A Watershed Moment in the 2008 Campaign

I don't usually opine on arcane details of bills in Congress. Others do it much better. One of those is Hugh Hewitt. In this post, he lays out the details of Section 1070 of the Senate Defense Appropriations bill, a bit that got its own vote late Wednesday night. Here's the meat of it:

It is the sense of the Senate–

(1) to reaffirm its support for all the men and women of the United States Armed Forces, including General David H. Petraeus, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq;

(2) to strongly condemn any effort to attack the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all the members of the United States Armed Forces; and

(3) to specifically repudiate the unwarranted personal attack on General Petraeus by the liberal activist group Moveon.org.

The Moveon.org ad in question ran prior to and during General Petraeus' testimony (the timing is important) pre-emptively calling him an unrepentant and across-the-board liar, without using the actual word.

It is one thing for an activist group to say what it wants--as reprehensible as that position may be. It's quite another for Senators to endorse such a position while saying the exact opposite (i.e., "we support the troops") and while pretending to listen to and take seriously the man to whom they unanimously gave the authority to bring back frank analysis from the front.

How did the vote go down?

72 yea, 25 nay.

One quarter of the U.S. Senate does not support the man they unanimously approved only a few months ago. Why? Pure politics. One quarter of the U.S. Senate does not support the U.S. Armed Forces--anywhere, anytime, anybody, doing anything. Note carefully that the bill does not say anything at all about supporting or opposing the war in Iraq. That's key. Do you support the U.S. military? No. Well, at least that's as plain as it gets. As Dennis Prager likes to say: clarity is better than agreement.

But still... unbelievable. One wonders whether these Senators still go to parades back in their districts. One wonders whether they still visit military bases. One wonders whether they take seriously letters and e-mails from military personnel in their districts. One wonders... well... one wonders many things that this vote makes nearly unfathomable.

Bottom line: Hillary voted against it. That's absolutely huge. In Hewitt's words:

"If she ever wanted her public image to be that of a moderate, it's gone now with this vote... she just tipped her hand that she shows more respect to the radical fringe of her base than she does to the country's top general prosecuting a war that she originally supported."

Obama showed up on the Senate floor, heard what the vote was about, and promptly left without casting one. Courageous. Not.