Democrats and Iraq

And as long as I'm discussing Democrats and security, I made the following comment over at TPMCafe regarding James Lindsay's suggestion that Democrats support "staying the course" in Iraq:

If you're going to talk about "staying the course", then you should define what exactly that entails. I don't even think the Bush administration is sure, and most days it seems they are wandering through the fog while blaming the Democrats for not following them. It's a blind leading the blind mentality.

I'm not saying I disagree with you, but before we talk about more or less troops or even staying the course, we need clearer priorities, a better set of measurements for success or failure and greater public access to information about what's going on. Those are fairly concrete things the Democrats can push for today, even from the minority party position.

Fortunately, Rep. Pelosi put forward a very similar suggestion and will try to attach an amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill that calls for the administration to define its measurements for success and report on their status. I'm obviously very supportive of this. It's an honest request from Congress and it's a positive policy movement from Democrats. This of course means the Republicans will try to block it from reaching a vote.

Today's Washington Post notes that President Bush will need to begin talking about Iraq again due to his falling poll numbers. I was especially pleased by this paragraph:

Even some Democrats say Bush could turn things around if he spoke frankly about what has been done and the obstacles to finishing the job.

Sure, it's hard not the feel the occasional schadenfreude, but Democrats should want to American people to push Republicans towards a successful solution to Iraq, not simply give up on it. Falling poll numbers are only a short term political gain. Keeping the American people supportive of US efforts around the world and engaged in the policy is a long term necessity. Once that public support for US foreign policy is lost, it can take a long time to regain, even with a change of administrations and policy. Some day the Democrats will be back in power and will need that same support of American people in order to move forward with a smart foreign and national security policy.

In a sense, I think the Democrats argument for US policy in Iraq is "mend it, don't end it". They should not see these poll numbers as an electoral gain, but rather a chance to push the Bush administration to make some serious needed reforms to our policies on the ground.

UPDATE: Now corrected thanks to the spelling police.