Senate Agrees To Debate Bill On Iraq Pullout

The unusual GOP tactic left Democrats in the odd position of criticizing Republicans for supporting a procedural motion to debate a bill that was offered by Democrats. "They're scared to death of [the] housing bill. They are going to stall and stretch this out as long as possible," Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) said, referring to the Iraq pullout debate.

Democrats had not been expecting the troop-withdrawal debate to resume until late April or May, when Congress is expected to take up another supplemental spending request for the Iraq war from Bush. But Feingold was given the chance to offer his legislation this week as a stand-alone measure, largely because Reid had defused an earlier debate over Pentagon policy by assuring Feingold that he could offer the withdrawal language at a later time.

Instead of the expected quick rejection of Feingold's bill yesterday, the chamber's decision to debate it forced Democrats to scramble to pull together their war-related proposals. Under consideration are a pair of amendments from Sen. James Webb (D-Va.). One would require troops to return to a one-to-one ratio in the time spent on duty in Iraq and the time spent back home; the other, modeled on the post-World War II "G.I. Bill," would provide greater financial assistance for higher education to troops returning from overseas duty.

Senior Democrats said they remain stymied in their long-term effort to pull Republicans away from Bush on Iraq policy, with just four GOP senators so far supporting a less stringent withdrawal bill offered by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich).

"There's been no shift toward us," Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said yesterday.

Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), the Democrats' 2004 presidential nominee, said the debates this week and this spring are not likely to change policy but would probably sharpen the division between the two parties on Iraq in advance of the November election.

"The best hope is that you're going to strengthen the [Democratic] majority in Congress and win the presidency," Kerry said.