Resolutions of Disapproval

RESOLUTIONS OF DISAPPROVAL -- (Senate - February 05, 2007)

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, let me say, for those who have not followed this debate closely, I think we have made amazing progress until today--until today--because what happened before today was that we were moving on a bipartisan track, a track of cooperation, so that the Senate would exercise its responsibility and deliberate a topic that is being debated today in Springfield, IL, and Little Rock, AR. That is the war.

In an effort to reach this point, we have made accommodations. Senators BIDEN, LEVIN, and HAGEL worked long and hard on a resolution of disapproval of the President's policy. They reported it from the Foreign Relations Committee. Yet, we set that aside and said, in the interest of comity, in the interest of fairness, we will gather behind Senator JOHN WARNER, the former chairman of the Armed Services Committee, in a bipartisan fashion, and we will work together so we bring one resolution of disapproval to the floor.

Senator Warner was kind enough to make some modifications in that resolution, and we were prepared to proceed. We felt that was fair. Throughout this process, we have not been asserting the rights of the majority. We have tried to work in a bipartisan fashion.

So now comes the moment of truth. Will the Senate, after all the sound and fury, finally have a debate? Now we are told by the Republican side, no. We are told by the Republican side that because they have several other amendments they want to have brought up, they will stop any debate on the Warner resolution unless they have their way on the procedure.

I am troubled by this. If the Republicans in the Senate cannot swallow the thin soup of the Warner resolution, how will they ever stomach a real debate on the war in Iraq?

What we face now is a sense-of-the-Senate resolution.

It is important. It expresses the feeling of the Senate. But it is not going to change the situation on the ground. The President will not be held back from sending the troops that he wants to escalate the war, nor will there be any money moved from one place to another, nor any limits on the troops, nor any of the changes that have been discussed.

What we started to do here was to have a sense-of-the-Senate resolution, a bipartisan resolution, introduced by Senator Warner on the Republican side, as the basis for this debate. How much more good faith could we show on the majority side? And yet now we find that the Republicans have objected. We are witness to the spectacle of a White House and Republican Senators unwilling to even engage in a debate on a war that claims at least one American life every day and $2.5 billion a week.

As we debate the procedures, as we go back and forth, day by day, we lose more soldiers and spend more money. I am sorry there is no sense of urgency on both sides of the aisle to move this matter to debate quickly. If the Republicans want to stand by their President and his policy, they should not run from this debate. If they believe we should send thousands of our young soldiers into the maws of this wretched civil war, they should at least have the courage to stand and defend their position.

One of their own on the Republican side, speaking before the Foreign Relations Committee, said he felt it was a matter of responsibility. He said: We are Senators, not shoe salesmen. I do not want to reflect poorly on entrepreneurs in America by referring to shoe salesmen in a derogatory way, but I would join in his remarks. If we cannot come together today and begin the debate on the single issue that is paramount in the minds of people across America, why are we here? What are we waiting for?

We have certainly tantalized them with the prospects of a debate. And now to have the Republicans pull the rug out from under us at the last minute and say, no debate this week, well, they understand, as we do, the continuing resolution is imminent. We have no time to wait. We have to move to it. And if they can slow us down and stall us for a few more days, then the White House gets its way: no deliberation, no debate, no vote.

The final thing I will say is this: Some on the other side have argued this is a vote of no confidence in the President and the troops. They could not be further from the truth. I cannot believe that Senator Warner, a man who has served his country so well in so many capacities, would be party to a resolution which would express no confidence in the troops of this Nation. I would not be. He would not either.

This resolution expresses our confidence and our faithfulness in those men and women in uniform. Nor is it a vote of no confidence in this President. Of course it is his policy. But what we should debate--and we will debate--is the policy itself, not the personalities involved. But for the Republicans, now in their minority status, to put a stop to this debate is to try to put a stop to a debate that is going on across America.

I will tell them this. They may succeed today, but they will not succeed beyond today. There will be a debate on this war. It may not be this week; it may not be this bill; it may not be this resolution. There will be a debate because the American people made it clear in the last election it is time for a new direction.

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