Votes Are In: Congress Opposes Bush Iraq Plan

After four days of debate, the House of Representatives has passed a resolution opposing President Bush’s plan to send 20,000 additional troops to Iraq.

The resolution, below, passed by 246 to 182.

Senate Democrats are holding an up or down vote on the resolution Saturday.

Text of the “Concurrent Resolution on the President’s Escalation Plan:

This week the House of Representatives will be considering the following Concurrent Resolution.

Disapproving of the decision of the President announced on January 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional United States combat troops to Iraq.

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That–

(1) Congress and the American people will continue to support and protect the members of the United States Armed Forces who are serving or who have served bravely and honorably in Iraq; and

(2) Congress disapproves of the decision of President George W. Bush announced on January 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional United States combat troops to Iraq.”

Click

Read Full Post »

Democratic Leader Gambles That Weekend Detention Could End Senate’s Squabbling on Iraq

WASHINGTON, Feb. 15 — As the House prepared to pass a symbolic resolution denouncing President Bush’s war policy, Senate Democratic leaders on Thursday abruptly scheduled a weekend debate on Iraq in an effort to break a stalemate and avoid impressions that partisan bickering was weighing down deliberations over the war.

A steady line of Republicans and Democrats made their way to the House floor for a third straight day of debating Mr. Bush’s troop buildup plan before the matter comes to a vote Friday. The Senate, stung by its own failure so far to act, spent much of Thursday locked in a debate about debating until Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, called the rare Saturday session.

“We demand an up-or-down vote on the resolution the House is debating as we speak,” said Mr. Reid, a Nevada Democrat. “We’re determined to give our troops and the American people the debate they deserve.”

But when they convene Saturday afternoon, senators will not debate the Iraq resolution itself. Instead, they will be taking up a procedural vote required under Senate rules to move forward to the actual debate.

Click for more

Read Full Post »

Libby’s ‘conspiracy theory’ never took root in court

The “conspiracy theory” hinted at by former White House aide I. Lewis Libby’s lawyers at the start of his trial “never really took root in court,” notes an article in Friday’s L.A. Times.

“In his opening statement three weeks ago in the federal perjury trial of I. Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby, defense lawyer Theodore V. Wells Jr. dropped a bombshell,” Richard B. Schmitt writes. “In dramatic tones, Wells declared that Libby had been the victim of a White House conspiracy to make Libby the fall guy for the CIA leak scandal.”

Schmitt reports that “when the jury begins deliberating the fate of the former vice presidential aide next week, it will have seen virtually no evidence to back up the provocative claim.”

“The difference between what Wells promised and delivered, and how it will play with the 12-member panel, is just one of the wild cards as the trial winds up,” Schmitt continues.

“Endelivered promises” by defense attorneys may sometimes “backfire,” because, as one former US Attorney tells the L.A. Times, it can potentially provide “the government an opportunity during closing arguments to cast doubt on the entire defense case.”

Click

Read Full Post »

Votes Are In: Congress Opposes Bush Iraq Plan

After four days of debate, the House of Representatives has passed a resolution opposing President Bush’s plan to send 20,000 additional troops to Iraq.

The resolution, below, passed by 246 to 182.

Senate Democrats are holding an up or down vote on the resolution Saturday.

Text of the “Concurrent Resolution on the President’s Escalation Plan:

This week the House of Representatives will be considering the following Concurrent Resolution.

Disapproving of the decision of the President announced on January 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional United States combat troops to Iraq.

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That–

(1) Congress and the American people will continue to support and protect the members of the United States Armed Forces who are serving or who have served bravely and honorably in Iraq; and

(2) Congress disapproves of the decision of President George W. Bush announced on January 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional United States combat troops to Iraq.”

Click

Read Full Post »

Auditors: Billions squandered in Iraq

WASHINGTON – About $10 billion has been squandered by the U.S. government on Iraq reconstruction aid because of contractor overcharges and unsupported expenses, and federal investigators warned Thursday that significantly more taxpayer money is at risk.

The three top auditors overseeing work in Iraq told a House committee their review of $57 billion in Iraq contracts found that Defense and State department officials condoned or allowed repeated work delays, bloated expenses and payments for shoddy work or work never done.

More than one in six dollars charged by U.S. contractors were questionable or unsupported, nearly triple the amount of waste the Government Accountability Office estimated last fall.

Click for more

Read Full Post »

Keeping Up With The Scooter Libby Trial…

From Firedoglake Live Blogging:

Bonamici: To the extent we were able to digest them (jury instructions) WRT elements instruction, govt concerned about summarization of false statements as part of elements instruction. We understand that the precise charge statements will be appended to the back. It was our understanding that the summaries of the false statements would only be provided at preliminary and that the false statements would be read for the final instructions.

Jeffress stands.

Bonamici: Is the perjury quoted as well.

Walton: Perjury is. I wouldn’t be inclined to read all that, I would say it’s going to get lost. I’d give a short statement about that and the jury will have an opportunity to read it.

Bonamici: We’re of the view that the charged false statements are the core of the case.

Walton: I was only talking about the perjury.

Bonamici: They’re shorter. I do see the distinction. We took from the first instruction that you were struggling with just reading them allowed.

Walton: As far as the false statements are, I thought I had indicated I would summarize what the false statements were.

Jeffress: [I think he says he was under the same understanding as Bonamici, too]

Bonamici: In the seventh circuit, the indictment goes back so it is never the practice to presesnt the false statement in the instructions.

Walton: I’m okay to have those portions of the indictment appended. I have a problem with the entire indictment going back bc there’s a lot of stuff in there that should not be submitted to the jury.

Bonamici: That would be acceptable to the govt and would probably solve the problem.

Walton: I’m looking at the false statement instruction. I thought that was everything.

Bonamici: I don’t, I don’t. Have you figured out what page it’s one.

Wells is up. Shows it to her. [Guess we have nice Ted today]

Click for more

Read Full Post »

Pelosi: Bush lacks power to invade Iran

WASHINGTON – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (news, bio, voting record) said Thursday that President Bush lacks the authority to invade Iran without specific approval from Congress, a fresh challenge to the commander in chief on the eve of a symbolic vote critical of his troop buildup in Iraq.

Pelosi, D-Calif., noted that Bush consistently said he supports a diplomatic resolution to differences with Iran “and I take him at his word.”

At the same time, she said, “I do believe that Congress should assert itself, though, and make it very clear that there is no previous authority for the president, any president, to go into Iran.”

Pelosi spoke in an interview in the Capitol as the House moved through a third marathon day of debate on a nonbinding measure that disapproves of the military buildup in Iraq while expressing support for the troops.

Passage of the measure was expected Friday, and across the Capitol, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (news, bio, voting record) unexpectedly announced plans to hold a test vote Saturday.

Partisan bickering has prevented a Senate vote on the troop increase, with Republicans insisting on equal treatment for an alternative rules out the “elimination or reduction of funds for troops in the field.”

Pelosi and other Democrats have said approval on the nonbinding measure would mark the first step in an effort by the new Democratic-controlled Congress to force Bush to change course in a war that has killed more than 3,100 U.S. troops.

Click

Read Full Post »

INTELLIGENCE LEAKS –Cheney’s Call

Early on the morning of June 20, 2002, then-Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Bob Graham, D-Fla., received a telephone call at home from a highly agitated Dick Cheney. Graham, who was in the middle of shaving, held a razor in one hand as he took the phone in the other.

The vice president got right to the point: A story in his morning newspaper reported that telephone calls intercepted by the National Security Agency on September 10, 2001, apparently warned that Al Qaeda was about to launch a major attack against the United States, possibly the next day. But the intercepts were not translated until September 12, 2001, the story said, the day after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Because someone had leaked the highly classified information from the NSA intercepts, Cheney warned Graham, the Bush administration was considering ending all cooperation with the joint inquiry by the Senate and House Intelligence committees on the government’s failure to predict and prevent the September 11 attacks. Classified records would no longer be turned over to the Hill, the vice president threatened, and administration witnesses would not be available for interviews or testimony.

Click for more

Read Full Post »

Democratic Congressman: Rest assured that history, fact will not be kind to decision-makers of this war

Congressman Raul Grijalva (D-AZ) will say that “history and fact will not be kind to the decision-makers” during his House floor statement tonight concerning the Iraq War Resolution that will be voted on Friday, RAW STORY has learned.

“This head in the sand attitude, while politically expedient, denies reality and truth,” Grijalva will say. “Rest assured that history and fact will not be kind to the decision-makers and deciders of this war.”

Click

Read Full Post »