It's a Start: Republicans Breaking Away from Bush

There's only a dozen Republicans in the House breaking away from supporting Bush's surge in Iraq, but it's a start. The move is sure to put enormous pressure on Bush and sure to make other Republicans think about whether it's time to listen to voters or continue listening to a failed president. Here's the story from Paul Kane of The Washington Post:

From the moderate suburbs of Delaware to the rural, conservative valleys of eastern Tennessee, House Republican opponents of President Bush's latest Iraq war plan cut across the GOP's ideological and regional spectrum.

Numbering a dozen or more, these House Republicans have emerged as some of the most prominent opponents of the plan to increase troop presence in Iraq. They admit to being a ragtag band, with no scheduled meetings and little political cohesion.

(snip)

The conventional wisdom on Capitol Hill has been that those Republicans facing the most tenuous political hold on their seats would be in open revolt against Bush's unpopular decision to send more troops into Iraq. But the lion's share of GOP opponents of the Bush plan come from comfortable to very safe congressional districts.

Our foreign policy is in disarray. Bush is not capable of fixing that disarray with anything more than bandaids. In fact, it's worse than that; Bush still thinks he can fix his blunders with better photo ops. Cheney is still going around 'misreading' intelligence reports to the detriment of our nation. A year ago, Condi Rice launched a diplomatic program aimed at Iran but hasn't bother with the task of actually talking with the Iranians.

We can no longer afford a policy that simply digs a deeper hole without a clear concept of what it is we're trying to do. We all know that the cost of Bush's war in Iraq far exceeds any benefit that the United States is getting from the misadventure. We all know we don't need need to be in the middle of a civil war and we don't need a third war however it might happen. A dozen Republicans are speaking up. The American people need another fifty Republicans in the House to say enough is enough; it's time to wind down the war, not expand it.