I don’t want to pick on TPM Reader DP, but his email exemplifies the reader emails coming in suggesting that Sen. Harry Reid’s support for a temporary increase in the number of U.S. troops in Iraq is either a clever political move or a move that Reid has no choice but to make:
I just want to send my qualified agreement with your readers who say that, as a tactical move, Reid should be supporting this temporary increase in troops. Somehow over the last six years our national debate over matters of life and death have been reduced to stupid slogans and 2 dimensional ideas. That’s the “facts on the ground” we have to deal with. Dems have to give the Commander/Decider in Chief every resource he asks for during this “last effort.” Opposing it will not prevent it from happening but it will make it harder for Dems to then clearly demonstrate that victory is not going to happen.
In the fantasy world I like to live in, Dems could repeat all the intelligent and nuanced arguments that demonstrate without a doubt that the war is lost and it’s time to leave and Bush would back down in the face of the country rising against him. In the real world, if Reid does anything more at this moment than say “I disagree with his tactics but will give him the resources he needs” then it will be much more difficult in three months to force real change. The political reality, as awful as it is, is that Bush had an opportunity after the elections to take a mandate for change and do whatever he wanted with it. He chose a stupid route, but what can we do about it?
There are any number of problems with this reasoning, both politically and substantively, not the least of which is the assumption that Bush will send additional troops (check), it won’t work (check), and then he’ll be forced to begin a large-scale withdrawal of U.S. forces (right–just like he was going to be forced to do after the Democrats took Congress and after the ISG report).
On the political side, 71% of Americans disapprove of Bush’s handling of Iraq. Why are Democrats still looking for political cover?
