Rancor

Despite the upbeat tone of my New Years Day post, it seems that things in Washington have reverted back into the petty partisan rancor that characterized the last several years. I had thought that now that the Democrats have a degree of political power after last year's elections, they would perhaps now demonstrate that they are the leaders that they have been claiming to be. Instead what we have is the same old Democratic party, with obvious exceptions like Joe Lieberman, that can be characterized by petty partisanship, pointless and backward looking Bush Bashing and an undeniable paucity of ideas of their own to replace the ones they shoot down on matters of security specifically the war on terror and Iraq.

When Nancy Pelosi declared endlessly, "Stay the course is not a strategy" not only was she intentionally mischaracterizing Iraq war strategy by implying that Stay the course means stay endlessly, but you would think that now that a new strategy has been conceived and presented she might relent somewhat. No dice. Instead, it has gotten worse. The obvious truth of the matter is that the Democrats do not have any strategy of their own in Iraq other that the one that they lack the backbone to publicly and openly promote that is: full retreat.

So Barbara Boxer can revive the petty "Chicken Hawk argument" and roll it out again against Condi Rice all she wants to. Nothing will change the fact that to most Democrats, the only acceptable strategy in Iraq and possibly the entire war on terror is full retreat. The problem is that most Democrats who believe in retreat lack the moral courage and intellectual honesty to admit they hold this position. Democrats, rather than admit they favor retreat in Iraq, would prefer to snipe away at Bush policy and make snide and petty remarks as if they were still the embittered minority party that they were four years ago. It may be a new year with some new leadership in Washington, but for many Democrats on Iraq, it’s the same old song and dance.