How antiwar do the Democrats need to be?

Another article from last year, this one look at the Democrats agreement early in the year 2007 to compromise on the non-binding resolution against the McCain escalation (The Surge) that Bush had adopted for Iraq. Although by embracing Sen. John Warner's much milder version, they barely make a statement against the escalation. (See Spencer Ackerman at TPM Muckraker, Is Compromise Really An Anti-Surge Resolution? 02/01/07.)

That event showed a tension that we will see and experience for as long as the Iraq War continues. Politicians will normally try to stake out a position that wins support from as wide a group as possible and alienate as few as possible.

In that case, I could see the value in having the first anti-Iraq War measure passed in the new Congress be a bipartisan agreement. And the Senate Democrats laboring under the problem that they have a one-vote majority that depends of Joe Lieberman voting with the Democrats. As Ezra Klein wrote in Anti-War, or anti-this-war? TAPPED 02/02/07:

The lesson I've taken ... is that toppling Middle Eastern governments, occupying their societies, and trying to impose pluralistic democracy is an almost impossible endeavor, one with far more potential for catastrophe than completion. And it's easy to assume, listening to politicians who have turned against the war, that they've gleaned the same. That isn't necessarily true. Just because they oppose the Iraq War in retrospect, doesn't mean they oppose the theory on which it was based. They may have turned against the lies, or the mismanagement, or the unpopularity. But they may not have substantially raised the bar for the use of force. Given Edwards' recent comments on Iran, he seems comfortable hinting at another war with a more powerful Middle Eastern country over the issue of WMDs. Hillary certainly is. Being anti-war, it seems, is rather different than being anti-this-war.

Tags: iran war, iraq war, john edwards