After anger, Congress starts talking

In the Kubler-Ross progression of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance – Congress inched toward Stage Three this week over Iraq. Voters who tossed out the Republican congressional majority and put Democrats in charge may not recall rallying to shouts of “Let’s Bargain Now!” but that is what they got, likely for the better.

This was evident Wednesday as members of the Senate Armed Services Committee asked Gen. John Abizaid, head of the U.S. Central Command, whether a deadline should be set for Iraqi troops to stand on their own. No, he said. Well, how about more U.S. troops to regain control in places such as Anbar province? No. Fewer troops? Not advisable. Where are the benchmarks to demonstrate progress? Indeed. Phased withdrawal? Naive.

A majority in both houses means Democrats really could change the U.S. direction in Iraq, and the thought seems to concern them. Demanding reform is one thing; actually being responsible for it, something more stressful. As a result, the committee hearing lacked the usual level of accusations of who screwed up – Donald Rumsfeld wasn’t there so that wouldn’t have been as much fun anyway – and instead focused on specific questions of what to do next.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, for instance, began by slamming the Bush administration’s efforts with the catchy line, “Hope is not a strategy,” but quickly moved on to asking Abizaid about dividing Iraq along sectarian lines. “I understand the complexity of that, the difficulty of that,” she said. “Is there any strategic argument to be made in favor of a partition?”

There wasn’t, as it turns out. But compare that with last August, when Clinton recited to Rumsfeld his many failings as secretary of defense and concluded that, “because of the administration’s strategic blunders, and frankly the record of incompetence in executing, you are presiding over a failed policy.”

Practical-mindedness was a bipartisan event this week, with Sen. Susan Collins expanding the discussion by asking about Iraqi political considerations, such as how delaying provincial elections affected the ability of Sunnis to participate in government. Presidential contender John McCain stuck to his belief that more troops were the answer; Carl Levin stayed with his measured reduction of troops, but both seemed to be thinking about Iraqi, not electoral, strategies.

Immediate withdrawal was nowhere among the options.

If the midterm elections were about change, voters will need a highly developed sense of revolution to pick up differences in leadership. The most telling fight was over majority leader in the House: Would it be the politically skilled Steny Hoyer of Maryland or would Democrats sacrifice that ability to make an unambiguous point about Iraq and choose defense expert and anti-Iraq-war leader John Murtha of Pennsylvania?

Thursday, Democrats chose Hoyer, 149-86, despite the pleading of the next speaker, Nancy Pelosi. Iraq, the message was, can wait.

Rep. Tom Allen’s position on this reflects where Democrats are likely to land. He wants a departure date for U.S. troops set, preferably by the Maliki government, sometime in 2007. As members of both parties have also suggested, he thinks the United States should begin a regional conference on the belief that surrounding countries have a strong interest in a stable Iraq. And he says funding support from Western Europe would come if the United States were to announce its intention to leave. That is a serious strategy but also one open to more bargaining.

Iraq was just one reason, and not even the primary one, Republicans lost Congress last week. Corruption, arrogance and a sense among conservatives that the GOP had abandoned its principles may have all been more important to voters.

And more than all of those, I think, was fatigue with a political extremism that did not make most lives better.

But Iraq now will become a bipartisan challenge as never before, and that will mean new policies, but only over several months. This will disappoint a wing of the Democratic Party that clearly wanted more, but it will move Congress to an acceptance of what is possible in Iraq.

Todd Benoit is the editorial page editor of the Bangor Daily News.