California Conservative

Sen. Russ Feingold received a stinging rebuke today when a bill that would’ve defunded the troops lost today:

The Senate on Wednesday rejected legislation that would cut off money for combat operations in Iraq after March 31, 2008.

The vote was a loss for Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., and other Democrats who want to end the war. But the effort picked up support from members, including presidential hopefuls previously reluctant to limit war funding, an indication of the conflict’s unpopularity among voters.

The proposal lost 29-67 on a procedural vote, falling 31 votes short of the necessary votes to advance.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a Democratic presidential front-runner, previously opposed setting a deadline on the war. But she said she agreed to back the measure “because we, as a united party, must work together with clarity of purpose and mission to begin bringing our troops home and end this war.”

Sen. Barack Obama, another leading 2008 prospect, said he would prefer a plan that offers more flexibility but wanted “to send a strong statement to the Iraqi government, the president and my Republican colleagues that it’s long past time to change course.”

This is stunning news. It isn’t surprising that this legislation got soundly defeated. It’s stunning that such unpopular legislation even came to a vote. They knew that they’d get thumped. This is also proof that Obama has pushed Hillary farther left than she’d wanted to go. She’s now been forced to abandon her general election strategy just to get the nomination.

I signed up for Obama’s email updates to keep up with what he’s peddling. Here’s something from his last e-letter:

This isn’t a game. We need just 16 additional votes to override the president’s veto and bring to a close this sad chapter in American history. It’s going to take some convincing, but Senators need to hear from people in their states that they can join us to bring a responsible end to the war.

Based on today’s vote, I’d say that they fell short of the override by more than just 16 votes. This is a serious slap in his and Hillary’s faces.

Technorati Tags: Russ Feingold, Hillary, Obama, Anti-War Left, Election 2008, Military

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 8:50 am and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Election 2008, Hillary, Iraq, Liberals, Military. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.