The American Spectator

The Spectacle Blog

Joe Biden has introduced an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act that expresses non-binding support for "an Iraqi political settlement based on federalism." They're debating it on the Senate floor now, and may or may not get around to voting on it this evening. (He has 11 cosponsors, including Sam Brownback.)

Biden makes the case for his amendment in this op-ed. I'm quite skeptical of Biden's insistence that the devolution of political power can be safely pulled off while "drawing down U.S. forces, not just to pre-surge levels but well below them." Joseph and O'Hanlon suggest that we "err on the side of too many troops, not too few," and don't envision a major drawdown until at least a year after we begin implementing a soft partition. Still, Biden's amendment doesn't get into those specifics, so I'd probably vote for it if I were a Senator (ha-ha).

topics:
Joe Biden, Iraq, NATO