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House panel backs Iraq exit

Troops would leave by August 2008. A related Senate measure fails.

By WES ALLISON
Published March 16, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT [AP Photo] Senate Republicans hold a news conference Thursday following a series votes on Iraq. Left to right are Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

WASHINGTON - The House Appropriations Committee easily passed a measure Thursday that calls for American troops to leave Iraq by next year at the latest, setting up the first major showdown over the war with President Bush since the invasion four years ago.

But the bill remains a work in progress, as House Democratic leaders work to win over enough liberal and conservative Democrats to pass the bill when it comes to the floor next week.

Meanwhile, in the Senate, Republicans beat back a resolution, by a vote of 50-48, that would have required U.S. troops to leave Iraq by the end of March 2008. But the votes in both chambers - a day after the Pentagon first acknowledged Iraq was in the midst of a civil war - made clear that Congress is losing patience with the continued cost of blood and treasure for what many members believe is an intractable mess.

"The American military ... cannot and should not police an Iraqi civil war," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., told colleagues before his resolution was defeated. "The war can only be won through diplomacy, and by forcing Iraq's political factions to resolve their differences."

The $124-billion spending bill approved by the House Appropriations Committee on Thursday afternoon included money for a range of programs, from new antimine troop carriers to better military medical care to health care for poor children.

But at its heart were controversial measures requiring Bush to send troops to Iraq only if they are properly trained and equipped, and requiring the Iraqi government to meet political and military benchmarks or face the withdrawal of U.S. troops as early as this year.

Specifically, the Iraqis must show progress toward those benchmarks, which were set by Bush last month, by July or U.S. troops would begin to leave.

If other benchmarks aren't met by October, more U.S. troops would withdraw.

And all but a few U.S. troops must be out of Iraq by August 2008, regardless.

It is doubtful the Senate would agree to such an aggressive timetable, and Bush has vowed to veto the bill if Congress were to pass it. Regardless, said Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, D-Wis., it sends an important message.

"It puts Congress in the role of bad cop," Obey said. "It's time to deliver a message to the politicians in Iraq that we're not going to sit around forever while they dither, watching our troops die."

Added Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., the bill's lead sponsor: "This is a meaningful way to say to the administration, the Iraqis have to make progress."

But Rep. C.W. Bill Young of Indian Shores, the top Republican on the Appropriations subcommittee that oversees defense spending, said Congress shouldn't place time limits or other restrictions on the ability of the president or military commanders to run the war.

"Nobody wants our troops out of Iraq more than I do," Young said. "But we can't afford" to try to run the war from Washington.

The time limits would just encourage insurgents to lay low until the deadline, then fill the vacuum left by departing U.S. forces, he said.

A vote on the bill by the full House is expected late next week. The committee approved the measure 36-28 on a party-line vote - with one exception. Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., a leader of the Progressive Caucus, voted no, suggesting that Democratic leaders are still having trouble winning the support of liberals who believe the spending bill doesn't go far enough toward ending the war.

Instead, a coalition of liberals led by her and Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., favors an amendment authored by Lee that calls for using the money only to withdraw American troops by the end of the year.

Woolsey has said she believes 15 to 20 of her Progressive Caucus colleagues will vote against the measure, especially if House Speaker Nancy Pelosi forbids them to offer the Lee amendment on the House floor during next week's debate.

Republicans are mostly against the measure, and some conservative Democrats have expressed concern about limiting the president's power to wage war.

Democratic leaders loaded the bill with goodies designed to persuade reluctant colleagues to vote for it, from more than $2-billion in hurricane relief to $500-million for wildfire control to $1-billion for vaccines to protect Americans from a flu pandemic. They also added $3.7-billion for farmers whose crops were damaged by natural disasters last year.

And for good measure, they tacked on a $2.10-per-hour increase in the minimum wage. That raise passed both chambers of Congress this year, but it has stalled in House-Senate negotiations over tax breaks for small businesses.

"This is an effort to buy votes," complained Rep. Harold Rogers, R-Ky., during the committee's five-hour debate.

Wes Allison can be reached at allison@sptimes.com.

Fast Facts:

How the Florida delegation voted

On the Senate resolution to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq by March 31, 2008:

Yes: Bill Nelson, Democrat.

No: Mel Martinez, Republican.

On the House Appropriations Committee plan to limit U.S. involvement in Iraq committee members only:

Yes: Allen Boyd, D-Monticello; Debbie-Wasserman Schultz, D-Broward County.

No: C.W. Bill Young, R-Indian Shores; Dave Weldon, R-Palm Bay; Ander Crenshaw, R-Jacksonville.

[Last modified March 16, 2007, 11:59:14]