Steny Hoyer has never been committed to ending the war and he isn’t about to start now.
Hoyer struck a pragmatic tone, pushing for Congress to adjourn for the year by the end of next week. He suggested that Democrats need to divorce their goal of ending the war from the battle over funding.
“We have to get to a point where the American public more clearly perceives our policy position and is not confused by whether or not the Democrats intend to support the troops that we’ve sent to Iraq. I don’t think there’s an option on that,” Hoyer said.
You might think you know what that means. Hoyer is saying we have no choice but to give no-strings-attached supplemental funding for the war in Iraq because, otherwise, the American people will be confused about whether we support the troops that ‘we’ve sent to Iraq’. Give him ‘A’s’ for Cowardice and False Dichotomies and a ‘F’ in Framing. It’s actually worse than you know. And it’s going to be incredibly ugly. A car wreck.
House Democratic leaders could complete work as soon as Monday on a half-trillion-dollar spending package that will include billions of dollars for the war effort in Iraq without the timelines for the withdrawal of combat forces that President Bush has refused to accept, House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) said yesterday.
In a complicated deal over the war funds, Democrats will include about $11 billion more in domestic spending than Bush has requested, emergency drought relief for the Southeast and legislation to address the subprime mortgage crisis, Hoyer told a meeting of the Washington Post editorial board.
If the bargain were to become law, it would be the third time since Democrats took control of Congress that they would have failed to force Bush to change course in Iraq and continued to fund a war that they have repeatedly vowed to end. But it would also be the clearest instance yet of the president bowing to a Democratic demand for more money for domestic priorities, an increase that he had promised to reject.
“The way you pass appropriations bills is you get agreement among all the relevant players, among which the president with his veto pen is a very relevant player,” Hoyer said. “Everybody knows he has no intention of signing anything without money for Iraq, unfettered, without constraints. I think that’s ultimately going to be the result.”
How is it going to work?
The Democrats plan to take a three-step approach to completing the deal. House leaders are considering an initial allotment of about $30 billion, ostensibly for the war in Afghanistan and some other military needs, which all sides in the deal recognize could be shifted to fund the Iraq war.
Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) then would allow Republicans to increase that amount to avert a filibuster of the spending bill in the Senate. The goal of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is $70 billion for the war, more than the $50 billion short-term funding that House Democrats initially proposed but far less than the $196 billion Bush has sought.
The Senate-passed bill would then go to the House for final approval.
Step One: pretend the money you are appropriating is for Afghanistan, even though everyone agrees it is really for Iraq. This is a concession to the Democrats because it allows them to pretend that they are not appropriating money for Iraq.
Step Two: the Republicans threaten to filibuster, so the Democrats cave in and increase the funding for the war in Afghanistan Iraq.
Step Three: the President agrees to sign appropriations bills that he had previously threatened to veto.
It’s a swiss fucking watch, Walter…how could anything go wrong?
Start with the fact that we’re not stupid. No one is going to fall for the idea that this money is really for Afghanistan, nor are they going to fall for the initial sum. It’s not much of a concession at all by the Republicans. It’s a total cave in by the Democrats in return for a paltry $11 billion in domestic spending.
At least, that’s the plan. Except for a couple of problems. The Democrats in the House are going to hate this ‘grand strategy’ and huge numbers of them are going to refuse to vote for the bill. The Republicans in the House are going to hate it and huge numbers of them are going to vote against the bill.
At a White House meeting this week, McConnell presented the proposal to Bush, but House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) urged the president to reject it…
“I am adamantly opposed to it,” Boehner said Thursday. “I came here to hold the line on spending, not to raise it.”
The ‘deal’ would sell out House Republicans very badly. Their entire strategy has been to hold the line on increased spending and prevent the Democrats from passing anything. Any deal that allows the Democrats to pass their appropriations bills with increased spending (however paltry) allows the Dems to tick off their accomplishments and avoid the ‘do-nothing’ label that they can’t achieve any results. Yet, the whiff of money is like nectar to Republicans.
Democratic leadership aides expressed confidence that Boehner and Blunt will not be able to keep enough Republicans away from a bill that funds the war, popular domestic programs and their own pet projects, known as earmarks. With a long holiday break beckoning, few lawmakers will be in the mood for a protracted standoff.
You see, the key is not just to give the Republicans all the money they want for Iraq, but to pay them off with lucrative pet project money to get them to vote for the money. Isn’t that brilliant? And it just might work.
A bunch of cowardly Democrats will vote for the Iraq funding and a bunch of greedy Republicans will join them. And between the two, the president will get everything he wants.
Will this actually happen?
Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) vowed last month to oppose any additional money for the Iraq war that does not come with a timeline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. In talks this week with White House Chief of Staff Joshua B. Bolten and White House budget chief Jim Nussle, Reid signaled that he could accept the McConnell deal, according to Senate Democratic aides. But Pelosi is uncommitted, spokesman Nadeam Elshami said.
Now, I know the Democrats would like to get their spending bills done and go sing Christmas carols with their families. And Hoyer is right that the president does not intend to sign anything that has strings attached, nor give the Dems any of their spending priorities. But I ask Hoyer…who the hell do you think you are dealing with?
Washington D.C. is now officially a crime scene. The White House should be roped off with yellow tape to preserve the evidence.
We have a criminal regime running our country and all you can think to do is to throw more money at them. Congratulations.
This strategy is going to rip the Democratic caucus apart and create some rather severe riptides in the presidential primaries.
And where are our “fearless” leaders? Especially the ones running for leadership of the entire country? Do Clinton and Biden and Dodd think that supporting a lie: “funding for cough Afghanistan cough” shows character? Do they think that throwing more gazillions of dollars at an illegal war that not even the military supports anymore is justified? Why???
If they are so afraid that they’ll be called cowards, perhaps they are COWARDS!!!
I don’t vote for cowards. Or liars.
ANY senator can place a hold on a bill. Clinton could, if she wanted to actually do her job. Biden could act. Dodd claims to support the Constitution, why doesn’t he yank some of the congressional powers back?
How about no additional so-called “EMERGENCY” appropriations for the military since we are 6 years into this bloody war, and the military ought to be able to balance war needs in the annual budget request.
Furthermore, how about cutting the appropriation by all missing moneys, equipment, overcharges, bribes, and scams, etc.?
If a billion dollars worth of equipment is missing, cut a billion out of the budget and tell the military to go find their lost tanks and missing machine guns! I bet they’d record serial numbers if there was a penalty for losing stuff! The DoD charges the poor wounded soldiers if they don’t bring the rifles and helmets back as they get airlifted from the killing fields, so let’s charge the colonels and generals for losing gear.
If the contractors on the no-bid contracts (Halliburton, etc.) charge and don’t deliver, or overcharge, cut the budget. You’d get more oversight if the military didn’t have unlimited money to toss on the pallets in their warplanes.
So far, Kucinich is the only candidate who has shown courage, and determination, and right-headedness on various issues.
hey Boo- did you think this post through all by yourself? I gotta tell ya, it is Brilliant.And tragically, you are probably correct. What we have is, in reality, a one party system in this country now. There are a few inconsequential folks in congress that are basically there for entertainment.
I have come to the conclusion that until the the people get tired of simply eating crumbs, there will be zero change in the direction that this country in moving in. Tragically, the ability of the current power structure, with its lock on the media will be the cause of this countrys destruction and it will bring on a violent shattering of this country.
well Boo, in a strange kind of way, I hope you are spot on….
a good ripping might be just the spark that is needed to wake some people up..
and give us a real good look at which candidate is real..that will show in the vote 😉
time…it’s a ticking thing..
Should we stockpile food and weapons? Nobody knows what to do.
Well, having survived both a train wreck and a car wreck – I can tell you that often the recovery time is measured in decades, not hours.
run that yellow tape cordon around the senate and the house too. just one more example of how dysfunctional, and unresponsive to the wishes of the people, our government has become.
it’s not just hoyer and his bff rahm who haven’t committed. there’s more than enough complicity, within the demoRat party, to go around.
this will, no doubt, pass; and if we’re fortunate enough to even get the opportunity to have a ‘town hall’ with our reps, we’ll get another whine and much gnashing of teeth over their inability to accomplish anything ’cause of the big ol meanie chimpy. [the guy who 70% of the country wants gone…yesterday wouldn’t have been too soon.]
reid and pelosi will cave, the kabuki will continue, and the lemmings will continue their inescapable journey towards the face of the cliff.
personally, l hope this causes a tsunami in the caucus and the primaries, and sinks clinton and obama both.
lTMF’sA
I thought at the time that Pelosi was making a mistake to support Murtha over Hoyer. Now I wish she had succeded. This guy is a world class sellout prick.
What a F’ing tool Hoyer is.
You can understand Steny Hoyer on foreign policy if you understand his devotion to AIPAC. Just Google some of his AIPAC speeches.
AIPAC gave Pelosi quite a booing when in her speech she proposed withdrawing from Iraq. Steny Hoyer never made that mistake, of going against the grain of Neocon venturing, which is what Iraq is all about. Don’t expect any changes concerning Iraq when a Democratic administration and Congress come into being in 2008.
The enemy is us, and that will not change with a flip in power.
I still can’t get my head around the idea that we’re their enemy, but I have finally accepted that they are not by any stretch of the imagination our friends, not the tiniest bit.
and Boehner said he came to stop spending? I thought he was around for the 90’s….
As for Hoyer, he has become more of a problem that even I thought – a Rahm size problem. What can be done about him?
BooMan’s right. You really do have to admire this deal, the way one has to “admire” the efficiency and efficacy of the Black Plague in the Middle Ages.
The GOP gets to play the “compassionate conservative” and “fiscally reponsible” cards. The Dems get to claim the “populist champion” and “resist the war” titles. Bush picks up “Decider’s legacy” and “cut through the crap” points.
Plus there’s a healthy round of pork for all. It really is brilliant. The only losers here are of course the American voting public, but we long ago ceased to really matter to these folks.
it’s men like hoyer that make me hate the democratic party. if there were any sense to the people in the country, they’d rope off the entire area from the white house to congress and the supreme court and round ’em all up, put ’em on trial, demorats and republicans alike and be done with it.
intellectuals left and right love to talk and write but nothing of substance comes out of that swamp of a town since godknowswhen. mid60s at the latest.
don’t expect me to vote or empower for any of these clowns until they end this war and the torture once and for all. even if some of them are decent people blah blah blah