The Blue State

Gates: Iraq resolution "emboldens the enemy"

During a press conference today, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates insisted that Congress was emboldening the terrorists by passing a non-binding resolution against Bush's Iraq escalation plan.  Watch here:

According to Gates, the resolution says the "general going out to take command in the arena shouldn't have the resources he thinks he needs to be successful."

Actually, that is not what the resolution says at all (hint: non-binding resolutions don't take resources away from anyone).  Read the resolution yourself:

Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), That it is the sense of Congress that_

(1)it is not in the national interest of the United States to deepen itsmilitary involvement in Iraq, particularly by increasing the UnitedStates military force presence in Iraq;

(2) theprimary objective of United States strategy in Iraq should be to havethe Iraqi political leaders make the political compromises necessary toend the violence in Iraq;

(3) greater concertedregional, and international support would assist the Iraqis inachieving a political solution and national reconciliation;

(4)main elements of the mission of United States forces in Iraq shouldtransition to helping ensure the territorial integrity of Iraq, conductcounterterrorism activities, reduce regional interference in theinternal affairs of Iraq, and accelerate training of Iraqi troops;

(5)the United States should transfer, under an appropriately expeditedtimeline, responsibility for internal security and halting sectarianviolence in Iraq to the Government of Iraq and Iraqi security forces;and

(6) the United States should engage nationsin the Middle East to develop a regional, internationally-sponsoredpeace and reconciliation process for Iraq.

At no place in the resolution did it say Congress would cut off funds for anyone.  It appears as though the new Secretary of Defense is picking up where Donald Rumsfeld left off -- painting anyone that challenges Bush's war policy as an enemy of the troops.  That tactic is getting old.

(Video) Evan Bayh on Gates hearings

Democratic presidential candidate Evan Bayh (Sen-IN) went on Fox News today and discussed his take on Robert Gates, Bush's nominee for Secretary of Defense.

I couldn't tell whether Evan Bayh was whispering because he didn't want to interrupt the hearing behind him, or if he just normally speaks that way.  I think he speaks that way.

Robert Gates on board of voting machine company

Not that this really means anything.  Just interesting.  Black Box Voting notes on the connection between Bush's nominee to become the next Secretary of Defense and the largest voting company:

Gates was on the board ofdirectors of VoteHere, a strange little company that was the biggestelections industry lobbyist for the Help America Vote Act (HAVA).VoteHere spent more money than ES&S, Diebold, and Sequoia combinedto help ram HAVA through. And HAVA, of course, was a bill sponsored byby convicted Abramoff pal Bob Ney and K-street lobbyist buddy StenyHoyer. HAVA put electronic voting on steroids.

Black Box Voting labels Steny Hoyer as a "K-street lobbyist buddy?"  That's interesting.  No wonder Pelosi wants Murtha as the Majority Leader instead of Hoyer; Hoyer might try to stall Pelosi's bill that would crack down on interactions between lobbyists and members of Congress.

How Senate Democrats should respond to Robert Gates nomination

Although his confirmation will certainly go a lot smoother than if Donald Rumsfeld were re-applying for the Defense Secretary job, Robert Gates could face a few stumbling blocks with Senate Democrats -- and rightfully so.  They are expected to question him about his involvement in the Iran contra cover-up and one instance where he intentionally gave false intelligence about the alleged plot to assassinate the pope while he was CIA Director.

Congressional Quarterly highlights Gates' controversial past:

And it wasn’t the first time he’d been nominated for the post — or his first dose of trouble in the spotlight.

In early 1987, his role in the so-called Iran-Contra affair, asecret White House operation to sell weapons to radical Islamic Iran inexchange for the release of U.S. hostages — and cash for CIA-backedrebels in Nicaragua — came under scrutiny.

Gates withdrew his nomination in the face of sure rejection.

Then, in during his 1991 nomination hearings to run the CIA, Gatesran into a buzz saw of testimony from a former agency analyst who saidthat during the 1980s Gates had skewered intelligence to fit theconvictions of senior Reagan administration officials that Sovietagents had concocted a plot to assassinate the pope and were arming andencouraging Marxist revolutionary groups to carry out terrorist attacks.

At the same time, it is not standard Senate procedure to block a nominee unless he or she is seriously unqualified for the job or has a track-record of failure.  Gates, although he is from the right side of the spectrum, is quite qualified -- from what we know now.  Maybe Senators might find something else about him, although I highly doubt it.

My guess is that the Democrats will live to fight another battle, since there are certainly a lot of them left to be fought -- the way forward in Iraq, minimum wage, Pell grants, port security, stem cells, and deficit reduction.  In other words, if the Democrats want be taken seriously by many Americans who voted against the Republicans a few nights ago for the first time ever, they might want to choose their battles wisely.  That does not mean being weak.  It means acting like an older brother to the President.  Compliment him when he does something right -- such as removing a neocon mimicker like Rumsfeld and replacing him with a realist like Gates; yet putting him into a corner when he does something stupid -- like continuing to side with the pharmaceutical industry on staying the course when it comes to high prescription drug prices.