



Sept 23, 2002

"I believe we can achieve peace. Oh, I know the kids hear all the war rhetoric and tough talk, and that's necessary to send a message."



Sept 27, 2002

"I'm willing to give peace a chance to work... People who are willing to work with us to send a clear message to the world, a unified message, a strong resolution which defines our vision for peace... I want you to know that behind the rhetoric of war is a deep desire for peace."



Sept 28, 2002

"I want to thank members of both political parties in the Congress for working on a strong statement of resolve that the world will see. Members of both political parties have worked together with the -- with members of my staff, to develop a statement that shows our determination and our desire to keep the peace<"



Oct 7, 2002

"Approving this resolution does not mean that military action is imminent or unavoidable. The resolution will tell the United Nations, and all nations, that America speaks with one voice."

In fact, no president should have that much power.

Your point there is useless. Get what I mean? True and a lesson we should pass on to our kids, but in terms of holding Bush accountable, useless.

That is my key frustration wtih the "voted for the war" people - as long as they say Congress knew, then Bush didn't lie to Congress, and there's no reason to impeach.

Should Congress assume that the President is playing politics with things like "impending mushroom clouds"? Would we want our Democratic President hamstrung by a Congress who wouldn't allow him to legitimately react to a gathering threat? I don't think so. We had to assume good intentions on the part of this administration. In hindsight, we now understand that this was about the control of the oil in the ME and domestic consolidation of power by the Republican Party...but a lot of that stuff didn't get exposed prior to the IWR. We smelled a rat at DU, but it was only an educated hunch....if I were a US Senator, would I want to vote "No" on the IWR and then explain to my constituents my vote if another attack was sucessful?

I could see such an attack completely wiping out the Democratic Party as the media would have had Karl Roves talking points on the "Party of Saddam Appeasers" as soon as the smoke started to clear.

We had to assume no such thing. I don't give any yea votes a pass, because invasion without "armed attack" is illegal under the UN Charter. The specific wording was given a lot of thought, specifically to avoid tragedies like this. With the neocons clamoring to hold up UNSCR's as justification, any Senator/Rep could have simply used that fact to explain their "no" vote.

They're all pathetic.

I still think that the vote was timed for the November midterm. If the Dems had come out strong against the war resolution, I remember wondering if we'd have another "event" planned to frame Saddam and completely nuetralize the Democrats. We hadn't even had a formal public investigation into 9/11 at that point. I put nothing past this ssyndicate of criminals...I really think they wanted to destroy the opposition at home and the Democrats didn't give them that option.

Regime change wasn't the UN's position. It was the Bush Administration's.

Offering Saddam elections and "economic liberty" (ie provatization and deregulation) - ie overthrow - was hardly a recipe for a deal.

This was invasion talk.

We didn't need to pick apart the speeches: all the signs were there.

being on DU, faxing, writing letters and emailing dozens of congresscritters.

Everyone KNEW it was war. They KNEW it. His hard on was obvious.

Your memory may be different. I know about what I remember, because I remember Viet Fucking Nam and I knew it was gonna be the same goddamend thing all fucking over again

Reminds me of Sen. Byrd's impassioned attempt to wake up his complacent Congressional colleagues:

... if we are going to make it a blank check, let's make it a blank check right upfront, without all of these flowery fig leaves of "whereas" clauses, and simply say that the president has this power. Give it to him and we will put up a sign on the top of this Capitol: "Out of business." "Gone home." "Gone fishing."

that would support the ""The reason is that this resolution is too timid." His statements justifying his vote, if you've read them, indicate the resolution didn't go far enough. Thanks Bob." statement in your OP? Thanks!


"Five of the nine Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee, including Graham and Durbin, ultimately voted against the resolution, but they were unable to convince other committee members or a majority in the Senate itself. This was at least in part because they were not allowed to divulge what they knew: While Graham and Durbin could complain that the administration's and Tenet's own statements contradicted the classified reports they had read, they could not say what was actually in those reports." http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/unmovic/2003/0630selling.htm


Frontline Interview with Bob Graham:

Here's the start of his statement:



http://cns.miis.edu/cr/021014sd.htm