The Democrats Go To War
Unfortunately, that war is on their political enemies, particularly the president. The Opinion Journal is less than impressed with the behavior of the Democratic party leadership in Congress and once again sounds the alarm that media cover for the Democrats will not be forthcoming.
Democrats took Congress last fall in part by opposing the war in Iraq, but it is becoming clear that they view their election as a mandate for something far more ambitious–to wit, promoting and executing their own foreign policy, albeit without the detail of a Presidential election.
Their intentions were made plain this week with two remarkable acts by their House and Senate leaders. Majority Leader Harry Reid endorsed Senator Russ Feingold's proposal to withdraw from Iraq immediately, cutting off funds entirely within a year. He promised a vote soon, as part of what the Washington Post reported would also be a Democratic offensive to close Guantanamo, reinstate legal rights for terror suspects, and improve relations with Cuba.
Meanwhile, Speaker Nancy Pelosi made her now famous sojourn to Syria, donning a head scarf and advertising that she was conducting shuttle diplomacy between Jerusalem and Damascus. If there was any doubt that her trip was intended as far more than a routine Congressional "fact-finding" trip, House Foreign Affairs Chairman Tom Lantos put it to rest by declaring that, "We have an alternative Democratic foreign policy. I view my job as beginning with restoring overseas credibility and respect for the United States."
Americans should understand how extraordinary this is. There have been previous battles over U.S. foreign policy and fierce domestic criticism. In the 1990s, these columns defended Bill Clinton against "the Republican drift toward isolationism and political opportunism" amid the Kosovo conflict. But rarely in U.S. history have Congressional leaders sought to conduct their own independent diplomacy, with the Speaker acting as a Prime Minister traveling with a Secretary of State in the person of Mr. Lantos.
Yes, Congressional Republicans have visited Syria too. But Ms. Pelosi isn't some minority back-bencher. Without a Democrat in the White House, she and Mr. Reid are the national leaders of their party. Even Newt Gingrich, for all his grand domestic ambitions in 1995, took a muted stand on foreign policy, realizing that in the American system the executive has the bulk of national security power. He also understood he would do the country no favors by sending a mixed message to our enemies–at the time, Slobodan Milosevic.
I have called Pelosi the Imperial Speaker; she appears to want to gather the power of the executive branch to herself. Other Democrats should be very, very wary of what she is doing here. Because one of their own will have to live with the consequences some day. A Democrat will inevitably occupy the White House at some point in the future. The will find themselves having to deal with the wreckage left by the Imperial Speakership. And there will be wreckage in one form or another, even if it is just in an ugly precedent that will leave the executive branch seriously weakened.
I am not at all happy with any of the politicians in the Congress - from any party - visiting nations hostile to the US with delusions of impressing their mark on foreign policy. This, it seems, has become pretty commonplace these days and is exceedingly dangerous for America. Sending mixed messages is the worst thing a nation can do. The wreckage will be left for future occupants of the White House. And it is accumulating.
By Gayle Miller, Friday, 6 April , 2007 @ 7:29 am
Rest easy. I predicted when Mrs. Pelosi became the Speaker that her tenure would be short. With the Washington Post (aka Pravda on the Potomac) now criticizing her and the Associated Press, another fellow traveler, holding her up to ridicule, she is not long for her job.
Personally, I see the fine hand of Madame Clinton in all of this - any woman who poses any kind of a threat to Hillary’s relentless march to (she thinks) power will be given less-than-short-shrift and will be sabotaged by Hillary’s backstage minions.
By Quilly Mammoth, Friday, 6 April , 2007 @ 10:47 am
I agree with Gayle Miller. Speaker Pelosi is settingherself up to be the power broker in DC. There can only be one Queen Bee and Hillary aims to be it.
By Blackhawk, Friday, 6 April , 2007 @ 11:19 am
“Pravda on the Potomac”. Good one, hadn’t heard that before:)
By daveinboca, Friday, 6 April , 2007 @ 11:59 pm
When this Skeletor in a scarf denied Jane Harmon the job as chief of the House Intell Cte, I knew she was even dumber than John Murtha, whom she preferred to the much smarter Steny Hoyer. The Senate has girlie-man Reid croaking his double-digit IQ twaddle about GWB not being able to veto the spending bill on Iraq because Bush was not a king. Who does that simpleton think HE is?
The Dem leadership is on a race to the bottom.
When taunted by a Liberal in Parliament that he was going to die “on the gallows or of a vicious social disease,” Disraeli replied “That depends on whether I embrace your principles or your mistress.”