Reid Opens Door to Pact With Antiwar Republicans

[jefferson_dem]

Source: WaPo



Reid Opens Door to Pact With Antiwar Republicans

By Shailagh Murray
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, August 31, 2007; A01

LAS VEGAS -- Saying the coming weeks will be "one of the last opportunities" to alter the course of the war, Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said he is now willing to compromise with Republicans to find ways to limit troop deployments in Iraq.

Reid acknowledged that his previous firm demand for a spring withdrawal deadline had become an obstacle for a small but growing number of Republicans who have said they want to end the war but have been unwilling to set a timeline.

"I don't think we have to think that our way is the only way," Reid said of specific dates during an interview in his office here. "I'm not saying, 'Republicans, do what we want to do.' Just give me something that you think you would like to do, that accomplishes some or all of what I want to do."

Reid's unwavering stance this summer earned him critics who said he was playing politics by refusing to bargain with antiwar Republicans. In the interview, he said that his goal remains an immediate return of U.S. troops but that now is the time to work with the GOP. He cited bringing up legislation after Labor Day that would require troops to have more home leave, forcing military leaders to reduce troop levels, a measure that has drawn some Republican support.

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Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/30/AR2007083002117_pf.html

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. the words sound great, but wait for the reality

just as a deal will be "brokered", at the very last minuted it will be broken, and bush will get everything he wants, without strings.

[Xipe Totec]

2. Backsliding

I'm not happy.

[Ian David]

3. Bipartisanship with Republickers is date-rape. No, Harry. Don't "Compromise."

Look, most of the Repuke chickenhawks pushing Bush's endless war on the floor of Congress, while the cameras are rolling, sing a completely different tune, privately, in the halls.

What needs to be done is that Harry Reid needs to call them out, individually, publicly, by name, in front of the cameras, and on the record.

"Senator so-and-so said that he thinks we need to end the war right now, and that it's a disaster. But he promised Bush he wouldn't vote against the war until after September, so five minutes ago he stood-up and publicly told the American people the exact opposite of what he has told me that he knows to be true."

Congress is NOT a Country Club.

Congress is the voice of The American People, and Harry Reid is supposed to be looking out for US.

[rodeodance]

5. the table has be set. He used the big word COMPROMISE.

[tom_paine]

6. Well said, IanDB1. And as always, the Republics will "betray" the Dems

and withdraw their support as if it was never there, right before the vote that gives Chimpenfuhrer every single thing he wants.

And Harry will be so SHOCKED...SHOCKED I TELL YOU that this "betrayal" has happened.

Hard as I try, I cannot disregard the mouting MOUNTING MOUNTING evidence that, for whatever reason (anthrax in his wheaties, blackmail, greed, it no longer matters the reason), Harry is just as complicit as a dog lyin' down at Chimpenfuhrer's feet.

I am trying not believe what I am seeing again and again, and I wouldn't consider not voting for the Dem against Fred or Rudy Bush because of what I am seeing (though it is tempting but futile to vote for a Nader-type), but this is increasingly despiccable.

We will see how it plays out, but if it does as I suspect, we are in deeper trouble than any of us suspect.

Not Republicans and Democrats, but Top 0.05% vs. everyone else (with many many MANY hired from this pool of people to fight this pool of people).

I hope it's not that.

[Ian David]

7. The only way I will vote against Party lines for president is if it's Joe Biden vs. Ron Paul. n/t

[mac56]

4. Noble motivation, but wrong method.

nm