A number of Democrats are voicing their opinions that we should stay in Iraq. As Senator Carl Levin calls for a change in Iraqi leadership, the Washington Post reports on the results of visits to Iraq by members of Congress to Iraq determined to make their own assessments of the situation.
Not every Democrat has come back from Iraq supporting a drawdown of U.S. forces in the coming months, as party leaders have advocated. Staking out positions that could complicate efforts to achieve party unity in September, a few Democratic lawmakers have returned expressing support for a continued troop presence. One of them, Rep. Brian Baird (Wash.), said yesterday that he will no longer vote for binding troop withdrawal timelines. ...Last Friday, Baird told the Olympian, a newspaper in his district, that he now believes the United States should stay in the country as long as necessary to ensure stability.
Although Senators Levin and Warner have returned from Iraq with a call for leadership change, other Republicans have used their trips for political advantage, the Post reports. In all cases, the Pentagon has taken charge of what they've seen.
The tours, carefully conducted by the Defense Department, generally include visits to the Green Zone for consultations with U.S. and Iraqi officials, trips to forward operating bases and joint security stations involved in Petraeus's new counterinsurgency program, and heavily guarded tours of open markets, often in Anbar province, where a U.S. alliance with Sunni sheiks has calmed the region.
Republican leaders have seized upon any positive statements from lawmakers returning from Iraq to portray Democratic leaders as wedded to failure there while the Democratic Party grows increasingly divided over the war's progress.
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