Surprise of the Day

White House review of White House Iraq policy deems said policy to be successful; White House decides, based on the report, to continue with its same policy.

There's something, I dunno, degrading about this exercise. Bush is the Bush. The Republicans plus Joe Lieberman constitute a majority of the Senate. As few as 34 Senators can uphold Bush's vetos. Bush has no practical need to do anything other than keep playing the role of petulant boy-king. Why the pretense? I have in my inbox a ""Benchmark Report Fact Check" email that is, of course, devastating. If it included a link, I would link to it. But I won't attempt a summary. It says the report is BS. But, of course, you already knew that. Jim Fallows watched the press conference.

UPDATE: And here's your link.

Comments

That's like asking why Bill Clinton went around ordering studies of affirmative action programs and proclaiming "mend it, don't end it." Is there some fact or set of facts that would make Democrats turn against affirmative action? Of course not, though they tend to pussyfoot a bit. Or why the Clinton administration ordered up epidemiological studies of second-hand smoke (which didn't turn out to give quite the results they wanted, so Carol Browner had to mock the entire concept of statistical significance). Again, is there some fact or set of facts that would turn the Democrats away from smoking restrictions? Of course not.

Posted by y81 | July 12, 2007 12:44 PM

The Republicans plus Joe Lieberman constitute a majority of the Senate. As few as 34 Senators can uphold Bush's vetos. Bush has no practical need to do anything other than keep playing the role of petulant boy-king.

Not quite. There's nothing forcing Harry Reid and the Democrats to pass funding bills for the war; they could defund the war by simply refusing to pass another appropriations bill. You could say that the resulting political fallout wouldn't be worth ending the war, but you certainly can't make the argument that the Democrats are utterly and completely helpless here. There's a political calculation not to use a power that's certainly within the hands of Democrats.

As for "why the pretense?" Do you expect Bush to come out and say, "Well, it's obviously all gone to shit, but fuck if I'm moving my toys out, neener neener"? If the administration failed to keep up the pretense, then you would see more and more public support for hardball tactics like war defunding.

Posted by Christmas | July 12, 2007 12:44 PM

why the Clinton administration ordered up epidemiological studies of second-hand smoke

Awesome! The "smoking won't kill you" crowd has arrived! Your libertarian connections have paid off, Matt.

Posted by Christmas | July 12, 2007 12:47 PM

I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but does it seem like Bush contradicting Chertoff a day later was just a little too convenient? We get reports that Al Qaeda is back to fighting weight to keep our teeth chattering and heads nodding along with whatever belligerent policies we're told are necessary, but just as a few skeptics start wondering, "well if that's true then what the hell have you been doing for six years?", whammo - big presidential presser and no, no, no, we're winning, we're on the hunt, can't back down now. Our policies' failures are proof that we must continue to pursue them.

Posted by Jack | July 12, 2007 12:50 PM

Right, y81, because in the context of the current, actually existing administration lying in self-justifying ways about an ongoing war that's killed tens of thousands, it's important to remind everyone of stuff Bill Clinton did.

I thought being a libertarian sort of logically excluded being a tool. Apparently not.

Posted by Ryan | July 12, 2007 12:53 PM

The point of the pretense is to hold onto the last 26% of deluded American who like him. If Bush dropped the pretense and let it be known what is obvious to us already that he is staying in Iraq no matter what, then he would make a serious run at Cheney's 13%.

Posted by Ron | July 12, 2007 1:02 PM

Am I missing something, or is the entire concept of, you know, a fucking benchmark a bright line test? Either you hit it or you don't, not "we're, like, sort of making some kind of progress towards achieving these aspirational goals" or whatever nonsense du jour this shitty administration is serving.

Posted by ed | July 12, 2007 1:32 PM

You write as if degrading the president by forcing him through this ritual weren't, as far as it goes, satisfying.

Posted by Jim Henley | July 12, 2007 1:36 PM

Bush is the Bush?

Are we adopting the Roman model of calling everyone to hold the office of divisive usurper after the given name of the first holder of that office?

Posted by Marshall | July 12, 2007 1:49 PM

I guess I don't follow. Although the Democrats in Congress were unable to end the war, there were able to require the administration to produce a report. Even the Bush version of the report shows little progress, but in any case the result has been a week of media stories about Republican divisions on Iraq, leaks from the administration about the lack of progress, and overall renewed media interest in the failures of the war. The report was the "hook" to get the media to tell these stories. This has strengthened the Democrats and increased the number of votes they can get. So I don't see why you think it wasn't worthwhile from the Democrats' point of view.

But maybe you mean that Bush could just ignore the reporting requirements altogether? That would be a clear-cut constitutional crisis, and that's a much more dangerous strategy for holding onto the 34 Republican votes and what public opinion he has left.

Posted by John DE | July 12, 2007 1:58 PM

Am I missing something, or is the entire concept of, you know, a fucking benchmark a bright line test?

This is a very good point. Who was responsible for selecting the benchmarks in the first place?

Posted by Steve | July 12, 2007 2:35 PM

Christmas has it right. The Democrats need 41 votes to end the war, by filibustering any funding bill. Indeed, they only need 1 vote (Reid's) to refuse to bring any funding bill to the floor.

I don't particularly care what the political explanations are for them not doing this; the fact is, they aren't, which means they support the indefinite continuation of the war and the building of permanent bases and the continued murder of brave American servicemembers just like Bush does.

Posted by Dilan Esper | July 12, 2007 2:45 PM

I don't particularly care what the political explanations are for them not doing this; the fact is, they aren't, which means they support the indefinite continuation of the war and the building of permanent bases and the continued murder of brave American servicemembers just like Bush does.

I suppose Democrats objectively support the war in Iraq.

Posted by Draeton | July 12, 2007 3:41 PM

"Bush is the Bush."

I think he does deserve a definite article by now. As political phenomena go, he is unique. There must be some way of signaling what an extraordinary being he is.

Posted by Kyle | July 12, 2007 4:04 PM

This administration needs to recognize the war in Iraq is a complete failure and mistake. There are more critical issues that affecting the lives of millions of americans and people world wide that our president is not taking actions against. Now the war has proven to be a failure and is causing more violence, terror and poverty in this world. According to the Borgen Project, it only takes $19 billion dollars annually to eradicate world hunger and poverty. However, our government has already spent more than $450 billion dollars over this fruitless war in Iraq. It is time for the Bush Administration to take a real interest in the lives of the American people as well as people who are in desperate needs around the world. Stop the lies and stop poverty now. Put away the arrogance and put the needs of the people before political gains.

Posted by Mstessyrue | July 12, 2007 10:19 PM