Democrats vs. the Peace Movement

The U.S. Congress failed in recent weeks to take even symbolic steps to encourage a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, even though the majority of Americans support an end to the war. Many anti-war advocates are hoping that the mid-term U.S. elections in November will push Congress into Democratic hands and thereby increase the chances of ending the war. Don't hold your breath.

The Democratic leadership of both the House and Senate supports continued funding of the Iraq war and has been reluctant to force the Bush administration to set even a tentative deadline for the withdrawal of American troops. Indeed, the Democrats -- who controlled the Senate in 2002 -- share responsibility with the Republicans for creating the tragic conflict in Iraq by voting to authorize the invasion in the first place. The majority of Democratic senators as well as the Democratic leadership of both houses gave President George W. Bush free rein to invade Iraq at the time and circumstances of his choosing in direct violation of the United Nations Charter, which the United States is legally obliged to uphold. These pro-war Democrats teamed up with the Bush administration to mislead the American public by making a series of false claims regarding the ongoing presence of "weapons of mass destruction" (WMDs) in Iraq and the "threat" supposedly posed by that government.

Just as a solid majority of Congress members blindly supported the Bush administration's lies about WMDs, they now blindly support the Bush administration's argument that the United States must continue prosecuting a counter-insurgency war that has taken the lives of more than 2,500 Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis, primarily civilians.

As a result, Congress will not likely stop the war -- unless the anti-war movement forces it to do so.

In Search of Democratic Backbone

On June 15, the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly defeated a resolution calling for the withdrawal of American combat forces from Iraq by the end of this year. Only six of the 100 senators voted in favor of the resolution, even though public opinion polls indicate that the majority of Americans and the vast majority of Democrats nationwide support such a deadline. Furthermore, a recent Le Moyne College/Zogby International poll revealed that 72% of U.S. troops serving in Iraq believe that the United States should end its operations in that country by the end of 2006, thereby giving the Democrats a concrete way of demonstrating that they "support the troops."

During the same week, the House of Representatives, by a 256-153 vote, claimed that the ongoing war in Iraq was part of the "war on terror" and explicitly declared that "it is not in the national security interest of the United States to set an arbitrary date for the withdrawal or redeployment of United States Armed Forces from Iraq." Forty-two Democrats joined all but three Republicans in supporting the resolution. Although the former Iraqi regime rid the country of WMDs years earlier, allowed UN inspectors to return to verify dismantlement, and maintained no ties to al-Qaida or other Islamic extremists, the House resolution claimed that the deposed government "constituted a threat against global peace and security and was in violation of mandatory United Nations Security Council Resolutions" and "supported terrorists."

Faced with a lack of support in the Senate for a withdrawal of American forces by the end of the year, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts put forward a resolution the following week calling for a withdrawal by July 1, 2007. The Democratic leadership reportedly put enormous pressure on Kerry to withdraw even this tepid resolution from consideration, but the bill went to the floor anyway. Kerry's bill was also soundly defeated, with no Republican senators and only 13 of the 44 Democratic senators voting in favor. The 87% of the Senate that believes U.S. forces in Iraq can stay indefinitely is also the percentage of Iraqis who want the United States to have a timetable for departure -- but the sentiments of Iraqis have never been of particular concern for American politicians of either party.