More Make Believe from the Democrats: Benchmarks by which to Blame the Iraqis

Democrats seem to understand that they have public support to extract the US from Iraq. They're getting some good press today with Associated Press reporting, "Democrats not backing down on Iraq Bill." They also seem to be considering Congressman John Murtha's idea of limiting the duration of funding through July, contingent on "benchmarks" that the Iraqi government is to achieve.

It's the later part that is generally suspect. True enough that Iraqi's aren't showing the "resolve" necessary to solve the "problems" in Iraq. But the unraveling of Iraq's society is due predominantly to US policies. Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin knew in advance we were going to war on false pretenses, and now hides behind false notions that he was sworn to secrecy and couldn't divulge that fact:

I was angry about it. [But] frankly, I couldn't do much about it because, in the intelligence committee, we are sworn to secrecy." Durbin went on to say "We can't walk outside the door and say the statement made yesterday by the White House is in direct contradiction to classified information that is being given to this Congress.

That, as we all know, is BS. Durbin is also sworn to protect the Constitution against all foes, external and internal. Ray MacGovern, who's getting a lot of air play on this blog reacted to the Durbin blather as follows:

Classification is to protect sources and methods. It’s not to protect presidents, OK? And so, he should have come out and said, “Look, this is not what I’m hearing in the Intelligence Committee. Hold the presses. We’re not going to go to war until I get satisfaction.” He didn’t do that.

And now we're in a war, and Iraq is taking the brunt of it, and these same Democratic politicians are saying Iraq needs to meet benchmarks? As predicted predicted by Robert Fisk and Gary Younge, the US Iraq exit strategy is going to be "Blame the Iraqis." "Oops. They didn't meet their benchmarks for resolving their problems. We gotta go. Sorree." It's pathetic. More make believe by the Democrats.

Sources:

References to Durbin and McGovern from DemocracyNow, May 1, 2007.

misspellings: Durban, bench mark, ray macgovern, secracy
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