Bush Vetoes Iraq Withdrawal Plan
Embattled Bush vetoes Iraq withdrawal plan
http://rawstory.com/news/afp/Embattl..._05012007.html
Published: Tuesday May 1, 2007
President George W. Bush on Tuesday vetoed a bill setting an Iraq withdrawal timeline, defying the US Congress exactly four years after he declared major combat over in a "Mission Accomplished" speech.
"Setting a deadline for withdrawal is setting a date for failure, and that would be irresponsible," he said as protesters outside the White House chanted "stop the war now!" and "how many more will die?".
Bush -- who has signalled no willingness to compromise on his plan to escalate the unpopular war -- was to meet top lawmakers at the White House on Wednesday to map the way forward after killing the legislation.
The measure included emergency spending for the war but tied that to a call for US combat troops to start coming home October 1 and most of them to be withdrawn by March 2008. Like previous measures was larded with funds for unrelated projects and programs.
"Members of the House and Senate passed a bill that substitutes the opinions of politicians for the judgment of our military commanders, so a few minutes ago, I vetoed the bill," Bush said.
Democratic leaders, due at the White House on Wednesday in the next phase of the unprecedented Iraq spending showdown, quickly slammed Republican Bush's move and accused him of trapping US soldiers "in the middle of an open-ended civil war."
"The president wants a blank check. The Congress is not going to give it to him," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned at a joint public appearance with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
"If the president thinks that by vetoing this bill, he will stop us from working to change the direction of this war, he is mistaken," said Reid. "Now he has an obligation to explain his plan to responsibly end this war."
Bush had long signalled he would kill the 124 billion dollar measure -- Democrats appear to lack the votes to override his veto -- and insisted that his foes, not his veto, were keeping much-needed funds from the troops.
The House of Representatives and Senate had approved the legislation by mostly party-line votes, with Democrats urging Bush to "listen to the American people" as polls showed a majority want the war to end.
The veto came exactly four years after the US president, speaking aboard a US aircraft carrier under a giant "Mission Accomplished" banner, declared that the March 19 US-led invasion had yielded "one victory" over terrorism.
Bush, in a carefully choreographed photo-opportunity, had told sailors aboard the home-bound USS Abraham Lincoln that "major combat" was over in Iraq, as US officials in Washington privately predicted a swift US withdrawal.
When he spoke, just 139 US soldiers had been killed since the US-led invasion launched in March 2003. Now more than 3,350 have died in Iraq since then, and April has been the bloodiest month of 2007 with 104 killed.
Bush, pleading for patience with his unpopular decision in January to send more US troops to Iraq, earlier warned at the US Central Command headquarters in Florida that a hasty withdrawal would turn Iraq into "a cauldron of chaos."
"Our enemy -- the enemies of freedom -- love chaos. Out of that chaos they could find new safe havens," he said. "Failure in Iraq should be unacceptable to the civilized world. The risks are enormous."
The White House had expressed anger that the Democrats timed their efforts to send Bush the legislation on the anniversary of his May 1, 2003 speech.
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters that the timing "is a trumped-up political stunt that is the height of cynicism."
But Democrats, including the party's 2008 presidential hopefuls, pounded Bush over his strategy before and after his veto.
"Today, President Bush vetoed a bill that supports our troops and ends the war in Iraq that he declared won four years ago," former senator John Edwards said in a statement.
"Today, all the photo ops in the world can't hide the truth - the war is still raging, and the president's mismanagement of Iraq is still dead wrong," he said.
