Behind the scenes- Joe Biden and the Iraq War Resolution

[creeksneakers2]

The following is not all Biden did in his attempt to keep the US out of war with Iraq. I'm limited by copyright.

Excerpts from the Book HUBRIS By Michael Isakoff and David Corn

Page 64:

Hagel, who believed Saddam was bottled up and posed no pressing threat to the United States, quickly talked to Senator Joe Biden, the Democratic chairman of the foreign relations committee, and the two discussed whether the White House's war aims extended beyond Iraq. "I remember saying to Joe over the phone, the way this is written, the president could go to war anywhere in the Middle East, " Hagel later said. "And I remember Joe and I talked about Iran and Syria. Maybe they're thinking, 'We just take them all down, just take two, three of them out, go after Syria and Iran too,' What's to stop them?"

Page 127:

By the end of September, the president's war resolution was no sure thing. The White House had trimmed it back, dumping the language that authorized Bush to go to war to achieve stability in the region. Still, the White House faced a threat. Senator Joe Biden and two Republican senators on the foreign relations committee - Richard Lugar and Chuck Hagel - were pushing an alternative that would narrow the president's authority further. Under their proposal, Bush would be able to attack Iraq only for the purpose of destroying Iraq's WMDs and only after seeking UN approval. If the United Nations said no, Bush would have to come back to Congress and demonstrate that the Iraqi weapons threat was so "grave" that only military action could eliminate it. The Biden - Lugar measure was attracting support from both Democrats and Republicans. And, according to Biden, he and his allies were getting backdoor advice and encouragement from the administration's reluctant warriors, Powell and Armitage. The White House was worried about Biden's endeavor, and Bush was furious. "I don't want a resolution such as this that ties my hands," he told Senator Trent Lott. The president, according to Lott, gave him an emphatic order: "Derail the Biden legislation and make sure its language never sees the light of day.


But it was Dick Gephardt, the Democratic leader in the House and past and future presidential candidate, who derailed the bipartisan effort.....At any moment, the House Republicans could put the president's bill to a vote on the floor, and it would pass - with a number of Democrats signing on......"This is a good as it gets," Gephardt recalled, "and I became convinced we couldn't get more."


Biden also held a hearing on the WMD threat.


Page 117-118

.....But the hearing wasn't done. The committee had previously learned of the dispute within the government about the aluminum tubes, and Biden had invited witnesses to represent the skeptics. The State Department's chief intelligence officer, Carl Ford, Jr., was there to testify after Tenet, as was Rhys Williams, the chief of the Energy Department's Office of Intelligence. Both witnesses told the dwindling number of senators that their agencies didn't accept the tubes argument. But few senators were paying close attention to their testimony, and the hearing was petering out.

David Corn mentions this on his website.

http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/davidcorn/

[speedoo]

1. I never trusted Gephardt.

Not at all surprising that he would torpedo Biden's good work.

[TwilightGardener]

2. Very interesting--and very disappointing that all three Senators still

voted for the AUMF, knowing what they did at the time. They knew more than almost anyone else what Chimpy was up to, and STILL gave him the green light. And Powell, too. Still, at least Biden, Hagel and Lugar kept us from being able to go to war with Iran and Syria--that's something.

[TayTay]

3. This is what Tom Daschle wrote as well in his book:

Like No Other Time. Sen Biden had brought together other centrists behind a resolution that would have required the President to consult the Congress more on Iraq and would have introduced more restrictions under a Biden-Lugar Resolution.

This was undermined by Rep. Gephardt and Sen. Joe Lieberman who capitulated to what the White House wanted. That Rose Garden ceremony that showed Bush flanked by Lieberman and Gephardt pretty much sealed the deal on what would happen.

Ah, I also ask people to remember that the Bush Administration has since admitted that they believed they had the Constitutional Power to go to war and would have done so without an IWR Resolution. The IWR just allowed them to spread the blame should something go wrong. They calculated that no one would remember Congressional efforts to rein in Bush, only that theIWR passed and had Democratic support. Blame could then be successfully diverted away from Bush and Dems would place a lot of blame on those who tried to prevent this from happening. That was largely successful.