From E. J. Dionne, Jr. of The Washington Post, for The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Jan. 6, excerpts below:
The shift in power heralded by the Democrats' assumption of control in the House and Senate on Thursday could lead quickly to a direct confrontation with President Bush if he chooses, as many expect, to "surge" additional troops into Iraq.
More on the flip...
Democrats are quietly but urgently seeking new ways of pressuring the president to change course, including the possibility of having Congress reconsider its original authorization of force passed in October 2002.
Given the limited options, Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), the Foreign Relations Committee chairman, has proposed that the strongest response to the surge would be a congressional resolution explicitly opposing the step.
Where cutting off funds is a "hollow threat," Biden remarked, a congressional resolution could have a powerful effect if it drew support from the significant number of Republican senators who are increasingly alienated from Bush's policies.
More intriguingly, Biden is studying whether Congress might reconsider the original Iraq War resolution, which is now as out of date as the news stories of 2002, the year it passed.
The resolution includes references to a "significant chemical and biological weapons capability" that Iraq didn't have and repeated condemnations of "the current Iraqi regime," i.e., the Saddam Hussein regime that fell long ago. In effect, the resolution authorizes a war on an enemy who no longer exists and for purposes that are no longer relevant.
Biden is candid in acknowledging that it is difficult to find precedent for reconsidering a war resolution.
Yet Biden's idea of revisiting the authority granted Bush could be a forceful way for Congress to reassert itself and encourage a full-scale debate on the future of American policy in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
KEEP INFORMED: CALL YOU SENATOR AND ASK IF THEY SUPPORT A CONGRESSIONAL RESOLUTION; WATCH THE HEARINGS ON C-SPAN (First day is a closed session, the rest start Wed. Jan. 10).
Read more of this Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article here.
Read about the Biden-Gelb Plan For Iraq here.
Senator Biden chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which, along with other Senate committees, will hold four weeks of Iraq hearings beginning January 9, 2007. To see a schedule of upcoming hearing dates, with names of persons scheduled to testify, click here.
Senator Biden is opposed to increasing troop strength in Iraq regardless of the plan. Read the New York Times news article, January 4, 2007, with his comments here.