The Crossed Pond

But they still might win the war.

Errr, maybe that’s a bad way to put it.

Today, the Democrats failed to pass a resolution calling for withdrawal by a vote of 48-50 vote. Another measure, the prickly Gregg resolution against the thought of cutting funding for the war effort, passed by an overwhelming 82-16.

It’s pretty clear that the Democrats are going to have little success in getting through their efforts to defund the war, or otherwise use the machinations of the legislature to apply the brakes. Not that I’m convinced their efforts in that regard have been much more than posturing anyway. But, even the posturing isn’t effective, at least legislatively.

That’s not to say they won’t keep trying.

Captain’s Quarters posts the news, with an addendum:

The Democrats want to keep digging on this issue until they weaken Republican resolve to see the war through to a successful conclusion. Gordon Smith (OR) voted with the Democrats, giving them some hope for more erosion later, but three Democrats voted against the bill. Joe Lieberman joined red-state Senators Mark Pryor and Ben Nelson.

What’s next? Another attempt on another day.

And while that next attempt will also likely not be effective, the point of these measures is not legislative, but political. 48-50 is a losing vote, but as a call for withdraw, it’s pretty incredibly close, particularly through the prism of even election year 2004. Remember, even WITHIN the Democratic party, when Howard Dean even broached (but never explicitly called for) the topic of getting out of Iraq, he was met with….well, he wasn’t greeted as a liberator, we’ll say that.

Now, the Democrats have reached close to a 50-50 split in Congress on whether to withdraw. That’s a victory for the Republicans, but a backsliding one, by any measure.

But of course the point, for the Democrats, is not to actually withdraw from Iraq. We’ve discussed it in a few places, but the line the Democrats are trying to walk (and frankly, mostly succeeding, at least for the last few years) is to get on record against the war, get the GOP on record for it, do both things as much as possible, and keep the GOP’s fortunes tied to Iraq. The bet, and it isn’t a bad one, is that as Iraq goes, so goes the GOP, and Iraq doesn’t seem likely to start “succeeding” anytime soon.

The risk, though, is twofold. First, if things in Iraq DO get significantly and appreciably better, and the American public becomes re-sold on the whole endeavor, the Democrats are fucked.

The Republican party would, at this point, be lunatics to hang their hats on that probability, though.

The second though is that the farther they go to try to disown the war, the farther they get towards owning the lose. That remains an open battlefield, and perhaps the best chance the GOP has of retaining some political edge to Iraq.

I’m skeptical on how likely that is. But whatever the political implications of these lost votes are, I’m fairly sure of one thing: the LAST thing the Democrats want is a genuine BILL calling for withdraw to pass.

Anything but that.