McCain, Lieberman … and Reyes?

December 6, 2006

Perhaps I was hasty in my praise for incoming House Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes.

Of the finalists for the post considered by Nancy Pelosi, Reyes was the one candidate who was not only saying all the right things about accountability moving forward, he was also the one who consistently made the right call on the war in Iraq over the last few years. Given this, and his background, Reyes seemed like a strong compromise choice over Reps. Jane Harman and Alcee Hastings. He wasn’t perfect — there were those odd Curt Weldon meetings — but on balance, Reyes seemed like a solid choice.

But there’s one piece of the puzzle that we weren’t aware of.

In a surprise twist in the debate over Iraq, Rep. Silvestre Reyes, the soon-to-be chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said he wants to see an increase of 20,000 to 30,000 U.S. troops as part of a stepped up effort to “dismantle the militias.”

The soft-spoken Texas Democrat was an early opponent of the Iraq war and voted against the October 2002 resolution authorizing President Bush to invade that country. That dovish record got prominently cited last week when Speaker designate Nancy Pelosi chose Reyes as the new head of the intelligence panel.

But in an interview with NEWSWEEK on Tuesday, Reyes pointedly distanced himself from many of his Democratic colleagues who have called for fixed timetables for the withdrawal of U.S. troops….. “We’re not going to have stability in Iraq until we eliminate those militias, those private armies,” Reyes said.

Asked how many additional troops he envisioned sending to Iraq, Reyes said, “I would say 20,000 to 30,000 — for the specific purpose of making sure those militias are dismantled, working in concert with the Iraqi military.”

So, at this point, the only people in Washington who are anxious to send thousands of additional troops into Iraq are John McCain, Joe Lieberman, and the incoming Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee?

This isn’t good.

Reyes even appeared to play into a disconcerting straw-man game.

When a reporter suggested that was not a position that was likely to be popular with many House Democrats, Reyes replied: “Well again, I differ in that I don’t want Iraq to become the next Afghanistan.”

Does anyone want Iraq to become the next Afghanistan? Ray McGovern, a former CIA analyst who has been active in an anti-war group called the Steering Group for Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, said Reyes “needs a course in Insurgency 101. Have they learned nothing from Vietnam? If he pushes this and gets some support for it, and with McCain in the Senate, it could become more respectable … I think Reyes has got a lot to learn.”

Kevin Drum makes the case that maybe Harman wasn’t such a bad choice after all.

Which is better: someone who got it right in the beginning but has since lost his way, or someone who originally made a mistake but seems to have learned something since then? I think I’d pick door #2.

Pelosi reportedly knew Reyes’ position on increased troop levels — he says he was “very clear” with her on the subject — but she picked him anyway.

I think the phrase I’m looking for here is “buyer’s remorse.”

Ms. Pelosi needs to exert some party discipline upside of Sylvester’s noggin, and that right quick.

  • This might be a really dumb question, but why wasn’t Murtha picked to chair this committee? Perhaps he hasn’t been on the committee in the past, but he seems more qualified that any of these candidates.

  • Thankfully the House Intel Cmte Chair (or anyone else in Congress) has absolutely no influence on troop levels. If Bush wants to “Go Big”, he will and that will be that.

    The only thing I’ll be looking for from Reyes is whether he holds hearings into how the admin twisted intel to get into Iraq. That will be my litmus test. If he dismantles the failed “Gang of 8” briefings, that will be a bonus.

  • While, getting past the “boy he’s disappointing” issue to what he seems to be suggesting:
    “[adding 20,000 to 30,000] for the specific purpose of making sure those militias are dismantled…”

    Let’s have him try to explain how this is going to work in a country where we’ve actually trained most of these guys, where we have no control over the weapons we distribute, and where it’s a NRA’s fantasy of a gun lovers utopia where every family is guarranteed the right to own an AK-47.

    All they have to do is take off their “uniforms”, go to their homes, and then wait for us to leave. Pretty temporary “solution” if you ask me.

    “I can only hope it is some deep, dark sinister plan to tank McCain’s presidential run.” – bubba

    Kind of demonstrate that 20,000 to 30,000 troops aren’t going to help when you need 500,000 more? That could be.

  • So Nancy Pelosi thinks it’s a good idea to promote a guy who’s pushing ideas that make Bush look smart?

    I mean WTF, dude? First, our military is about to snap even under the current deployment. But even if you scraped up 30,000 more troops, they aren’t going to be able to “[make] sure those militias are dismantled”. You could send 100,000 troops, and that wouldn’t happen. We had half a million troops in Vietnam, and that wasn’t enough. Jeepers Cripes, dude, you’re a fucking IDIOT.

    And Pelosi says you’re the guy to run the House Intelligence Committee?

    At what point can we safely say “Nancy Pelosi officially sucks”?

    Just wondering.

  • Perhaps you all should start getting your anti war primary candidate warmed up for ’08. I hear Lamont is looking for a job.

  • As Ohioan notes, Reyes doesn’t get to decide troop levels. In any case, the idea of adding another 30,000 was never practical; the troops aren’t there, and adding them wouldn’t do much of anything. More to the point, there is zero political support for enlarging our footprint in Iraq.

    McCain is talking about it purely as a bit of tactical rhetoric. No idea why Reyes is.

  • Let them all blather on – three months from now when the resistance smashes the Green Zone (according to Juan Cole this is “in the works”), the only thing these idiots will be worrying about is whether they have enough helicopters to evacuate with. They’re all irrelevant with what they have to say about Iraq, and the American people know that. Sooner rather than later, Reyes, McCain and LIEberman are going to remember that French politican who said “there are my people, and I must catch up to them, for I am their leader.”

    The only sad thing is when this happens a lot of Americans whose crime was believing in their country are going to pay the price for listening to these morons.

  • Who cares? I do not want more troops sent to Iraq, Reyes does. Here is the rub…THERE ARE NO MORE TROOPS TO SEND.

    The legacy of Bush and Cheney and Rummy-cakes will be that they broke the mightiest army in history. We are out of people, out of working equipment and things are only getting worse.

    Unless JRSjr is working on JRSiii, JRSiv, JRSv etc. and can convince everyone else at the Chamber of Commerce to do the same we are fresh out of soldiers.

  • Militias aren’t tinker toy constructions. It isn’t a simple matter of sending in soldiers to “dismantle” them.

    Junior’s Report Card. #8 He almost had his head out of his ass but he’s cramming it back in now. F. I’m so diappointed, I might start crying like Bush 41.

  • “Unless JRSjr is working on JRSiii, JRSiv, JRSv etc. and can convince everyone else at the Chamber of Commerce to do the same we are fresh out of soldiers. ” – MNP

    If one percent of all the JRS’s that voted for BG2 in 2004 got up off their duffs and joined the military we’d have plenty of troops. This is a 300,000,000 person country. Hadn’t you heard?

  • Reyes needs to explain Reyes at this point. As best I can tell he means that he doesn’t want a resurgence of violence if and when the US and Iraqi armies can put down the current insurgency. The Taliban thugs are making a comeback in Afghanistan and Reyes thinks that more troops will prevent that from happening in Iraq. Good luck with that shit, Pancho.

  • “If one percent of all the JRS’s that voted for BG2 in 2004 got up off their duffs and joined the military we’d have plenty of troops. This is a 300,000,000 person country. Hadn’t you heard?”
    Comment by Lance

    Let’s see: 62,000,000 (approx.) votes for Bush in 2004 X .01 = 620,000. Hell, the JRS Jr.s of the country could actually really help their leader save face if they would only enlist. I know that the voting age has been recently upped to over 42 years of age, but I am sure the patriotic thing to do would be to lie about one’s age to get under that cap.

  • And wasn’t it Charlie Rangel who said we need to reinstate the draft, to the horror of every other Dem on the Hill?

    Pelosi squashed that one real fast, thankfully, but it goes to show that some of these guys act like they’ve just woken up from a really long nap and haven’t quite grasped the current situation yet.

    It’s becoming pretty clear that there are no perfect choices out there, but if Reyes just does the job he’s appointed to and keeps his opinions on other things to himself, he may work out ok. We’ll just have to wait and see.

  • As others have noted, if even a tiny fraction of Bush’s loudmouths would just do what they ask others to do, there would be plenty of troops. But they obviously don’t believe their own rhetoric. They all say this war is soooo important, but the vast majority of them have better things to do than “defend America against the Terrorists”.

    These are the same people who fight for tax cuts when they’re pushing for a war paid for with their kid’s money.

    JRS and his ilk aren’t just annoying, they’re pretty pathetic.

  • And the nice thing about that “tiny fraction” of BG2’s supporters is they all already have guns and Hummers. They’re ready. Send them over!

  • Below is a copy of the e-mail I sent to Pelosi.

    “In a surprise twist in the debate over Iraq, Rep. Silvestre Reyes, the
    soon-to-be chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said he wants to
    see an increase of 20,000 to 30,000 U.S. troops as part of a stepped up
    effort to ‘dismantle the militias.'”

    What is this insanity? Don’t you people read polls? Or is it that, like
    the Republicans, you do not care about the will of the people? Almost 70%
    of Americans want our troops out of Iraq either immediately or through a
    phased withdrawal within a year.

    Why on earth do you think people threw the Republicans out on November 7?
    Largely because they are sick and tired of this endless war that kills and
    maims US soldiers and destroys their families. And you want to send MORE
    TROOPS?

    We might as well have kept the Republicans in power. At least we knew the
    kind of devil we were dealing with.

  • where it’s a NRA’s fantasy of a gun lovers utopia where every family is guarranteed the right to own an AK-47. — Lance, @6

    I’m sure NRA approves of the “state of readiness” of every Iraqi family and would like to replicate it here. But, perhaps, *not* with the Avtomat Kalashnikova-47… :^) That particular rifle brings no profit at all to the US gun industry.

    There was a totally fascinating article about AK-47 in, I think, Wash Po’s Sunday Outlook of Nov 26. And the American equivalents — M-something-or-other, several of them.

  • I’m sure that the NRA is just using Iraq as a proving ground for their theory of mass distribution of semi-automatic weapons. Mr. Kalashnikova’s creation is merely the most easily available in Iraq.

  • Fortunately, Reyes is being appointed to the House Intelligence Committee, not the House Armed Services Committee. So I don’t see how this really matters. It may be a stupid thing to say but at least he didn’t just try to cover for Bush claiming no one knew he was so horribly wrong about Saddam, or suggesting that there’s nothing wrong with Bush’s illegal spying programs. Does Reyes have a record of defending Bush in those areas? You know, the ones related to his position?

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